Page 75 of Mountain Mens' Curvy Obsession

It’s been a quiet couple of days, and I’ve had some time to do another walk through my fractured memory lane. More pieces are coming back, but I’m starting to think I need to work a little harder—at least until the headaches hit.

“They’re still working on it, but there is hope,” Chance says, leaving his jacket in the foyer.

Booker walks over to the bookcase and opens one of the bottom cabinets, taking out a large photo album with a dark blue hardcover. “Hayes NY” is written in white block letters on the sturdy spine.

“Any word on Leo?” That’s usually my follow-up question when one of the brothers comes back from town.

“No, not even a sighting. Where’s Nico?” Chance asks, looking around the living room.

“Upstairs, getting ready.”

They take turns patrolling the property and the surrounding area, mountain paths included. Every day, like clockwork, there’s a Hayes man riding the ridges and moving like a shadow through the deep woods, a weapon ready to inflict maximum harm to anyone who even thinks about coming near me.

They also have motion sensors and cameras mounted everywhere on an internal surveillance circuit that isn’t dependent on a wireless internet connection. Old-school will save the day in case get hit with another blizzard.

“What’s that?” I ask as Booker turns the album over and places it in my lap.

“You need to remember more, and you mentioned visual aids,” he says. “The more you remember about how you got here in the first place, the easier it’ll be for us to protect you and to take the Sokolovs down, once and for all.”

“Wherever you hid over the past couple of years, you got out of there for a reason. We need to know what that reason was,” Chance replies.

“I thought it was the USB drive,” I mumble, my mind drawing a blank.

At least the morning sickness has subsided, thanks to those supplements Dr. Rollins gave me. In about a week, I’m due for another round of blood tests—I wish I could focus exclusively on this pregnancy, but life obviously has different plans for me. I can’t even enjoy the love I’ve found in the middle of a snowstorm.

“You could’ve just mailed it, or used a courier service without anyone tracking it,” Booker says. “It has something to do with what you saw or heard when you were in hiding. And as much as we were all about letting you remember everything naturally and slowly, Leo being so close sort of ups the stakes.”

I nod slowly. “I get it.”

He flips the photo album open.

“Oh,” I gasp, recognizing myself and my brother in one of the photographs, each image gingerly taped to the thick page with ballpoint pen notes scattered in every white space. “Look at us; we were kids!”

The photograph strikes a chord deep within my soul.

My brother Aleks and I stand at the bottom of the steps outside our apartment building. The brownstone façade creates a beautiful composition in the background, with its tall windows and flowers blooming at every sill. Aleks is about fifteen, maybe. I am still in pigtails and smiling a crooked smile at the camera.

At the top of the stairs, the Hayes brothers guard us with broad grins and a few bruises on their skinny, tanned faces.

“We were in our hoodlum era,” Chance chuckles dryly. “Look at Booker and me…”

“You were so thin,” I laugh.

Nico, on the other hand, was taller and broader even as a teenager.

“He looks so big,” I mumble, the photograph dissolving into a real memory playing before my eyes. “Oh, our mother took this photo…”

She wore a floral dress, and she had shadows under her eyes. She hadn’t slept much that night. Arguing with my father, I think. But the Hayes brothers wanted a photo with us, so my mother obliged.

“‘Stand up straight,’ she’d tell me,” I add, delving deeper into the memory, a mixture of emotions swirling through me. “‘Suck that belly in.’”

“Yeah, she had this fixation about you not being skinny enough,” Chance mutters. “The whole Balkan mom shtick was pretty tiresome.”

“To all of us,” Booker adds. “We kept telling her to cut you some slack, that you were prettier than most girls.”

I give the twins a surprised look. “You did?”

“Every time we were left alone with her,” Booker replies with a nod.

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