Page 1 of Cruel Debts
TRINITY
“For the last time,Trinity, your brother isgone.Stop holding onto this delusion that he’s coming back and move on with your life.”
There it was, like black ink on a fresh white canvas: they had given up hope. They would rather assume he was dead than listen to me, his fucking twin. Iknewhim. I knew Keehn would never just leave without a word.
It wasn’t like him.
Keehn told meeverything.We were attached at the hip.
So the last few years with him missing were hell on me.
I never gave up hope, though. He was out there somewhere; I just knew it. I could feel it—a bone-deep sensation, aknowingthat I just couldn’t explain. I was determined to find my brother if it fucking killed me.
I put my ear to the phone again and sighed for maximum effect. “Daddy, listen. I’m a grown woman, so if I don’t want to come home, I don’t have to.” I glanced around the crowded intersection, waiting for the light to turn red and the crosswalk to fill with people. My foot was among the first to hit the pavement as the stampede blocked traffic, a mess of languages, chatter, and noise filling the space around me. “I don’t want to argue, so I’m getting off here.”
“You’ve had two weeks, Trinity McCoy. Come home now, or I’ll drag you back here if I have to come to that godforsaken city myself.”
It was a bluff, and we both knew it. Daddy wouldn’t leave the comfort of his pretty mini-mansion for the likes of Port Wylde. Besides, he thought I was in Khula City. He would haveneverletme come to a city like this alone. And the idea of dragging my father here to find Keehn was laughable.
He’d have had me packed up and on the next flight home before I could fucking sneeze.
“Two weeks isn’t enough time,” I explained, no intention whatsoever of going home empty-handed. If I didn’t find Keehn, I wasn’t going back at all. But Daddy didn’t need to know that. “Love you, Daddy.” I hung up before he could, and the phone beeped against my ear as I pulled it away and stuck it back in my pocket.
“Well, that was fun,” I said aloud to nobody in particular, my words swallowed up by the honking of horns, shouts of pedestrians, and street vendors hawking their wares.
“Oh, sorry, excuse me,” a young man said as he bumped into me, practically knocking me over. He offered his hand with a smile, one that I immediately distrusted. “You’re not hurt, are you?”
I eyed his hand with thinly veiled disgust. “I’m fine.” My lips pulled into a taut line as I swallowed the urge to yell at him. “No worries.”
It was then I spotted the dog tags around his neck, and a wave of nostalgia threatened to drown me in the middle of the street. Before I could gather myself, he was walking past me, already out of sight, like it had never happened.
My footsteps were sluggish as I moved toward the bus stop, hoping against hope the last lead I had on my brother turned out to be productive. The last two leads I’d been given were dead ends, nothing but bullshit blown up my ass to make a quick buck. But then again, that’s what I got for putting an ad in the online fucking bulletin board.
I should have known better than to promise money unless a lead panned out.
Well, you live and learn, I suppose. Some lessons were more expensive than others.
While in Port Wylde, I’d been living off the money in my bank account. But if I didn’t transfer some of that out, I’d have to find a job now that my two weeks were up, just in case Daddy dearest cut off the purse strings to encourage me to come home.
I didn’t have many skills that transferred to a regular workforce. I could fly a plane, as long as it didn’t carry more than ten people. I was good with paints and even sold a few paintings here and there. Hell, I could even pole dance, thanks to that weird upstart pole dancing exercise class that Mom and I went to last year. But none of those were viable long-term jobs.
Well, okay, so stripping would definitely make money. Enough to keep me going, keep me comfortable. But it wasn’t on my list of things I wanted to do.
The bus hissed to a stop in front of me, and I was so deep in thought that my brain cells didn’t put two and two together when I reached into my pocket for the bus fare and came up empty-handed. I searched the other pocket, then my jacket pockets, suddenly in a panic.
That man must’ve picked my pockets when he ran into me.
The realization was a sobering one. With no money on hand, all my credit cards stolen now, and not even a phone in my pocket to call for help, I was fucked.
“Are you getting on or getting off, girl?” the bus driver grumbled, gesturing with his brows to the people waiting in line behind me. “Holding things up.”
“I-I’m sorry,” I stuttered, hating the weakness creeping into my voice. “I can’t find my wallet.”
“No fare, no ride,” he spat, gesturing me off the bus. I turned in shame, angry tears threatening the edges of my vision, when a kind soul reached around me and deposited the fare in the machine for me with a smile.
“Here you are, honey. I have extra.” The little older lady just waved me on and shuffled closer, putting another dollar in the fare machine with a nod to the bus driver. “Curtis,” she huffed, raising her brows. “You should be ashamed of yourself. Can’t take a dollar out of your pocket to help a girl in distress?”
Curtis, the bus driver, just waved her on and let the rest of the passengers on behind us, no longer concerned with whatever had just transpired between them.
