Page 3

Daniel

T he phone ringing was the last thing I wanted to hear. There were only two people who called me lately—the Gray’s Harbor County Jail and Chase. I never gave Mr. Stevens a reason to reach out, so when I picked up the phone, I did a double take when I saw it was my parents.

“Hello?” I pressed the phone to my ear, my heart racing. While Mom and Dad had started talking to me again, the whole calling me on the regular wasn’t the norm.

“Daniel? Are you still sleeping? We were watching the news and saw you guys got hit with a lot of snow overnight. Are you doing okay?”

I stumbled out of bed at my mother’s question. The little baseboard by the window wasn’t doing shit to warm the space, and I shivered as the morning air hit my body.

A blanket of white covered everything as far as I could see. It was times like this that I wished I still had the car, not that it would do shit in this snow.

“Yeah. It started when I got off work last night. I didn’t think it would be this much.”

Mom sighed. “Oh, honey. Is there anything we can help you with?”

Now they wanted to help me? Where were they months ago when cops showed up at their house and dragged me in for questioning? They’d been so fast to shut me out and blame me for everything Art and Tilly had done. It was all my fault for every family heirloom that had turned up missing. They’d had every right to be angry. Hell, I was angry. We should have been supporting each other and instead, I was shut out.

“I’m good.” Maybe it was harsh, and the way Mom sucked in a breath betrayed my gruff tone.

“Daniel?”

“Mom, it’s fine. It’s just snow. It helps that I’m close to work.”

“What about clothes? Do you need some more winter items? I know you had a few sweaters, but is that enough?”

I wanted to laugh. “This is Seattle. Not freaking Alaska. The snow isn’t normal. We both know that. Try not to worry so much.”

She was silent for a long moment. “Maybe I haven’t worried enough.”

And there it was. She’d felt guilty about how things went down at the end of summer, but there was no changing it now.

“You’ve done fine. There were hard feelings. It was good that we got some space.” I plopped back onto my bed and pulled my blanket up over me so that I’d stop shivering. The cold was seeping in from the window and the baseboard kept clicking like it was trying to keep up, but failing.

“Let me at least send you some money for rent again. Seattle is so expensive. I’m so proud of you for being independent, but I want to make sure that you’re successful at it.”

Was I successful if they were still sending me cash? If it weren’t for them, I would have been struggling well before now. Despite all the hard feelings when I left Ocean Shores, Mom and Dad had been helping with the rent situation.

I rubbed at my eyes again, pulling the blanket more tightly around my shoulders. “That’s... fine. Yeah, Mom. You can send me some rent money if you want.”

She laughed. “Don’t sound like I’m putting you out or anything. You could always come back home.”

No. No, I couldn’t. As much as I missed the sleepy beach town, it had become toxic. My own version of hell. If I hadn’t left, there was no telling what type of trouble I would have ended up in when Art and Tilly were released from jail.

“Thanks. I appreciate all you and Dad do. I wish there was a way I could repay you sometimes.”

“Maybe we can come out and visit for Christmas? You missed Thanksgiving.”

I had. It was because I didn’t have a way to get home and the idea of even stepping foot back in Ocean Shores had my pulse skyrocketing.

Looking around my apartment, Christmas wasn’t the greatest idea. If Mom and Dad actually saw the place, they’d probably drag my ass back kicking and screaming. I lacked any motivation to decorate.

“Maybe not.”

“Daniel—”

I let out a frustrated sigh. “It’s nothing personal. You said it yourself. Seattle is expensive. I don’t have room for you guys to stay with me and you’d probably have to stay at a hotel...”

“It would be worth it to see our only son.”

There was the classic Mom guilt.

My fingers played with the edges of the blanket, which at this point had migrated over my head. My nose was ice cold, and the baseboard was now making a strange hissing sound. I’d probably need to call the landlord to come take a look at it. Especially if this winter was going to be this cold.

Giving in a little, but not completely, I finally answered. “Let me think about it.”

We ended the call, and I braved crawling out from under the blanket. I shivered violently as the cold air of the room hit me again. My feet were ice on the wood floors as I walked back to the baseboard to check on it. As I feared, there wasn’t any heat coming out of it, yet it continued to make those popping and hissing noises.

“Just fucking great,” I murmured as I grabbed a thick pair of socks from my dresser and shoved my feet into them. Looking around the room, another shiver raced through my body. There wasn’t a chance in hell I was hanging out here today until I could get the landlord in to look at the heat. I got dressed, throwing on the warmest shit I had, which meant a pair of jeans that had the least amount of holes in them and a long-sleeved shirt with a hoodie over it. Mom would faint if she knew I was about to go out in the snow like that, but I didn’t have much of a choice.

I only had a pair of canvas shoes that weren’t my work shoes. They’d be soaked by the time I got anywhere, but I wasn’t about to wear dress shoes out and about. I stopped by the office on my way out of the building and put in a work order about the heat. The lady working there gave me a small smile and said they’d do their best to look into it. It didn’t make me feel all that confident that I’d have heat by the time I got home. I would probably have to look into crashing with Chase and Nathan.

My fingers slid across the screen as I typed a message to my friend.

Me: Hey. Are you and lover-boy decent? I need somewhere warm.

It took a few minutes, but a message finally came through.

Chase: Fuck off. Yeah, you can come over.

A smile lit my face as I walked down the sidewalk, the snow crunching beneath my feet and soaking into my shoes. This sucked so bad, and I wished I had taken my mom up on her offer to help me get some winter clothing. I was still holding on to hope that this was a one-off and the snow wouldn’t be around for long.

By the time I reached Nathan and Chase’s place, my feet were on the verge of frostbite. They hopefully wouldn’t have a problem with me taking my shoes off to dry them out. Fuck them if they did. I needed my damn toes.

Their building was worlds nicer than mine. Nathan had gotten a cushy job as a programmer for some game company. The biggest perk was that he got to work from home a lot, so I guess it helped to be comfortable.

My knuckles stung as I knocked on their door and waited. I rubbed my hands together as I waited for the circulation to warm them back up. My choice of attire was probably stupid. Maybe I should have added another layer. It got cold at the beach, but this was fucking ridiculous.

When the door opened, Chase raised his eyebrows and looked me up and down. “You forget how to dress yourself?”

“Damn. And here I thought I’d asked the right person for help today.”

I turned to leave when Chase grabbed my arm and pulled me through the doorway.

“You’re not going anywhere. What the hell happened, man?”

I explained about how the heating wasn’t working in my apartment and he said that I could stay for as long as needed. Knowing him and his boyfriend, I didn’t want to hang around too long. They were horny as fuck, and I’d rather not listen to the two of them go at it.

“I have to work again tomorrow, so at least I’ll be out of your hair for a while for that,” I explained as I sat on the couch. Chase shrugged as he walked into another room.

A small black and white ball of fur jumped up onto the seat next to me, and I suppressed the urge to scream like a little girl. I’d met Chase’s cat Oreo before, but it didn’t make her any less terrifying. Or any cat, for that matter.

My grandma had this mean old cat when I was little, and it would always chase me around, hissing and scratching at me. Whenever I’d try to tell her about it, she didn’t believe me or say that I’d probably done something to upset the cat. I’d been terrified of the animals ever since. You could tell me they were the nicest creatures on the planet, but my brain refused to believe it.

My heart pounded against my rib cage as Oreo sat there and stared at me. Her tail swished back and forth, but she didn’t move. What the hell did she want? I sure as shit wasn’t going to pet her. What if I reached out and she scratched me?

“Oreo.”

She jumped from the couch and ran into the kitchen when Chase called for her. He shook a bag of food before pouring some in a bowl and setting it out for her.

“Dude, you look like you just saw someone die.”

I wanted to laugh. My heart was still hammering away. So stupid that I was still so terrified over a little cat.