Snow On The Beach // R.C.

1.22

"What are you doing in here?" I blurt, eyes going impossibly wide.

Alan smiles, teeth and all, as he looks down at the ground then back at me. I watch, growing dizzy, when he pulls my phone out from behind him. He flashes me the screen. "You always ignore your little brother like this?"

Fuck.

Rushing forward, I snatch the phone from his hand, hating the sound of his chuckles as I obsessively begin reading each and every text from John. He called me at least 13 times, leaving half as many voicemails as that. I spent the entire day so caught up in Rafe's drama that I completely forgot about my phone, and I completely forgot about my brother. Well...that is until a few minutes ago when he caught me making out with Rafe in the middle of the party going on downstairs.

Each text is worse than the last:

SOS!

Answer the phone Sis

Earth to cecilia!!!!!?

Fine dont answer me but dont go home either

They could be monitoring our messages for all i know but fuck it. The house is being watched.

CECILIA JOY ROUTLEDGE!!!

"Shit," I mutter under my breath. Then a thought hits me, and I whirl on Alan, shoving the phone in his squinty-eyed face. "Is this you? Is Barry having my house watched?"

He doesn't even look at the screen, just stares straight at me. I figure he's probably already read every single message since he was clearly snooping before I caught him, but I hold the device in his face nonetheless. "Cops," he says.

The muscles in my face twitch. I drop the phone to my side. "What?"

"The cops are watching your house."

"Yeah, yeah, I get that," I snap, shoving my phone into my back pocket. "What I mean is why."

"You think I know the answer to that?"

"I do."

At that he smirks, running his hand along his scruffy jaw. Then he takes a singular step forward. It takes everything in me not to take one back. "They know about the Royal Merchant."

My mouth goes dry, and my skin pebbles. It's only then that I realize what I'm wearing. A white bikini and shorts aren't the most convenient outfit for a conversation like this. "And how do you know that?" I ask as I head for my closet, never once turning my back on him until I absolutely have to.

"Doesn't matter how I know," he says, the sound of his voice muffled amongst all the clothes. I pull a sweater off the wrack and tug it over my head as I head back out into my room. Alan still stands where I left him. "The cops know about your brother and his friends, and they know who murdered those two dudes that turned up in that guy's fishing nets. They sure are running with that shark attack story though."

I knew Peterkin was hiding something from me when I saw her yesterday.

"Are you saying they know who killed those guys?" I dare to ask.

Alan's silence confirms everything I need to know.

I cross my arms over my chest and sit into my left hip. "Are you saying that they think John—my brother—did it? Is that why they're having the house watched?"

At that, he laughs, and the sound grates on me way more than it should. "I don't know, Routledge. If I had to guess, the pigs are probably watching your place for the same reason me and my boys are."