“Great, thanks, Aaron. I appreciate that.”

He nods to my sister. “Nice to meet you, Teagan.”

“You too.” Her smile is on the right side of maniacal.

I wait until he’s out of hearing range before I ask, “What the hell was that?”

“I don’t know. But I made that so weird, and awkward. I guess it’s a good thing I don’t live here, otherwise I’d have to actively try to avoid him in the future. God, he’s so . . . small-town hot.”

“What does that even mean?”

“Like he clearly hasn’t showered, or changed out of his work clothes, but that just makes him sexier. Why is he so sexy? I mean, he hasn’t shaved in at least two days. And he probably doesn’t manscape at all. I wonder if he has any tattoos.” She taps her lip.

“Okay. You can keep those thoughts inside your head.”

“Huh?” She looks away from his retreating form. He’s so tall he has to duck way down to avoid getting clotheslined by the tree branches over his head.

“Nothing. Never mind. Not that I’m not happy to see you, but what exactly are you doing here?”

“Oh! Right! I have Bradley’s cloud password!” She bounces up and down excitedly. “Or most of it, anyway. Enough that I think we can figure it out.”

“How did you manage to get that?”

“I drugged him again, and then I went through his desk at work, and his entire room at the house. I found some things I wish I hadn’t, but you know how he has the worst memory in the world and his password is the same for every single site?”

I didn’t know that, but I go along with it. “Sure.”

“He has this notebook on his desk, and there was a page ripped out, but I could see the outline of words, so I did that thing where you use the side of a pencil to scratch the next page and find out what was on it.” She holds up her phone and shows me a picture of the paper. “I took the actual page, too, but I figured I’d want photographic evidence. I’m crossing my fingers that once we get into his cloud, we’ll get some answers.”

“As long as he wasn’t smart enough to delete all the trails.”

“He’s smart enough; I’m just not sure he’d take the time to do it.”

Teagan and I grab my laptop and flip it open. We’ll only have three tries before we’re locked out, so we need to be smart about it.

“I think that’s a hashtag after his name.” Teagan points to what looks like a bunch of scratches.

“He really has the worst penmanship, doesn’t he?”

“Yup. And who uses their own name as their password? How stupid is that? And is the e backward?”

“I think it’s a three?”

“Oh! Good call. Okay. So his name is the password, plus a hashtag, and then what?”

“I’d say number one, but it doesn’t look like that’s what it is since it’s curved and not straight.”

“Unless he wrote out the number one?”

“Ooooh. That would be smart. Should we try it?”

I type in the password and cross my fingers as I hit enter. But I get the red “Wrong Password” message.

“Shit. We have two more tries. Are we sure that looks like a zero? Or an o?”

“I think so. God, we need to not get this wrong.” Teagan taps her lip. “I have it! What’s his favorite movie of all time?”

“Uh, I have no idea.”

“He loves James Bond movies. He’s dressed up as him every single year at Halloween since he was a teenager.”

“All he does is wear a suit, though.”

“Because it’s easy, but also because he loves those movies. Try double oh seven.”

“You’re sure about this?”

“Positive. Just try it.”

“You try it.” I shift the computer toward her, and she types in the password.

We cross our fingers and hold our breath as she hits the enter button.

And this time we don’t get the error message.

We both shout obscenities.

“Oh my God, we’re in!”

An hour later, Teagan and I have found more than enough evidence to point all the fingers back at my brother. Somehow he managed to get the passwords to my bank accounts and forged a bunch of signatures. He actually was pretty good at doing it; I even believe that some of the paperwork I’ve seen had my signature.

“Who the hell takes this many dick pics? And who is he sending them to?” Teagan holds her hand up in front of the screen to block yet another image of our brother’s penis. There are many on the cloud.

“Maybe it’s his version of flirting?”

“How are we related to him?” Teagan shakes her head. “Dad is going to be so disappointed.”

I hadn’t stopped to think about how Dad will react to this whole thing. Having someone steal $3 million from your late wife’s foundation is bad enough, but finding out that it’s your own son would be a real mindfuck. “How do you want to do this? Should we tell Dad before we pass this information over?”

Teagan taps her lip and stays silent for a few seconds before she answers. “I think we call a family meeting, but we don’t give Bradley time to make an escape. Right now he must think he’s pulling one over on us, so we don’t want to give him the benefit of a heads-up. And the sooner we do it, the better.” She flops back on the couch. “I can’t believe we have to take our own brother down. How much does this suck?”

“A lot.”

I haven’t always been my brother’s biggest fan, but finding out that he’s the reason for everything that our family is dealing with takes my opinion of him to a new low.

 

Half an hour and a short conversation with Dillion later, in which I tell her I have to go to the city to deal with a family issue and that I’ll fill her in on everything when I get back, Teagan and I are headed to Chicago, with me in the driver’s seat.

The landscape changes from tree-lined highways to the bustle of a busy freeway.

“Do you miss this?” Teagan asks as we get closer to our exit.

My dad lives outside the city in a massive two-story home. Teagan still lives in the main house, but Bradley took over the pool house a few years ago. I was the only one who moved out and got my own place. I don’t think Teagan necessarily wants to stay in the house; it’s more that she doesn’t want to leave our dad alone in a huge house that’s full of memories of our mother.

“Honestly? The only thing I miss about being here is you.”

She nods. “I can see that. Pearl Lake is full of such good memories and great people.”

“It really is.” I pull off the freeway and drive down familiar streets, back to the house I grew up in. It’s been months since I’ve been home, and I realize I don’t miss this place at all. In fact, as soon as I pull into the driveway, I can feel the shackles of a past none of us can ever seem to escape locking me back in.

“You ready to do this?” I ask Teagan as I park beside my brother’s ostentatious car.

“As ready as I can be. You?”

“Same.”

We both sigh and get out of the car, closing our doors in tandem. We fall into step beside each other. The front door is huge and black with a wrought iron design set in the center. The redbrick face of the house is elegant and gorgeous, but even from the outside, I know it’s a pretty shell without a heart.