Chapter 5 The Dinner Bell

Nora's POV

My finger was still touching the edge of the photo when his voice cut through the hallway.

"Dinner's ready."

I spun around so fast my shoulder hit the wall. Colt was standing there like he hadn't just watched me find an eleven-year-old version of myself laughing in his family's lake house photo. Like my whole world hadn't just tilted sideways. His face gave me nothing. No surprise. Not guilt. Nothing.

"How long," I said, "have you known who I am?"

"Dinner's getting cold."

That wasn't a no. That wasn't anything. He turned and walked toward the stairs like the question had bounced right off him, and I stood there with my heart slamming against my ribs, because here was the truth I couldn't unknow anymore: this boy had picked me. Not randomly. Not because I was convenient. He'd known my face before I ever knew his name.

I heard footsteps coming fast down the hall.

Reid.

He looked wrong. His face had gone the color of old paper, and his hand was wrapped so tight around his phone that his knuckles stood out white. He saw me looking at him, and his eyes slid away, fast, like he'd gotten caught at something.

"Reid," I said his name low. "What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing." His voice cracked on the word. "We should go down."

He wouldn't look at me. Not once, all the way down the stairs. And that scared me more than anything Colt had just done, because Reid was the one person in this house who always looked at me, who'd looked at me since we were kids on a dock. If Reid couldn't meet my eyes, something was very, very wrong.

The dining room smelled like roasted chicken and money. A long table, more forks than I'd ever used in my life, and Colt's stepfather already seated at the head of it like a king waiting on his court. He smiled when he saw me. It didn't reach his eyes.

"Nora." He said my name like he was testing the weight of it. "Sit. Please."

I sat. Colt sat beside me, close enough that our arms almost touched, and Reid dropped into the chair across from me so hard the silverware rattled. Nobody said anything about that. I was starting to understand that in this house, you weren't supposed to notice when something was wrong. You were just supposed to keep eating.

"So." Colt's stepfather cut into his chicken without looking at it. "Tell me about your family, Nora."

My stomach dropped.

"There's not much to tell," I said carefully. "It's just my mom and me."

"No father?"

"He's not in the picture."

"And your mother. What does she do?"

I felt Reid's foot tap mine under the table. Just once. A warning. I kept my face calm and my voice steady, even though every question felt like a hand checking my pockets for something to steal.

"She used to work retail. She's sick right now. That's actually" I made myself say it before he could. "That's actually why I'm here. I'm sure Colt explained the arrangement."

"He did." Colt's stepfather's eyes flicked to his son, quick and sharp, like he was checking something off a list. "Medical debt, was it? Forty-some thousand?"

"Forty-two," I said. "Yes, sir."

"And you didn't think to ask your mother's side of the family for help first? Before agreeing to move in with strangers?"

The question landed like a slap. I felt my face go hot.

"There isn't a side of the family to ask," I said. "There's just us."

"Hm." He chewed slowly, watching me the whole time, like I was a stock he wasn't sure whether to invest in. "And you understand this arrangement is temporary. You understand that once the debt situation resolves, you won't be needed here anymore."

"Dad." Colt's voice was flat, but there was something underneath it, something with an edge. "That's enough."

"I'm only making sure she understands the terms, Colt. Better she hears it from me now than gets confused later." He smiled at me again, that same smile that didn't reach anywhere close to his eyes. "No offense intended, dear. Business is business."

I made myself smile back. "None taken."

It was a lie. Every word of it had taken something. But I'd had practice swallowing things that hurt, three years of diner shifts taught you how to keep your face calm while your insides screamed, so I picked my fork back up and ate like the question hadn't carved a little piece out of me.

Across the table, Reid still hadn't touched his food.

He was staring at me. Not the way Colt stared, careful and unreadable. Reid was staring at me like I was standing at the edge of something tall, like he could see a fall coming that I couldn't see yet. His jaw was tight. His phone, I noticed, was sitting face-down beside his plate, like he didn't trust himself not to look at it.

What had he seen on that screen?

I tried to catch his eye again, tried to ask the question silently, what is wrong with you, but he just kept eating tiny, mechanical bites like his body was on autopilot and his mind was somewhere else completely.

Then, under the table, his foot found mine again.

This time it wasn't a gentle warning tap.

It was a real kick, hard enough that I nearly dropped my fork, hard enough that Colt's stepfather glanced over, and I had to force a cough to cover the noise. I looked up at Reid, ready to glare at him for it.

He wasn't looking at his plate anymore.

He was looking straight at me, eyes wide, face pale as a sheet, and his mouth moved, slow, careful, silent, shaped only for me to read.

We need to talk.

My fork froze halfway to my mouth.

Whatever was on that phone, whatever had turned Reid's face the color of paper and made his hands shake before he even sat down, he hadn't told me yet. He hadn't told Colt either, judging by the calm, unbothered way Colt was cutting his chicken like nothing in the world was wrong.

Reid knew something.

Something bad enough that he couldn't say it out loud at a table full of people who smiled with their mouths and not their eyes.

And he was about to tell me.