“It’s been two and a half hours,” I tell Gabe. “We should go back. We need to go back!”

“Settle down,” Gabe says. “He said three hours, so we’ll give him three hours. I don’t want us rushing in on a bad situation.”

“He’s your brother! Don’t you care at all about him?”

“I care, goddammit,” Gabe says, grinding his teeth. “You don’t think I care? I’ve been waitin’ for him to come home for the last twelve years of my life! Growing up, he was my best friend and then I lost him!”

“Then let’s go!” I plead. “If we don’t, he could be gone forever.”

“I’m responsible for everyone here, including my wife,” he says. “I’m not going to be the guy who gets the women killed. Not going to happen.”

Fuck it. I’m an emotional, crying mess. Julia, on the other hand, is still as white as a ghost and as silent as a mime. I think this situation has really shaken her up, and I’m not surprised one bit.

Gabe is pacing the room and chain smoking cigarettes. Every now and then, he switches on the news to see if anything is being said on the subject, but nothing has been reported. He eventually gives up and sits on the motel bed.

“We leave right at the third hour mark,” he finally says. “But we’re being careful about things. I don’t want to lose any of you.”

“Julia should stay back,” I say. She doesn’t protest.

Gabe looks at her and whispers something. She nods her head and starts bawling. He holds her and looks over at me, with a tired expression. He nods.

What I wouldn’t give to have Soren back here with me, holding me in his strong arms, pulling me in close. I wish we could enjoy our homes together. Please, if there is anything out there… help him. Help him get home in one peace.

Silence. All I hear is silence and the muffled cries of Julia. For the next twenty minutes, that’s all that surrounds me. No answers. Nothing. And then it hits the third hour mark.

“I’m getting the hell out of here,” I tell Gabe. “I can’t sit around any longer. Either you’re coming with me or you’re staying here. It’s your choice, but I’m out.”

He looks at Julia. She wants him to stay, but he clearly wants to find his brother. “I won’t be long,” he tells her. “I love you.” She nods and he kisses her forehead.

“Let’s go,” he tells me. We leave the motel and head back toward Mary’s house.

“What if he’s—” I stop myself before finishing the sentence. I shouldn’t get that dark. He’s fine.

“Dead? What if he’s dead? Is that what you were going to ask me?” he asks.

“I guess so,” I whisper. My throat is dry when I try to swallow. My nerves are alert and erratic. Soren is strong. He’s a survivor. He’s got that type of luck on his side, at least. But can it last forever?

“If he’s dead, we’ll have to tread very lightly. They’ll be on the hunt for the rest of us, no doubt,” he says. “But he’s not dead. He’s alive. I feel it. Let’s call that brotherly intuition.”

I don’t know how to feel. All I know how to do is push my body forward and look at the ground in front of me. He feels it too. I can sense that much. For the rest of the walk, we don’t say a word. There’s only the crunch from the twigs and leaves below our feet.

Finally, we get there. It takes some quiet footsteps, but we make our way inside, only to find two men dead. “No sight of Soren anywhere,” I say. “Fuck, I have to get out of here.”

I run outside and nearly vomit. “What’s the matter?” Gabe asks. “You’ve never seen a dead body before?”

“Fuck off, Gabe,” I say.

He smiles, trying to be as lighthearted as he can, but it’s futile. This is as dark as it gets. This is officially the worst day of my life.

“Look,” Gabe points. “Over here. There’s a trail of blood.”

“Soren!” I scream. “Do you think?”

“I don’t know,” he says. “But we should follow it. Maybe we’ll find him.”

“There are more of them out there. Aren’t there?” I ask. “There weren’t only two of them.”

“There’s one,” he says. “Keep your eyes peeled.”

We walk until we get back to the roads into town. The trail of blood mysteriously disappears at the edge of the forest. “Where do we go from here?” I ask Gabe.

He looks both ways and takes a breath. We’ve both been walking for at least two hours and it’s completely exhausting. “I’m going to be honest with you. I have no fucking clue,” he says. “I feel dead.”

“Me too,” I sigh.

“Maybe we should head back,” Gabe says. “This is getting too difficult to follow. If he’s alive, he’ll find us.”

“I can’t just turn around,” I say. “I need to know he’s okay.”

“You really love him, huh?” he asks.

“I do,” I tell him.

“Even after going through all of this shit?” he laughs. “You’re crazy.”

“You’ve never met anyone who makes you want to go through anything just to feel them again, or breathe in their scent, or laugh with them at all of their bad jokes?” I ask.

“Julia,” he nods. “But I don’t think she’d do the same for me.” He laughs and stares off into the distance for answers.

“Soren is like that for me. It’s an urge that aches inside my bones. When I’m without him, my stomach turns with pain. When he’s near me, I feel like the world is complete,” I say. “Even after going through all of this, it honestly just makes me want him more. And when I see him, I’m going to go crazy on him. I’m going to let him—”

“Alright, alright!” Gabe laughs. “That’s my brother you’re talking about.”

Footsteps sound behind us. “You talking about me again?”

I turn around and nearly fall over. “Soren!” I scream.

“Happy to see me?” He smiles. God, he has no idea.

“You bastard,” I cry and throw my arms around him. Our lips collide and we kiss. I breathe in and am instantly filled with comfort. “My bastard.”

“You guys are fucking weird,” Gabe laughs.

Soren flips him off. “God, I missed you so much,” he says, cradling my head. He kisses me again and smiles. “I’m sorry it took so long. Mary. She got hit in the arm.”

“Mary got hit?!” I’m shocked. She’s too old to take a bullet.

“Oddly enough, I think she’s going to be okay. I don’t get it either, but the doctors seemed confident. She had me worried for a while. She was saying her goodbyes to me,” he says.

“What’s in the briefcase?” Gabe asks him.

Soren holds it up and looks at it. “What? This old thing? It’s nothing.” He smiles.

“Tell me,” Gabe says. “I know there’s something good in that thing.”

Soren turns serious. “Half of this is yours, Gabe. Mary kept it for us. She wanted to give it to us when we were together. It’s from Dad.”

“Dad? Bullshit,” Gabe says. “Dad never gave us anything in his life.”

“He did,” Soren says. “Apparently he had been saving some of his earnings throughout the years. There’s 800,000 in here, half of which goes to you, brother. The other 400,000 goes to Emma. My fiancée.”

“Wait, a second,” Gabe takes a step forward and looks confused as hell. “You just dropped a load of bombs on me, bro. None of this is making any sense. You’re getting married too? What in the hell is going on here?”

Soren opens the briefcase and sure enough, there’s stacks upon stacks of money. Gabe looks at me and I look right back at him. We’re on the same page here.

Soren continues. “I didn’t believe it either, but Mary assures me it wasn’t her. It was Dad. Every time he got some money, he gave a portion to Mary. The bastard probably didn’t trust himself to deliver it to us, so he had her hold it for him. This covers my shop. This covers everything. I can open up something new. I can finally start over,” he says. “As for this beauty here, she’s my fiancée now. I proposed to her right before they started firing.”

“Very romantic,” I say.

“Man, you guys really are weird,” he says. “Man, I can put that money into my business. Goddamn, Jim! You ended up coming through after all!”

Soren looks at me now, with the biggest smile he’s ever shown. “We can do whatever we want, baby. It’s not millions, but it’s a start.”

“I have another favor to ask you,” I tell him.

“Anything,” he says. “Just name it and it’s done.”

“I want to go back to Los Angeles. I want to be closer to my family,” I tell him, feeling my heart start to race again.

“Seriously? But you haven’t even started the job at Johannson Publishing,” he says.

“I know,” I sigh. “I miss my mom. I miss the warm ocean breeze. I miss the city, which I know you hate, but it’s really wonderful. You’d like it and there are so many opportunities to run an auto shop out there.”

“Hm,” he thinks to himself. “I’ve put you through enough out here, I guess.”

“Is that a yes?” I ask him.

But before he can respond, there’s a rustle in the bushes and a loud cry of pain. It takes one turn of the head to see the barrel of a gun explode in my direction.