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CHAPTER FOUR

ST. CLARE

I shoot up in bed with a gasp, panting through the rapidly disappearing images of my dream. It was something to do with Colin. I don’t remember what or how, but that feeling of fucking dread is deepening in my gut.

Because waking up hasn’t helped anything.

It’s been a whole week since I’ve seen him.

My brother is not the kind of person who disappears.

Being unable to fix a problem is the worst kind of helplessness, and as I turn and kick my legs out of bed, the shadows press in. Deeper. Darker. This screeching urge filling my ears, telling me I need to be out walking the streets or stalking his accounts or … or …

The laugh that falls from my lips is hollow.

I’m not a criminal mastermind. I’m not law enforcement. How the hell am I supposed to find a pinprick of a person in a city this size? A wave of panic passes through me as a question flits through my mind.

Is he in the city at all?

It’s one more question to join all the others I have no answers to. I reach for my phone, mostly by muscle memory at this point, and pull up his number. Still doesn’t ring. I open his social media pages and hope that maybe this time there will be something. A picture of him, literally anywhere, just enjoying himself, but it’s radio silent there too.

I’ve gnawed on my lip so many times over the last few days that it’s raw and shredded. My lack of sleep is normally great for when I’m working through the night, but with my naps constantly interrupted, I’m getting low on patience.

If something’s happened to Colin, I … okay, I don’t know what. Still not a criminal mastermind, but with my frustrations bubbling around a hundred, I’m interested to find out.

Fighting for sleep is useless at this point, so I head out to the kitchen and turn the coffee machine on. The view here isn’t as great as the one at work since we funneled all our money into the business, and I didn’t save a cent for this place. Lars and I took out the rent together so we could afford something slightly larger than a shoe box and not shared with who knows what kind of vermin.

The current takings at Saint Clare’s are looking promising, but we’re stuck here for a while.

The creak of a door behind me makes me jump out of my skin.

Lars’s chuckle fills the still apartment as he joins me in the kitchen. “What the hell are you doing?”

I wait for my suddenly racing heart to stop being so damn dramatic before I answer him. “Couldn’t sleep.”

“Colin?”

“Yep.”

Lars’s mouth flattens. “The whole thing is weird.”

“You’re telling me,” I mutter, grabbing the sugar. “I can’t shake the feeling something bad has happened.”

“I’m a big believer in listening to our instincts.”

“You also cleanse the apartment every other month and have a concerning addiction to horoscopes. My instincts tell me those things are bullshit. Who do we believe?”

Lars throws me an unimpressed look before taking over making the coffee. He’s only in his briefs, and it really highlights why he’s the muscle and I’m the … ideas guy.

When I’d hired him, it had been more about having a barrier between me and any drug-crazed partygoers or wannabe gangsters lurking outside. I’d never imagined for a second that I would need actual protection, but since Colin disappeared without a trace, who the fuck knows what’s going on?

The police have taken it as a missing person’s case and said they’ll look into Rev and any potential motivation. They said a lot, actually, and it was all the right things, but no one has reached out since, and I have the feeling that Colin has been forgotten about amidst all the other missing people being reported daily.

“Let’s see …” Lars pours himself a coffee with one hand and thumbs through his phone with the other. “Here we go. Capricorn.” He hums as he reads. “Interesting …”

“What’s interesting?”

“Never mind. You don’t believe in it.”

“I don’t.”

“So then you don’t need to know what’s interesting.”

That asshole. He grins at me because we both know what he’s doing. Joke’s on him, though, because I can go and Google that shit myself. Except I might not get the same thing he has since I know he subscribes to certain horoscopy places.

“I know you want to tell me,” I say, taking the mug he offers. “Just get on with it.”

“I’m good. Oh, look. Taurus will need to run errands, and traffic might be an issue. There you go. If I’m not around, that’s where I’ll be.”

“Bad traffic in Seattle? Wow. I’m sure glad you had your horoscopes to give you the heads-up.”

“Yours was better.”

“I’m sure it was.”

He’s bouncing on his toes, and I know it’s killing him. I don’t believe in horoscopes. I know they’re wild guesswork and vague enough that you can interpret them to any aspect of your life. The errands and traffic thing was specific, but those aren’t a huge reach. All it takes is Lars remembering he needs to do something, and suddenly, he remembers his horoscope and dubs it right. Self-fulfilling prophecy and all that.

Even with all that rationalizing, it doesn’t dim my curiosity .

Lars is downing his coffee like the faster he drinks it, the easier it will be to keep his mouth shut.

I sigh and turn to lean against the counter. “Tell me.”

“Fine. Apparently, you’re going to get into an altercation with a business or romantic partner, and you’ll need to try and see things from their point of view before turning it into a bigger deal than it is.”

Okay, that was almost as specific as his was. “I don’t have a romantic partner …”

“Could be a good sign that Colin will show back up though.”

I’m not going to put all my hope about that into a horoscope. “Sure. Some random person on the internet said it, so it must be true.”

“We’ll see, I guess.”

Considering I’m missing my brother, need to look at hiring someone to balance our books while he’s MIA, and have a club to run and a potential rival to keep on top of, his horoscope is low on my list of concerns. I’d gladly welcome a fight with my brother because then he’d fucking be here. In fact, the second he shows back up, I’ll hug him, then chew him out for ditching without notice.

There has to be a simple explanation for where he’s gone. Thinking about missing people and crime and his life being at risk is too much for my feeble brain to wrap around, and the only way to keep my cool is to remind myself of how unlikely it is.

We’re two unknown brothers who opened a business. We don’t have a lot of money, we’re not important, we don’t get involved with bad people.

Colin has just forgotten to check in. And charge his phone. And return to his place. They’re all totally normal things that can be explained away.

Without a word, Lars puts down his mug, then steps closer and pulls me into a hug. “He’s okay.”

“He fucking better be.” I refuse to think of the alternative.

** *

Come the fuck on, Colin, we have a horoscopic altercation to get to. Another night, another full club, another day of looking over my shoulder, sure I can feel eyes on me.

I’m frustrated, worried, and so damn horny with no desire to get that energy out.

I fucking hate it here.

Lars has been gone longer than he said he’d be, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s getting some distance from me moping over my brother.

I scrub my hands down my face, frustration getting the better of me. Where the fuck is Colin? All this worry can’t be good for me—doesn’t he care about my health? It’s almost like he’s forgotten that he’s supposed to be the considerate one. He’s left me to flail. I don’t like flailing. Especially in a club we’ve put our whole souls into that has only just opened. This is a flail-free zone.

“Brothers are the fucking worst.” I stalk back to the desk, glimpsing the irritating feature about Saint Clare’s still open on my computer screen.

It only pisses me off more.

The guy did his job. The write-up is a glowing review of the club and everything I’ve accomplished. It doesn’t matter how many times I mentioned Colin in that fucking interview, he was only given one small line at the bottom. Every time I reread what’s on the screen, my anger creeps higher, and I’m fully expecting to rage email that journalist at some point.

The following feature can be all about how fucking unhinged I’ve gotten.

I pinch the headache growing between my eyes and consider, again, whether I need to reach out to this guy and—instead of biting his head off—ask if he can get the word out about Colin. The police are doing sweet fuck all, so that might help?

The most frustrating part is that I’ve given the police their answer. It’s no coincidence that we got threats not to open the club, opened, and then Colin went missing. It has to have been those assholes at Rev. There’s no other answer. No one else has an issue with us. As much as I’d like to hope that Colin took himself on a vacation, I know him. He wouldn’t leave like this. Which means that he was forced to.

And there’s only one answer to who would force my brother to disappear.

A small part of me wants to be offended that they only went after him, but I can’t blame them. It’s barely been two weeks, and I’m already in way over my head—they don’t need to get rid of me when I can’t even run this place properly. They just have to wait out my complete incompetence.

While I wait to discover what the hell happened to my brother.

I’m not good with waiting. Or curiosity.

I chew my thumbnail, staring at the screen, trying to figure out what the hell I can do to stop being so gut-wrenchingly helpless, and all I can think of is that if the police won’t do their jobs, I’ll fucking do it for them.

I’m clearly not also a target, or I would have gone missing by now too. I’m not smart or sneaky and don’t know how to cover my tracks. So if they’re not after me, there’s no reason why I can’t pay them a little visit and start getting some of the answers I need.

Lars is still doing whatever the fuck he’s doing, so I grab my jacket and make for the door. I’m not going to be gone long, in a place as public as Rev, I’m not worried about anything happening there. Afterward, well, who the fuck knows what they’ll do. I’m not even sure I care at this point.

The not knowing is causing a brain itch, and if this is what I need to do, fuck it.

I take the stairs down from my office into the employees-only section of the club. There’s a door at the end of the hallway that leads to our back courtyard and parking spaces, which has a gate into the small through street behind us.

Almost as soon as I step outside, that creepy crawling feeling hits me again. It’s been hanging around all week, setting in randomly and suddenly, and I can’t help but do my usual look around at what the fuck could be making my skin prickle like this.

As usual, there’s no one here .

Colin going missing has me paranoid.

Ignoring my car, I cross the courtyard, where two of our bar staff are sharing a vape, and let myself out into the street behind our building.

Rev is only a few blocks away, and where they have specifically targeted a demographic who listen to rage music, doesn’t mind fighting, and the drug trade in there is high, we went in the complete other direction. Latest hits, drug checks at the door, and a zero tolerance for violence. We’ve started out strong on both the drugs and the fighting and already given out bans so people know we’re serious.

Saint Clare’s and Rev couldn’t be any more different, and there are more than enough customers to go around.

Their issues with us can’t be that we’re competition.

I leave the through road and walk along the busy street, that feeling of being watched even heavier out here. Every few steps, I can’t stop from looking around, but the restaurants and theaters in this part of town make it hard to spot anything out of the usual, as everything is wild and strange and fun.

It’s one of the reasons we were so set on opening in this part of town. The lease wasn’t cheap, but Colin knew it was worth it.

A passing woman shrieks, making me jump, but the friends with her break into answering laughter. Fuck me, I’m on edge. This isn’t normal.

When I get to Rev, as usual, the line is stretched out down the street, and the surly bouncer at the door is giving people the stink eye. We have Onyx on door duty, and they’re the most bubbly, flamboyant ex-MMA fighter I’ve ever met. Colin and I loved them instantly.

Our brand is welcoming. Rev’s is intimidation.

So. Fucking. Different.

Would they really take my brother over a little territory dispute when they’re not suffering?

Really?

Instead of heading to the front door to make a scene, I duck down the alley to the left. Like our place, this one leads around the back to the employee entrance. I can ask one of their staff to let Yanni know that I’m looking for him then we can have this out without strangers witnessing our business.

But before I can get there, I slow my footsteps, and the doubt comes back to me. What if it wasn’t them?

Big bad nightclub bosses making people go missing feels like a reach. Sure, I don’t have any other suspects in mind, but this isn’t a little close or else empty threat. This is a big fucking deal. A big fucking deal where I’m very possibly going to piss them off more or hand them the knowledge that I’m splashing around solo right now with no clue which way is up.

And I have no interest in making them feel that happy tonight.

I turn and sink back against the wall. It’s filthy down here. Graffiti and litter everywhere. Food and who knows what bodily fluids trampled into the dirty concrete. A dumpster that smells like rotten fruit down the other end, the smell so strong it’s making my eyes water.

All that just goes to show how completely fucking mindless I’m being here. The least I could have done was bring Lars. Maybe reached out to the police asking for more information. Hell, maybe they already questioned Yanni and didn’t think to let me know.

Are police supposed to give the heads-up about stuff like that? I don’t fucking know.

I tip my head back, looking toward the sky that’s nothing more than deep black, melting into the shadows of the alley. The streetlamp here is blown. The noise from outside muffled. The stench of decay enough to keep any sane person from coming down here.

Something in my chest twinges, and it takes me a second to place the feeling.

I miss Colin.

My annoying, overachieving, always right older brother.

He’d give me the most enjoyable lecture about self-preservation if he could see me now. I can picture the exact way his neck would go an angry red, and concern would pinch the skin between his eyebrows.

Logically, I know I need to head back to Saint Clare’s. Being here is a reach, and if they really did have something to do with Colin after all, I’m asking for trouble by being here.

Not-so-logically, my feet refuse to move, and this nagging instinct holds strong, telling me to get answers. Making decisions when I’m frustrated is futile, but at least I’m being consistent.

That prickly feeling kicks back up, stronger this time, and I know it’s time to move.

But as I have that thought, a shadowed figure steps into the alleyway with me.