Page 45 of The Lies We Told Ourselves

Booker nodded. “As far as I know, it’s still sitting in trust for him. He’d already left by the time he passed, and he never came back to claim it.”

“It’s strange that your father didn’t have his PI approach him about it. Isn’t he legally required to do that or something?” I asked.

Booker shrugged. “He wasn’t the executor of the will. My grandfather’s lawyer took care of that. I guess, legally, that gives him an out. It won’t win him any favors when Gage comes home and finds out, though.”

I hummed in agreement. Part of me didn’t want to get involved with the drama surrounding Booker’s family, but I could see how much he needed someone to talk to about it.

“Do you think your parents regret what they did?” I asked as I pulled up the usual social media accounts and logged in.

Booker watched in interest before finally grabbing a chair and pulling it up to see what I was doing.

“I doubt it. My mother would never admit that she was wrong. My father? Maybe. He seems to be going for the ‘I had no idea this was happening’ route. I’m not sure if that makes it worse or not.”

My hand moved to Booker’s knee, and he just smiled at me sadly.

It made my earlier idea seem even better than it had before. The only parts of Booker’s family that he wanted had fractured under the weight of their past and ran as far and as fast as they could. But now, they were starting to slowly return, and even if it took me years, I’d find a way to bring them all back together. I’d make sure that Booker got all his brothers back. They could build the family they always wanted between them. They didn’t need their parents in their lives to have something beautiful.

I checked down the list of places where Gage had spent a longer length of time and picked one at random before googling it. As I pulled some general images from the internet, I set about changing my social media accounts to show me in the same location.

“This feels an awful lot like trying to catfish your brother,” I murmured, and Booker looked at me strangely. “And you don’t know what that is.” I realized.

Booker shrugged, picked up the file, and flicked through to the end. “He was last in Oregon, but that was nearly a year ago. It seems like he dropped off the grid for a while.”

I posted a couple of the pictures, sending friend requests to some people Gage was linked to in the area. Mostly guys, because I knew they’d accept without even thinking about it. The aim was to make it seem like I was where Gage had been, so he’d accept a friend request, and then maybe I’d be able to spark up a conversation with him. It didn’t hurt that it made me seem like I was a lot further away from my ex than I really was.

By the time I was done, Booker looked completely defeated. “I wouldn’t come back if I was him,” he finally said. “Look at this life he’s had. He travels through all these places, doing these incredible jobs.”

“It must be lonely, though.” Booker looked confused, so I explained. “He never stays anywhere, so he never makes any connections with anyone strong enough to make himwantto stay.”

It wasn’t the right thing to say.

Booker looked completely defeated.

“I failed him. I’m his big brother. He should have known he could come to me.”

“Booker, you were all kids. None of you are to blame for your parents’ actions.”

He shook his head, either not ready to hear it or just not believing that it was true.

“What can I do?” I asked, desperately wanting to make this better for him.

Booker wrapped an arm around my shoulders and drew me into his side. “Tell me about this.” He nodded at the computer, and after a brief explanation of what I was doing, he looked at me in surprise. “How did you get so good at this stuff?”

“Well, it used to be my job. Not catfishing people. I think that might be illegal. But social media promotion for businesses and organic content campaigns.” I could see I was already losing him. “I ran social media accounts for businesses so they could reach their customers in ways that didn’t involve paid advertising.”

Booker squinted in suspicion. “And why are you working in my barn?”

“Because you offered me a job doing that?”

“I mean, why aren’t you doing that job for me? There are a lot of businesses in town that could benefit from that too. Delaneywould probably bite your hand off if she knew you could do that for her company.”

The more Booker spoke, the more excited he seemed to get.

I’d never hated my job. If anything, it was actually pretty fun. And I missed it at times. But I loved working in that barn. I loved spending time with the little mare I hadn’t thought of a name for yet.

“What’s wrong?” Booker asked when he saw the look on my face.

“I like it here,” I whispered. “I enjoy doing this.”

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