Page 79 of Forever Golden
“Brace yourself,” Linden teases, to which Scar responds with a light nudge of her knee.
She stares at the screen and reads. “It says:‘The vid Kyle posted of the band’s last gig got a ton of hits and brought new faces to The Loft! Rue’s itching to get you guys in to do another set. Got any free weekends coming up?’And… scene,” Scar adds with a smile when she finishes and passes Linden’s phone back.
West’s attempt at embarrassing the guy turned out to be one more thing for Scar to fawn over.
Shit.
“Tell him we’re open in a few weeks,” Keaton pipes up.
Linden finally manages to tear his eyes away from Scar long enough to reply to the text. Then, when he’s done, he has her right back in his sights.
“Scarlett, truth or dare?” he asks.
It doesn’t surprise me even a little that he chose her.
“Truth,” she answers.
Good girl.
That sly,you-know-you-want-megrin of his is back. “Fine. What’s your favorite part of the male body?” he asks.
Scar flushes red and I’m biting my tongue, hearing her voice in my head, screaming‘I’m not a kid, Blue!’.Only, she is to me, and I probably won’t feel any differently about that when she’s thirty.
The triplets are staring Linden down almost as harshly as I am. Like I said, they slipped into big-brother mode pretty deep.
“Well,” Scar starts, “I’d have to say… a guy’s hands.”
Linden tilts his head and mouths something and I can’t hear him, but I swear I just read his lips saying, “For now.”
My lips part, ready to rip him a new asshole when Boone steps into the room.
“West, got a moment? Figured we should talk before I get too much bourbon in my system. I have some things I need to show you,” Boone announces.
West passes a glance toward me before meeting his grandfather’s gaze. “Sure, we’re just hanging out.”
He stands and I wasn’t expecting to be invited, but he has my hand, gently tugging me to my feet.
Before making an exit, I put Joss in charge of watching over Scar, then we leave the group behind and head into a dimly lit room at the end of the hallway. There’s a box with folders stacked inside, which means at least some of Vin’s truths are about to be revealed.
I don’t know whether I should be relieved or afraid, but either way, there’s no turning back now.
Chapter 28
BLUE
“I presented all this info to your ma twenty years ago and a whole lot of good it did,” Boone sighs, resting his fists against his waist while staring at the folders laid out on his desk. “Not sure it’ll help you kids all that much, seeing as how it wasn’t enough to stop Pam from marrying that sorry S.O.B, but at least you’ll know everythingIknow.”
West says nothing, but slowly approaches the desk. He picks up the folder his grandfather placed there and stares at it.
“I can walk you through it if you want,” Boone offers, prompting West to nod.
Once he hands it over, Boone begins to thumb through the documents.
“Well, your daddy wasn’t exactly Rockefeller when he started sniffing around your ma, but he wasn’t destitute either. He flashed enough cash around when they’d come down to visit that I had my investigator start there, following the money. I wanted to know how he made it and what he did with it,” Boone explains.
“My guy found an old buddy of Vin’s up there in the city, one willing to share what he knew. Cost me a pretty penny, of course, but it was worth it. I mean, it didn’t stop your mom from selling her soul to the devil, but we can’t win ‘em all,” he adds with a laugh.
“Anyway, the friend told the investigator he grew up on the same street as Vin up there in Cypress Pointe, and that as long as he’d known him, Vin had been well-to-do. The guy never saw Vin’s mother work a day in her life, though. So, it seemed tohimthat they lived off some sort of inheritance.”