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Vaughn looked up when I entered, and for half a second, I thought I saw guilt flash in his eyes. But then it cleared and changed into something colder. Harder.
“What are you doing in here at one in the morning?” I asked, rubbing my bare arms in the drafty house. I caught sight of something in his hand and gasped, storming over to take it from him. “What are you doing with that? It was my mom’s.”
I ran my fingers over the familiar necklace. It was one I’d bought her not long after I first started working at Psychos a decade ago. It had been her birthday, and I’d been excited to finally be able to buy her a proper gift. Something nice, though in hindsight, I realized the eighty bucks I’d spent on it probably didn’t actually qualify as something precious.
But she’d acted like it had been.
“I think you were right about Kian.” Vaughn’s voice was hoarse.
I racked my brain, trying to think what he was referring to. “Unless you’re talking about the fact he definitely should have gone with the pig costume, you’re going to have to explain better.”
Vaughn turned around a framed photo on his lap.
It was of Mom and Kian, the two of them dressed to the nines, faces pressed together, both beaming at the camera.
“I found it on a shelf in her side of the wardrobe.”
That was surprising. It seemed a bit odd that she would have a framed photo of her and another man in her bedroom. But I shrugged it off. “It’s hardly the two of them writhing around in bed naked together, Vaughn. Men and women can be friends, you know?”
He side-eyed me. “Like us?”
I scoffed, while heat threatened behind my cheeks. “We’re barely acquaintances. I don’t see any photos of us together in my bedroom.”
“I watched a man eat your pussy ’til you came all over his face.”
I glared at him. “Keep bringing that up, and I’ll assume you were jealous.”
“I was.”
Oh, sweet Jesus. I turned around before he could notice the blush creeping across my cheeks. “That has nothing to do with Kian and my mom.”
He pointed to the bed and the array of photos on top of it. “They’re all variations of your mom, my dad, and Kian.”
“He does work here.”
“You love your friends at Psychos, right? You said they were your family.”
“They are.”
“How many photos of them do you have printed out in your room?”
There was one of me, Bliss, and Nash. But that was all. There definitely wasn’t anywhere near the number of photos Vaughn currently had spread out on the bed. I swallowed, the desire to protect my mom still strong. “I haven’t finished unpacking yet.”
“Bullshit. You see my point. This is weird.”
“Or you’re jealous.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Already told you I was.”
I wondered if he’d been drinking or if it was the late hour that had his tongue loosening. “Not about that.” I pointed at a photo of Kian and Bart. “Vaughn, there’s nothing in these photos that indicates anything weird going on. Why would Mom frame a photo of her and her lover and keep it in her bedroom for her husband to find? Why would there be just as many photos of Kian and your dad? Were they having an affair too?”
“Kian’s bi.”
“You don’t say. Picked up on that the day I met him. My point still stands. Just because he’s bi, doesn’t mean they were having some sort of polyamorous relationship.” I picked up a photo of all three of them. Kian was holding some sort of award, and my mom and Bart stood either side like proud parents. “This looks like a family.”
A twinge of pain flashed across Vaughn’s face, and his shoulders slumped. “He replaced me with Kian. I was the asshole son who ran off to another state and never came back. So he found someone to take my place.”
I put my hand on his arm. “Or, your dad was just a good guy. He loved you even if you were a Douchey McDoucheface, but maybe he saw Kian needed someone to love him too. If he’s lived in this house since you two were boys, he probably thought of Kian as a son even before his dad died. And probably before you left.”