out and got drugs from somewhere just to frame you? How would she even know which suitcase you were going to use? How could she know I was going to look under the lining? If that’s your proof, it’s pretty weak, Salinger.” Jeno grumbled the words, but his arms dropped from where they were locked around his torso and he was finally looking at me.
Maren pointed at my phone and looked at my brother with a frown. “You need to watch the video. Who knows if what she put in the suitcase is really narcotics or not, but it looks real to me.”
“You installed more cameras and didn’t tell me? So, all this time you haven’t trusted me fully either?” Jeno scowled and put a hand over his pocket, where I was pretty sure he put the stash before charging at me. “All I’ve ever done is clean up after you. I can’t believe you went behind my back and didn’t tell me you were changing the security at the house. I’m telling you, my mom wouldn’t do that. She might not like you, but she wouldn’t do something that might get you killed. She knows how out of control you are when you’re using. She knows I would never be able to forgive her if she did something like that to you.” Instead of sounding angry, he was starting to sound scared and desperate.
“I trust you with my life. I don’t trust Toren as far as I can throw her. You forget, before she was my enemy, she was my stepmother. She used to go through my stuff when we all lived under the same roof. She was constantly trying to stir the pot between my dad and me. She wouldn’t listen when I told her repeatedly that man couldn’t care less about me if he tried. This is nothing new.” I sighed and tapped on the video so I could attach it to an email and send it to his phone, so he could see what went down for himself. “You never answered my question. Was your mom at our house sometime before we left?”
Again, my brother lapsed into a steely silence, but I could see a muscle in his cheek twitch. Eventually, he met my gaze and quietly admitted, “She was there. We went out for lunch and she said she wanted to help me pack since this was the first time I would be on set with you for such a long time. I kept an eye on her the whole time she was there since you were at Maren’s, and I knew you didn’t want her wandering around the house. She asked about the leather jacket, if I wanted to take it or not. I told her it was yours, and she offered to drop it in your room. She did ask if it was something you would pack, and I told her I had no idea. She was gone longer than she should’ve been, but I didn’t think anything of it at the time.”
I swore under my breath as Maren reached out the hand that wasn’t holding the bag of ice to my face to cover one of my clenched fists. “She was probably going to put whatever she had in the coat, but figured it was better to go for the suitcase because you absolutely had to travel with that.”
Jeno sucked in a breath as he stared at his phone. He went pale as he watched the video.
“If the video isn’t enough, I’ll do a drug test right now. I’ll even do it in front of Maren to show how serious I am.” I closed my eyes and let my head fall forward until my forehead touched Maren’s. Almost instantly, some of the jagged pieces of my heart that were shredding my insides felt a little softer. It would be a hot minute before I stopped bleeding pain. “We went through customs. Not to mention the airport. Do you have any idea how wrong things could’ve gone if they pulled my luggage and went through it before you got the chance?”
Maren squeezed my hand even tighter. I felt her exhale against my lips as she shuddered slightly. “Thank goodness that didn’t happen.”
We both jumped a minute later when Jeno’s phone went flying through the air and landed on the floor with a clatter so loud there was no way the screen could survive. “You would’ve gone to jail. The movie would crash and