The Clean Ones

Chapter 19

I woke up the next morning to a completely silent environment. I would have thought the house was vacant, but I knew better. My eyes still ached with sleep as I rolled over to look at the clock, which displayed the time as 1:32 pm. That definitely woke me up. I slept through both breakfast and lunch? No, that was not okay. I threw off the covers and bolted down the stairs.
Benton and Lu were seated in the lavish living room, already engaged in some heated argument when I arrived. This was so very typical of them to act this way. Not a day went by that they didn't bicker or complain about something. And, as if it wasn't bad enough, I had to deal with the reality of there being two of them. Twice the fights, twice the complaining. Sometimes it felt like I was herding dogs rather than watching after two fourteen year olds. Their argument, whatever it was, ceased when I entered the room. "Oh look, Sleeping Beauty had finally awoken. Did your darling Perri kiss you awake? Or is she too busy with an older man?" Lu jested. A sly grin appeared among his face, one that told me he was trying hard to not laugh at his own joke.

"Ha, very funny." I said. Maybe I would have laughter at his joke, but not today. Granted, neither he nor Benton were aware of the severity of the current circumstances, but I couldn't help but cringe a little at the timing of his joke. Too soon, I thought to myself. Too soon.

"So, what does the pretty princess have on the agenda for today?" Benton asked. He was already seated on the caramel-colored suede sofa with his feet resting among the top of the glass coffee table. A steaming mug of liquid rested undisturbed in his hand, while Lu's mug was on the floor with the contents smeared amongst his face.

"I'm not sure," I confessed. "Really, though, is there that much for three teenage boys to while unsupervised in a wealthy man's home?"

The boys exchanged a glance at one another. They didn't need to say any bring for me to be a part of their silent conversation. Their gaze returned to mine with the same smirk now on both of their faces.

"I don't know," Benton replied. "But I guess we'll just have to find something to do."

Somehow, we ended up running to the Mayor's office, first. Whatever secrets he could be hiding were bound to be in there. Getting access to the office was easier than I expected. Today was Sunday and, since the Mayor was out of town, most of the staff had returned to their homes for the day. The only one left, besides us, was his old housekeeper who was busy tending to the landscape outside.
Much to my surprise, the office was a rather small room. Right as we entered, we came face-to-face with an elaborate, mahogany desk. Papers were strewn across the top of it, as were some on the same green carpet floor. Black blobs of ink stained the carpet in several locations. The whole room, despite the size, was a disaster.

"God, what happened in here?" Lu exclaimed. He bent down to retrieve a few of the papers.

"Find anything, Lewis?" Benton asked and propped his head atop his brothers shoulder. His nose wrinkled as he examined the papers closer. "I don't understand any of this."

"Well how do you expect me to?" Lu sighed, tossing the paper to the ground. "We all know that I'm the dull one out of the two of us."

"Lu!" I snapped. "You know that's not true."

"Are you really going to argue with me about this?"

I sighed, exasperated. "No. We have more important things to do, rather than sit here and argue about who's smarter than who. Now start looking, you two. We need to see if we can finds anything while we still have access to this room." My voice was harsher than I expected it to be. Not that it mattered, really. These boys were used to me barking commands at them often. Even before we were at the safe house, we were on the run often. Being the alpha male of the group, it wasn't out if line for me to demand that they do a certain task or act a specific way.