I Wanted One Stepbrother, So All Three Claimed Me novel · Chapter 12 of 24

Chapter 12: Ninety-Five Nights

Nobody was talking, and the soup had gone cold.

Kenji sat at the kitchen table at three in the morning in a dry T-shirt.

He had a towel around his shoulders, and his hair dripped onto the oak.

Leif sat across from him. Erik sat at his left, Soren at his right.

Between them on the table, with the rubber band off, lay the green notebook.

Leif put his hand on it.

"I'm going to say it plain," he said. "And then you can say whatever you want. Okay?"

"Say it."

"On the fifth of September, your third night here, I came down at two to check the stove. You were on the porch."

Kenji went very still.

"You were barefoot," Leif said. "You were standing at the top of the steps with your hand out, waiting for a car. It was forty degrees. I asked you what you were doing."

"I don't remember that."

"You said, 'Dad's late.' You said it twice. You said he was supposed to pick you up from the hospital." Leif's voice was calm and careful, and his hand on the notebook was white. "You weren't awake, Kenji. You were asleep with your eyes open."

The kitchen clock ticked.

"I used to walk," Kenji said. His throat hurt. "After the funeral. It happened a few times. Mom told me it was grief. I thought it stopped."

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