Page 40 of Brenna, Brat

“She probably doesn’t mean that people are entitled to work through their feelings with arson. Yeah, maybe it was all about your coworker. I haven’t gotten any death threats,” he told me. “Not yet.”

“Why would anyone blame you when it’s so clearly not your fault? None of it is!” I insisted. “They should be blaming your father, but they also need to wait and see if the courts can claw back their money like they have with other white-collar frauds. Lately I’ve been reading about famous swindlers and how the government went after their assets.”

“Frauds and swindlers.” He closed his eyes. “That’s hard to hear.”

“I didn’t mean…” Maybe I needed to stop talking? “I’m only trying to say that I think you’re safe and I hope that your father is, too. And again, I didn’t mean to bring up your sister’s problems, because they’re none of my business.” I didn’t care about them, except that they seemed to upset Campbell a lot. I also realized that I didn’t want that woman to suffer, even if she wasn’t anything to me and even if Sophie hated her.

“Yeah, I understand.” Now he looked at me. “Long day. You know what we should do?”

“Run away to France?”

“Watch some hockey,” he corrected. “That will put us both in a better mood.”

“Will it?” I asked doubtfully, and he nodded with a lot of confidence.

“It always works for me.”

I wasn’t as convinced but I did follow him into the next room, where he had a giant television. Usually, I was opposed to gaping, electronic black holes on the walls, but I didn’t mind it here. I didn’t mind anything here. The rug was a lovely antique Heriz and he, or someone he’d hired, had chosen the couch thoughtfully. The upholstery job was more than adequate and the fabric choice—

“Here you go,” he said, and patted the heavy-weight linen. I placed myself upon it. “How much do you know about the game?”

“I know nothing,” I said, as an arena popped up on the screen. It was almost as large as an arena in real life.

“Then we’ll start with the basics,” Campbell told me. “First, hockey is a competition between two teams that’s played on ice. That means they all wear skates, which I know you’re familiar with. We should go to the rink again.”

“Sure.” He’d said the same thing about cooking together, about meeting for drinks—

“I’m not doing anything tomorrow. You?”

“Uh, since my place of employment burned down, I’m free.”

“Good. We’ll go skating,” he said. “You’ll need to wear some cheap shoes and we’ll get a locker for them.”

He kept telling me about hockey, getting more technical as the game went on, and I listened and tried to be interested as the players flew around the ice and knocked each other down.Gradually, we both got quieter, and then I saw that he had fallen asleep. Well, it had been a very, very stressful day. It had been a very, very stressful set of days for him, and there were more coming in his future. I wondered if he’d be able to keep this humungous TV or any of the other accessories of his privileged life. How would he do without them? He’d never had to go without, I thought, but it wasn’t like you had to struggle to prove yourself as a good person. He was a great person, someone who had noticed that earlier tonight, I had been losing it and had needed to be somewhere calm and beautifully appointed. I was really—

“No, a burrito,” Campbell announced.

“What?”

But he was asleep, and talking like when he’d slept over at my apartment. He muttered several other things that I couldn’t totally understand and then I clearly heard him say, “No olives. Hold the olives.” He seemed to be upset.

“Campbell,” I murmured. “It’s ok about the olives.”

“No,” he answered—maybe he was answering, or maybe he was still talking about a burrito in his dream. He moved restlessly on the couch. “No!”

I touched his shoulder, resting my hand there to calm him. “It’s ok,” I repeated, but he made a noise like something hurt. “Shh,” I murmured, and gently stroked his cheek.

“Brenna,” he said distinctly, and before I knew what was happening, he’d slid down, breathing out a heavy sigh as he rested his head on my lap. He pulled up his legs and stretchedacross the couch and then he sighed again, but calmly and more like…more like he was content.

“Shh,” I told him again, and rested my arm on his body. Holy Mary, he was strong beneath his shirt. Of course I knew that, because he had lifted theEgosculpture without any issues and had also lifted me off the ice at the rink several times. But the tactile experience of his muscle beneath my hand was a different story. It was a thrilling story that seemed to make me breathe faster.

No, I was comforting him, not feeling him up. I patted his shoulder and arm, and then I let myself brush his hair out of his face. Like mine, it had a little wave to it and like he had done, I wrapped one lock around my index finger.

“It’s good.”

I froze and quickly let go. He had definitely slurred words of enjoyment, but it appeared that he was still asleep—smiling, but asleep. Well, I was glad that he was having more pleasant dreams now. I resumed gently touching him, which was simply in the way that I would have cared for a pet or a child. Although, when I considered it, I had never really taken care of Grace. She had been Nicola’s problem to handle.

And now that I was thinking of my sisters, and since I didn’t care about the hockey game, I carefully shifted around until I could reach my other hand into the waistband of Carrington’s leggings to retrieve my phone. Holy Mary, the messages had really piled up. Thankfully, no one had told my mom, and it seemed as if Nic had downplayed the firebombing—i.e., she hadn’t said thatit was a “bombing,” just that the gallery was gone and I was out of work. Even with that sketchy information, the rest of my siblings had gotten worried, even Patrick and Grace.

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