Page 76 of Broken Brothers

This time, though, unlike with Claire, where it felt like something of a desperate cry for social attention that I could only barely repel, Layla just felt like a way to calm myself when I thought of her name. There was no way I was ever going back to her—I was pretty sure—but at least if we let the fire between us simmer down a bit, when we hung out, things wouldn’t be sotense. I wouldn’t burn with rage or eye rolls every time I saw her texts or heard her name.

I just hoped she felt the same way about me.

Which… was unlikely. No one texted with this much frequency. No one that liked someone else, that was.

But at this point, I was just acting selfishly. At least it was a relatively healthy kind of selfish and not a screw-you-over selfishness.

Meanwhile, when I read Claire’s text, I couldn’t help but feel some sort of strong emotions to her.

“I don’t regret what happened last night,” she wrote. “I am feeling all sorts of confused after the past couple of weeks. I will never drag you into something you don’t want to do, Chance, but know I am not looking for anything serious. Whatever you want to do, we will do.”

The offer was quite enticing, but I still wasn’t quite ready to pull the trigger. I had a feeling I would eventually, but I had to make sure I was in the right frame of mind. I was like Morgan—I was almost desperate to see MCH take off, and I feared taking advantage of information Claire provided to allow us to negotiate a better deal.

Then, just before I got off the couch, I got a call from a New York number I did not recognize.

At first, I just ignored it, putting it on the coffee table as I got up to get a glass of water.

But then, the number rang again. I tried again to ignore it, this time actively pressing the ignore button. I turned on the TV…

And then the fucking number called me again.

Maybe someone was calling me from someone else’s phone for an emergency. Who would know my number by heart? Morgan. Mrs. Hunt. Maybe some random friend from college? The fact that they were calling three times negated the likelihoodof it being a spam caller, so I picked up the phone about five seconds into the third ring.

“Chance Hunt,” I said.

At first, nothing came through.

Then, in what can only be described as someone sounding like a muffled, anonymous TV source, a man in a deep voice began talking.

“We heard you last night, Chance,” the voice said. “We know your secrets.”

I was being watched last night. Fuck.

But they haven’t said anything yet. You don’t know what they’re referring to. They may be full of shit. Let’s not say anything that could spill the beans.

“I’m sorry, I think you have the wrong number,” I said, deliberately playing dumb.

“We know exactly who you are, Chance Hunt,” the voice said. “You fucked with the wrong people.”

“OK, this is a little creepy, but—”

“We saw you with the girl.”

Oh, shit.

Don’t say anything. Play dumb. They don’t know your relationship with Claire. They’re just trying to scare you.

And by they… I mean Edwin Hunt’s people. No one else is trying to do this to me.

Fucking dick. Fine. You want to play hardball? Morgan and I are going to fire your ass the second we take over the board.

“We know what you are doing with her.”

“Is that so,” I said. I was tired of playing dumb. I was going to play really dumb. “Did you like it when I made out with her?”

“Don’t fuck with us, Chance Hun—”

“Did you like it when we got all PDA? Ewww, right? Was it gross, were you—”