One True Thing (35 page)

“Asher Kyriakides?”

“Yes. Can I help you?”

“Yes, this is Lara Foster from the Melrose

Collections Agency. I’m calling to talk to you

about your outstanding bills.”

“Collections agency?” I was bewildered. I’d

paid off my new bedroom set right away, and my

car was up to date, and my phone. “I don’t have

any outstanding bills, Ms. Foster.”

“I have here that you are six months

delinquent on your Visa bill. It’s been in our

system since August, but we just recently found

this phone number listed for you through another

agency.”

“What was the previous number you had on

my account?” I asked. Even though it should’ve

been impossible, I had a sinking feeling I knew

exactly what number that would be. And just as I’d

been afraid of, Ms. Foster from Melrose

Collections read off Archer’s phone number.

“Ms. Foster, there has to be some mistake.

That phone number belongs to
Archer
Kyriakides,

not me. He’s my twin brother. I don’t have a Visa.”

Even my debit card was a MasterCard.

“There’s no mistake. The card is in your

name. We don’t have an Archer on the account at

all.”

I felt sick to my stomach all of a sudden.

“And exactly how much money is due.”

There were clicking noises in the background.

“With interest… you’re looking at a full payment

of twenty thousand four hundred fifty-seven dollars

and sixty cents.” I just about passed out, right there

in the middle of the store. “We can discuss

payment plans or—”

“Miss, can I call you back? I need to get in a

better place. I’m in the middle of the grocery

store.”

“Yes, that would be fine.” She read off her

extension, and I hung up. My head was spinning. I

mechanically walked through the checkout line, put

the groceries in my car, and drove to my new

home, where I put the groceries away and sat on

the couch, staring at the wall. I needed to call Lara

Foster back, get her to understand that it was
not

my account and I had nowhere close to twenty

thousand dollars. I barely had the extra cash to

cover the four hundred whatever that came after it.

It had to be a mistake. There really was no other

possibility, ’cause if somehow that much money

had my name on it, I was fucking screwed.

I called the collections agency back and went

around in circles with Lara for nearly an hour. No

matter how many times I told her I’d never applied

for a Visa, let alone spent money on one, she

repeated over and over that the card was in my

name, and while I could possibly try to prove

identity theft, it would be difficult, since the party

using the card had been doing so successfully for a

number of months. By the time I hung up, I was

about ready to kill someone. More than likely

Archer.

I grabbed my keys and locked the door. There

was one good way to clear the whole thing up. I

vibrated the whole way over to my old apartment.

I realized I should’ve called first, gotten my facts

straight, talked to Dusty, probably just about

anything but jumping in the car and rushing over to

confront my typically borderline hostile brother.

Not one of my most thoroughly thought-out plans.

Still, I followed through. I knocked, then

pounded until Archer opened the door with sleep-

tousled hair and a sour sneer on his face.

“Seriously, Ash. What the fuck?”

I held up the statement that I’d gotten Lara to

e-mail me near the end of our lengthy conversation.

“
This
is what. Tell me it’s a mistake, Arch. Tell

me it has nothing to do with you.”

Archer shrugged. “Whatever. Just ignore the

phone calls. I have been.”

“So it
is
you?” I nearly choked on my rage.

“You really opened a goddamn credit card in my

name?”

“Well, it’s not like they were going to give

me
one.” Archer snorted. “Do you have any idea

what my credit looks like?”

“This is stealing!”

“More like borrowing.” Archer gave me his

most angelic look. I knew it well. “After all, we

are family.”
Not after I strangle you we won’t be.

“Okay, so you borrowed, and now it’s time to

pay up. What’s your brilliant plan for dealing with

this? What are you going to do?” I shoved the

paper at his chest again, hoping that there might be

some sort of recognition in his eyes, some clue that

my brother realized he’d fucked up royally and he

had to fix it.

“Same as I’ve been doing for months. Ignore

it. Quit having such a goddamn cow, Ash. It’s not

like they’re going to come and arrest you.”

“You don’t know that!” It would be a long

time, probably, until anything got that dire, but I

wasn’t in the mood for rationality.

“I’m going back to bed. If you pound on my

door again, I’m seriously going to do something

violent. I was up until nearly six this morning.”

“Working?”

Archer made a rude scoffing noise and shut

the door in my face.

Mother-fucking-fucker.
What was I supposed

to do?

WHEN I got home from the debacle with Archer

where I tried to convince him to be a human and he

acted like he always did, Dusty was in the kitchen

boiling pasta and simmering one of his amazing

sauces. Usually, I’d be salivating and waiting for

dinner, but all I could do was sit and stare at the

wall. Dusty came in, concerned and amazingly

cuddly.

“What’s wrong, love?” He’d started calling

me that a few weeks before. It usually made me

melt. At the moment, nothing was getting through

my wall of “what the hell am I going to do?”

“Just had a really shitty day.”
Tell him!
I

wanted to. I trusted him with my life and

everything else, but I just couldn’t stand to say the

words.
My brother screwed me over more than I

thought he was ever capable of. I don’t see a way

out of it.

“C’mere.” He pulled me into his arms and

wrapped his top leg around me. “Didn’t anyone

ever tell you that shitty-day cuddles are practically

the purpose of boyfriends?”

“Yeah? I thought it was hot sex all over the

apartment after spending the day getting all heated

up at a porn shoot.” I chuckled at Dusty’s shiver.

The memory helped a lot.

“Maybe it’s both.” Dusty smiled softly and

brushed a kiss on my jawline. “I love you, ’kay?

Let me know if you want to talk about today.”

I nodded slowly. Eventually, I’d be ready. “I

will. Right now I just need you.”

Chapter Sixteen

Dusty

“ARE you going to tell me what’s wrong?”

Asher’s head jerked up from the salad he’d

been staring and poking at for the past ten minutes.

“Huh?”

I gestured to his plate. “You’ve barely

touched your food.” My own salad was less than

half-finished. I was too worried about whatever it

was that was worrying
him
to concentrate on

eating.

Asher shrugged a little. “It’s good. I’m just…

not very hungry.”

He hadn’t had much of an appetite for almost

a week. I’d noticed. Ever since that “shitty day”

he’d refused to tell me about, he’d been distracted

and withdrawn. His silence puzzled me, and it

made me nervous. I thought he knew he could say

anything to me—I’d offered to listen more than

once—but whatever it was that had been bothering

him, he was keeping it close to his chest.

It hurt that he might not feel like he could

share with me, because I couldn’t see any reason

why
. It hurt even more that I’d been trying to talk to

him about my sister, and he obviously hadn’t been

listening.

Our conversation about my family had been

weighing on my mind a lot lately. We hadn’t

discussed my sister since the drive back from

Sonoma after visiting his parents, but I’d been

thinking about her, and the idea of contacting her,

on and off over the last couple of weeks. Actually,

I could time it back to the move from Erik and

Rue’s place to Asher’s apartment.
Our
apartment.

Erik and Rue had been thrilled for me and

waved away my concerns about leaving them in a

financial bind. They’d been putting money away in

the months we’d all been living together, and they

were both earning more than before. They’d

assured me they could handle it, and I believed

them. We would still be there for each other no

matter what happened. We were family. That

wasn’t about to change because I was living a few

miles away. And Asher, well, he’d become an

intrinsic member of our little fold, at least for me.

With him was where I belonged.

But thoughts of family and distance had

naturally brought my sister to mind. Thousands of

miles separated us, and my parents had done their

damnedest to keep us apart even when we lived in

the same town, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t

hope for us. It didn’t mean she wasn’t wishing for

some kind of contact herself. We were blood, and

we’d been close once. Maybe, just maybe, we

could have that again someday. All I had to do was

work up the courage to try. I knew that would be

the hardest part.

I’d been attempting to say as much to Asher

before I realized he wasn’t hearing a word. His

brown eyes, normally so warm and open, had

grown dark and troubled in the last several days. It

upset me to see them so shuttered. “Ash… please.

You have to tell me what’s wrong. It’s killing me

seeing you all stressed out and not knowing why.”

He was quiet for a long time, long enough that

I thought he wouldn’t answer, and my stomach had

started doing its best to twist itself into knots, but

finally he started talking. By the time he’d finished

telling me about the situation he was in, what

Archer had done, the twisty, uncomfortable feeling

had evolved into outright nausea.

“Oh, God,” I said. My tone was horrified, and

no surprise. Twenty thousand dollars’ worth of

credit card debt. It boggled the mind. What the hell

had he spent it all on? Asher probably didn’t even

know. “Holy shit.”

Asher nodded miserably. “I don’t know what

to do. I used most of my savings to move into this

place.” He waved vaguely at the room that

surrounded us. “I only have maybe a grand left, if

that. I don’t have anywhere near the amount of

extra income to cover the monthly fee for the

payment plan they suggested. I am screwed.

Totally fucking screwed. I don’t even….”

He trailed off and buried his face in his

hands. I couldn’t help myself. I didn’t question

why he hadn’t told me before. I just stood and went

over to him, wrapped my arms around him, and

drew his head against my chest.

How could Archer do it? How could he do

such a thing to his own brother? God, I was furious

with him. It was his responsibility to clean up this

mess.
His
.

“Honey….” I hesitated, knowing Asher

probably wouldn’t like what I was going to ask

next, but it had to be said. “Have you thought about

going to the cops? This is identity theft. It’s a