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I was so busy looking at my girl’s adorable face as I pushed the door open that I missed it until I stepped into the doorway.

Then my heart plummeted.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Zoe

“Girl, you okay?” a female voice called, making me jerk so hard Lainey giggled, thinking I was playing with her. “You look about to faint. It’s hot as the devil’s buttcrack out here today,” the woman continued on. “Your air not working again? I told the manager it’s been all wonky the past two weeks. People are gonna pass flat out in this heat.”

Turning, I saw a petite woman in a jean skirt and a green tank top that revealed yellow bathing suit straps. She had her bright red hair piled on top of her head in a messy bun and giant black sunglasses on her round face.

There was a male toddler on her hip and a set of what seemed like four or five-year-old female twins at her sides, all of them dressed for the pool and their skin sporting a white cast from sunblock.

“I, uh,” I said, shaking my head. “No, the air is working,” I told her, feeling the cool wafting out toward me, hoping it might dry the anxiety sweat beading up all over my body.

“You sure you’re okay? You don’t look so good. I got some of them sports drinks in my bag. You need one?”

“Thank you. No. No, it’s not the heat. I… did you happen to see anyone in my room last night? Or this morning?” I asked.

“Oh, no. Did you get robbed?” she asked, walking over, her flip-flops slapping against the cement. “Oh, look at thatmess!”

It was a mess.

Every drawer had been pulled out. The clothes in the closet were strewn about. The bed stripped. Even the fridge was opened. Thankfully, there was nothing in there, save for two pears I was trying to keep from going ripe too quickly.

Even from where I was standing in the doorway, I could see a similar mess in the bathroom. Lainey’s little bath seat was in the middle of the floor next to her shampoo that had leaked halfway across the room.

“Girl, did they get anything?” the woman asked, stalking into my room, her two kids in tow.

“I don’t have anything to get,” I admitted.

“Been there,” she said with a snort. “Oh, shoot. Look at all the shampoo. You want some help cleaning all this up? You wanna help the nice lady clean up this mess, don’t you?” she asked her two girls. They very clearly would rather go to the pool but they were little dolls who gave their mom a nod.

“That’s so nice,” I said, giving the girls a smile I only had to half-force. “But I won’t keep you from the pool.”

“Snap, snap,” the mom said in a sweet but no-nonsense voice. “Put those clothes and toys right there in piles for Miss…”

“Zoe,” I supplied.

“For Miss Zoe. The faster we shake our tail feathers, the quicker we get to the pool,” she said.

The girls jumped into motion as their mom gave me a nod toward the balcony.

“You were out last night?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“Baby daddy?” she asked, reaching out to boop Lainey’s nose. “No, we keep our hands to ourselves,” she told her son, who tried to reach out and snatch Lainey’s nose off her face.

“No. No, I was with some friends,” I said.

To that, she nodded.

“These locks on these doors, they ain’t worth s-h-i-t,” she told me, shaking her head. “Wouldn’t put it past one of these men out here to notice you were gone and just do a quick little hairpin unlock. Motel living, it ain’t for the weak,” she said. “I’m Brook, by the way.

“Sorry we had to meet like this.”

“Me too, girl. Me too. I didn’t see no one. But next time you think you’re gonna be out all night, you let me know and I’ll keep an eye. I’m up most of the night. I just got this one off the tit, so he’s punishing me by not sleeping through the night anymore,” she said, jiggling her son.

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