Page 64 of My Brother's Enemy
Fuck.
Fine.
I was going to regret this.
“Hold on.” I pulled out my keycard and went back into my room. Stuffing my phone in my purse, I tossed my headphones on the table and grabbed a hoodie from the chair. Minnesota was having an abnormally warm November, but it was still chilly at night. I exchanged my shorts for leggings and found my car keys.
When I returned, Tyler was waiting in the same spot, except with his back against the wall. I faltered for a moment. Jesus, he was hot. He wore a black Grays hoodie and black joggers. No one who played hockey should look like he did. It wasn’t fair. Then he turned those cold eyes on me, and I remembered that even if we fucked again, he hated me. He’dalwayshate me, just on principle, which I was loathe to admit I understood, but I did.
The hatred was deserved.
I shut the door and headed down the hall as he pushed the button for the elevator.
“Where do you want to start?” I asked.
He grimaced. “She won’t be at her place, but we’ll start there.”
Awesome.
41
RAIN
Idrove while Tyler was on his phone. Most of the people he called answered, and they sounded like old friends of his sister’s. They were excited to hear from him. Most wanted to catch up, but he tried to keep it short. We checked an apartment building first, and he ran in by himself. He came back out five minutes later, and off we went again.
At the end of the seventh call, he said, “Yeah. No. It’s great to hear your girls are doing well. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Thanks. Yeah, if you hear from her, give me a call. Thanks again.” After hanging up, he cursed, rubbing his forehead. “Fuck’s sake. The problem with my sister is that she has a whole network of people I don’t know. Some of them don’t even have phones. I’ve called all the people I can think of, but I’ve not been back here to socialize in a fucking decade.”
I needed to concentrate with the traffic. I couldn’t sort through this with him at the same time, so I turned into a cafe’s parking lot.
“What are you doing?”
I pulled into a slot and put the car in park. “Let’s go through the basics. Her best friends.”
He held up his phone. “I called them.”
“Okay. Family members?”
“It’s just her and me. And Zoey.”
“No cousins?”
He shook his head. “No one. The woman who helped us didn’t have family or kids. And that was only for a few years. She’s down in Florida. It was really just Skylar and me growing up. She didn’t get close to any of my billet families.”
Their parents died in a car crash.
My chest squeezed, and I cleared my throat. “Okay, work friends. Who are they?”
He thought for a moment. “She has two jobs. She works at a bar part time. She doesn’t need the money, but my sister is stubborn. I bought their condo. I pay for their medical insurance. She works so she has something to do while Zoey’s in school, and now she’s getting older. Her social life is more active. She also works full time at a nursing home.”
“Your sister or Zoey?”
“My sister.”
“You don’t know who your sister’s work friends are?”
“Do you know your siblings’ work friends?” he shot back.
“Yes, because it’s blasted on Instagram and TikTok. I’d rather not know, but when I took this job, that meant I had to tune into the lovely world of the NHL again.”
