Page 62 of Devil's Kiss

He told himself he would wait two rings and then hang up. Unfortunately, the phone connected after one.

“Hello?”

Derek shut his eyes against the beautiful view, and then turned his back on it altogether. “Alan?”

There was a pause, as though his brother was trying to place his voice or who he might be, and then he asked, “Derek?”

“Yeah.” He wasn’t about to offer up more than that. Alan was lucky he was calling him at all.

“So that new gym, the fancy one,isyours…”

Derek’s spine stiffened at the tone of Alan’s words. He had a sneaking suspicion that his brother wasn’t calling just to “inform” him of his father’s ailing health, and with the next words that came out of his brother’s mouth, Derek knew he was spot on.

“You must be doing pretty fucking good to be openin’ up some gym down on the beach. Guess leaving your trash behind helped you out, huh?”

Derek ground his molars together and rubbed his fingers over his forehead. “What do you want, Alan? You didn’t just email me to shoot the shit. You said he’s sick. So what’s wrong with him?”

Alan coughed, and Derek held the phone from his ear as he heard some shuffling and then the muffled sound of a television being turned down or off.

“I found him on the kitchen floor the other mornin’. And when they got him to the hospital they did a bunch of scans on him and it turns out he had pneumonia.”

Derek waited for the sadness to hit, for something to trigger inside him that would make him feel for the old man. But nothing came.

“They told me he’s got COPD. It’s pretty advanced. He needs treatment he can’t afford or he’s just gonna get worse.”

Derek’s first instinct was to say,So what?But he managed to bite that back and instead ask, “And what do you want me to do about it? I’m not giving him any fucking money.”

Alan coughed again, and Derek shook his head. He wouldn’t be surprised if his brother was in the same boat, or pretty damn close.

“Insurance, Derek. Medical. He doesn’t have any since he was laid off.”

Derek fumed. The audacity of the guy. There was no way he was asking him what he thought he was. Was he?

“If you add him to yours, then he can get therapy. Some regular help—” and before Alan could say another word, Derek ended the call, throwing his phone on the couch like it’d just transformed into a grenade.

He couldn’t fucking believe what had just come out of Alan’s mouth. His entire body was vibrating with rage as he stood trapped in his office, looking for a way out.

Christ.He wanted to hit something.Anything. He had the urge to destroy and get the adrenaline racing through him out of his system. He looked to the door of his gym and thought about going in and seeing if a bag was free, but that wasn’t what he really needed right then.

He paced back and forth, running an agitated hand through his hair, and wondered if he should skip out early and hit up a local bar. Maybe knocking back a bottle of bourbon would help numb the anger thrumming through him. But no, doing that made him just like them. He needed something else entirely.

He needed the one person who knew where he came from and everything he’d gone through.

Heneededthe one person who’d told him years ago that if he called, he would always answer.

And like a moth to a flame, Derek reached for the cell phone, pulled up his contacts, and dialed.

THAT EVENING,JORDAN was pouring himself a glass of Merlot as he got ready to relax in his tub after a long day at work. He’d had a jam-packed schedule this semester, and tonight was the first night in months he’d had completely to himself. Not only did he have nowhere to go, but he also had nothing to do.

Thank God.

He picked up his glass and walked down the hallway in his robe, determined to forget about everything in his head as soon as his tub was full, the lights were off, and his intergalactic bath bomb was working wonders on his body.

After adjusting the lights to a muted glow, he turned on the faucet and dropped the Lush bomb into the tub, then he slipped out of his robe and dipped his toe inside the fragrant water with a sigh.

Yes…This was exactly what he’d wanted.

He sank down into the water and stared out the window to the bright lights below.