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Where was he? She turned around quickly and whispered, “Jims?”

She heard shuffling and could tell so Ji she should’ve done as well

High above them, Toms called out, “Rons says your brother is part of that Trouble bunch Says that older guy you snuck around hat’s his naain? Ah, it don’t ured on that’s why you called your big brother Reckon ya wanted that man of yourn to come fetch ya”

“I don’t knohat you’re talking about”

“Yep Ya do Gabe That’s his name Gabe and Bradley Brother and boyfriend”

She closed her eyes, willing her tears away, not that anyone would see them in the darkness For atricks on her

She pictured Gabe on his twenty-first birthday, driving around the high school parking lot He had heard a ru to find out if gossip held truths

Heather grinned then at the memory He had slowly crept up one aisle and then another, movin

g through the rows of parked vehicles as he searched for her She’d hidden from hiht

Prior to that particular afternoon, Gabe had believed she’d just celebrated her twentieth birthday In fact, she’d been seventeen

Heather still remembered the look on his face when he found her crouched down behind her old Plymouth And the words he’d spoken? Well, those sentiments still haunted her to this day “I wanted you I had setbut a kid?”

Noenty-one, Heather wondered if Gabe still thought about her They’d kept in touch by emails prior to her stop at the Vance fa at the Vance property, she had heard about Trouble and soested that he worked there with her brother, but that’s not why she reached out to Bradley She had reached out because she was frightened and she wanted to go ho, she couldn’t be sure

“Ya quiet for a reason, cupcake?”

“Please”

“Beggin’ is not attractive, Heather”