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My brother was being uncharacteristically talkative

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My brother was being uncharacteristically talkative.

Granted, he hadn't actually said a single word, but he'd actually been following along with my conversation, grunting occasionally and nodding his head, his eyes glittering like he was actually paying attention to what I was saying which was a miracle in and of itself.

"Anyway, so they were supposed to go out last night with the whole group, but since she hadn't been at school most of the week I figured she was just sick or something and would come since her friend was going with Carter, but nope. She never showed up, and even her friend Mori hasn't heard from her."

Grey nodded his head, seemingly intrigued with our conversation.

"And Colton was so pissed. I don't think I've ever seen that guy so mad. I asked him where she was and he almost hit me. Hit me! Can you fucking believe that? It's some bullshit, is what it is. I wonder where she is."

I hadn't been able to take my mind off of Cami all week, especially not since she'd pulled her great disappearing act.

She'd become the talk of the school after Colton's show he'd put on at the museum trip, and she had just blown school off for the rest of the week like she wasn't suddenly the school's newest shiny toy to talk about.

It was wrong, the things they were saying about her.

Camille Astor wasn't well known in social circles. She'd been best friends with Mori since coming to school at the start of the semester, but before that she was a complete mystery.

I'd even broken down to googling her name, but the internet was either scrubbed clean of anything mentioning her, or she never had anything noteworthy ever reported about her.

Of course, the Astor name had pulled up tons and tons of search results, being the prominent family name that it was, but ever since the scandal a few years ago that wiped most of them off the map, they'd gone silent.

Scarlett Astor hadn't gone silent, though. No, she'd been murdered by her husband, who was sitting pretty at San Quentin State Prison carrying out a life sentence for that one.

The articles wouldn't shut up about the money laundering, the cheating wife who'd stepped out on her husband with his work partner, and their twelve year old daughter caught in the crossfire who'd gone into foster care with a massive trust fund hanging over her head, being lorded over by the state of California, per her parent's will.

Who knew where that poor girl was now. The articles had never named her for her privacy.

Grey rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand and I realized the time, wondering why my big brother had let me ramble on about some random girl for fifteen minutes straight without walking away.

"Hey, so, are you doing okay?"

Grey became deathly still. He always hated the 'how are you doing' question.

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