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I laughed with my hands up, but the sound was forced. I hoped he wouldn’t notice. “Don’t worry, B. I’m not here to screw anything up for you. I know you don’t want me around. I’m just killing time before I head into the city for an appointment. I didn’t know you were going to be here.”
His eyes narrowed, likely not believing my story because, frankly, it was weak at best. There was zero reason for me to be at a playground in Providence, apart from the fact I’d heard Colt talking with his mom on their front lawn the day before and heard him say they were having a picnic here this afternoon.
I winked at Banjo and pulled my helmet on. “Say hi to Lacey and the boys for me.” I backed out of the parking spot, revving the engine, and peeled away. I didn’t want to turn back, but I did.
The cocky smile slid straight off my face when my only brother walked back to his family, shaking his head.
The hurt of losing him was constant but one I was normally able to push deep inside. The reminder nothing had changed between us was a painful one. I was never going to be able to set things right with him. I knew that. But when Fawn had been around, that sibling void in my life had felt a little less lonely. She’d had no family either. So we’d kind of adopted each other.
Until I’d realized her feelings for me were more than brotherly. It had been a shock to find that out, but because we were such good friends, I’d tried to imagine what more would feel like. I’d spent sleepless nights, trying to force myself to feel more for her.
It would be so easy, if soft and gentle was what I needed.
But it wasn’t. I would eat her alive, and not in a good way. I’d destroy her innocence. Drag her down into the mud and then drown her in it.
I’d never been a man who could be with someone kind and sweet. I didn’t understand love like that. I craved darkness. Attitude. Sass. Someone who could give me shit because God knows I deserved it. I needed someone who could take my bullshit, call me on it, and give me hell in return.
That woman wasn’t Fawn. She was just too young to see it.
But I had, and instead of handling it like a mature adult in his thirties, I’d ignored her calls. I’d avoided having a real conversation because I hadn’t wanted to hurt her.
And now she was gone.
I couldn’t just let it lie. I’d done that with Banjo, and look where that had gotten me. With nothing and no one. Fawn was sweet and kind, and she was the first person besides Banjo who I’d ever truly loved, even if the love I felt for her wasn’t romantic.
She couldn’t just be gone. She had no one else to find her, no family hounding the police or starting search parties. That responsibility was mine. I owed her that much.
I drove into the city with a lump in my throat and a burning desire to remove it with alcohol. But the tattered photo of Fawn in my wallet stopped me from finding the nearest bar and drowning my loneliness in bourbon. At least for now.
I parked outside a seedy law firm on the edge of the city. I’d been here before. More than once, but something kept drawing me back. A feeling if I just searched harder, longer, I might find her. That if I studied the faces of each and every prostitute, maybe she’d be one of them, forced into work by her abusive ex. Or if I went into every strip club, I might find her there, swinging around the pole the way she had in Saint View. If I went through every homeless shelter, she might be there, too scared to come back to us because Eddie knew she’d run to us if she was ever set free.
I walked up and down the busy street, darting looks at every woman of the right age and build who passed. “Excuse me.” I stopped a man passing by and thrust the photo in front of his nose. “Have you seen this woman?”
He squinted at the picture, then shook his head. “No. Sorry.”
I stepped to the side and let him pass, only to try again with another man. “Have you seen her? Her name is Fawn. She’s early twenties. Long blond hair—”
“Nope.”
He hadn’t even looked. Just brushed past me and kept going down the stairs to the subway.
“Thanks for fucking nothing,” I muttered in his direction but then decided the subway probably wasn’t the worst place to ask around either. I found a platform and showed the photo to every person waiting impatiently for their train.
One after the other, they all shook their heads.
No one had seen her. It was the same story every time I’d gone searching.
She’d disappeared without a trace. No clues to where she was. No leads to follow.
The police had given up, and it was time I did too.
The train pulled into the station with a whoosh of air and screeching brakes. I let the crowd move me along aimlessly, because where the hell did I have to go?
A woman staring out from the train, her chin in her hand, stopped me dead in my tracks.
I blinked twice, sure I was seeing things through the scratched-up windows, but I picked up the pace anyway, jogging alongside the train as it rolled to a stop.
Her hair was too dark, but her features…her eyes…
