Page 34 of The Rowdy Ones

“Want something to eat?” Wild asks from the front of the RV.

“No.” I hug Rowdy’s pillow and pray he’ll show up soon.

I’m not sure how much time passes, but my phone rings, alerting me to a new call.

Weston calling. Weston calling. Weston calling.

“Hello?”

“Hey, baby,” Weston says in greeting. “Did you see the news?”

Wild shakes the whole RV as he thunders across it and into Rowdy’s room. “What news? Who is that?”

“Weston,” I blurt out. “No, tell me.”

“Weston Simmons?” Wild asks at the same time Weston says, “Someone died.”

This gets our attention.

“Who the fuck died, Simmons?” Wild demands, snatching my phone from my hand.

Weston grunts in irritation. “Hey, man. What’s up?”

“You not getting to the point is what’s up. Who fucking died?”

“I’m worried about my brother. He’s missing and not answering our calls,” I explain, voice shaking. “We were going into town to look for him, but the road was blocked off. They sent us away, but when we inquired about Rowdy, they suddenly had a lot of questions for us.”

Weston is silent for a beat. “They haven’t identified the victim yet.”

Victim.

“Out with it,” Wild growls.

“I don’t have much to say, but the police are definitely calling it a homicide. There weren’t many details. We just never have this sort of thing happen around here, so I wanted to tell Destiny about it.”

Wild hands me my phone back and storms off. I soon hear him on the phone with someone else. Most likely it’s his uncle again.

“You really think something happened to him?” Weston asks gently. “Damn. I’m sorry.”

My eyes burn with tears and I choke back the urge to cry. “I’m sure he’s fine. He has to be.”

That’s the truth of the matter. I will never forgive myself if something happens to him here because of me.

“Wait? What?” Wild bellows from the front of the RV.

“I’ll call you back later.”

I end the call with Weston and make my way down the hall to where Wild is cursing under his breath. He flinches when my hand touches his arm.

“Yeah, okay.” He sighs heavily, jerking from my touch. “I’m not jumping to conclusions. You’re right.”

He slams his phone down hard on a surface and I jolt at the loud sound.

“What happened?” I ask, running my hand along a countertop until I’m able to touch him again. “Was that your uncle?”

“It was my uncle, yeah. Fuck. It was bad.”

“What was?”