Eli waves amidst the chorus of hellos. “You guys look like you’re set. I won’t stay. I just wanted to bring you that information you asked for, Tank.”
I set the beer down on the floor and hand the pizzas off to Gabe. I take the envelope he’s holding out. He seems uncomfortable and I can’t get why. We’ve never really hung out before but I wanted him to meet my brothers. Yet, he’s acting like he can’t wait to get out of here.
“Okay, if you can’t stay I understand. I just figured you might want to escape for a while.”
He drops his head. “Yeah. I just bought the house and it’s been taken over by a bunch of women I haven’t seen since I was in Sunday school as a kid.”
“Eli just got engaged,” I mention to the others. “His fiancée is in the middle of planning the wedding.”
Zack gets up and walks to the kitchen. When he comes back, he hands a beer to Eli. “You probably need this.”
Eli laughs but stops when he sees me ripping open the envelope. “Hey, I’m going to give you guys some privacy for a minute.” He doesn’t look at me before walking into the kitchen.
Zack looks at me and shrugs. “What’s going on with him?”
“I have no idea—“ I stop in mid-sentence when I pull out the stack of files in the envelope. I asked Eli to assist with a background check that was proving more challenging than I’d expected. He’s got a magic touch with finding things that other people want to keep hidden.
My brother Lucas obviously didn’t want to be found.
Zack follows me as I walk over to the couch still scrutinizing the pictures. Gabe and Finn look up as I step in front of the television.
“I think my boss is trying to distance himself just in case any of you turn out to be closet racists.” They all look over at Eli, who is currently bent over trying to pretend he’s fascinated by the contents of Finn’s refrigerator.
I look too, trying to see him through their eyes. He’s a heavily muscled, dark-skinned guy with a shaved head. I’ve never thought too much about what he looks like before, mainly because it doesn’t matter. He’s an exceptional boss and an even better friend. That’s all I care about. And without even asking, I know my brothers are the same way.
I raise my voice. “Eli, you can come over here now. It’s cool.”
He looks up at the sound of my voice. “You sure?” He glances over at the others, uncertainly. At their nods of agreement, he walks over and perches on the arm of the couch.
I turn to the others. “I needed Eli’s special touch to find someone. He came through, as usual.”
I hold up one of the pictures. A tall, thin young man with light brown skin and curly hair is shown crossing the street. He’s wearing sunglasses but there’s no denying that he looks like us.
“That’s him?” Gabe reaches out to take the picture. When he’s done looking at it, he passes it to Zack.
“Yeah. Lucas Brown Marshall. Age 22. Also known as Luke,” I say, reading from the typed summary sheet that Eli included. “He’s some kind of child prodigy. He graduated high school at 16 and college at 19. He owns a software development company. It says here that when he was on summer vacation one year, he created the program that the majority of the state’s hospitals use to keep patient’s digital records secure.”
“I guess he was bored that summer,” Gabe comments.
Finn claps him on the back and snorts out a laugh. “Yeah, I guess so.”
I continue reading. “His mother, Anita Brown Marshall, owns a bakery called Anita’s Place.”
Gabe sits forward. “I’ve been there a bunch of times. Best damn cheesecake I’ve ever had. So, what’s the plan? Should we go there and wait for him to show up?”
I look at some of the other pictures. Eli retreated because he was worried that my brothers’ initial reactions would be less than positive. But what if Luke’s reaction isn’t positive? It makes sense that he was so hard to find now that I know he’s some kind of cyber genius. He’s probably been taking steps to erase his digital footprint since he started using a computer. And if he’s taking that many precautions, he might not take too kindly to being found.
For any reason.
“I’m not so sure about that. A gang of white guys rolls up and says ‘Surprise, we’re your brothers’ ?”
Zack makes a face. “Right. Because I can’t see anything going wrong with that plan.”
There’s a beat of silence and then we all laugh. Finn has the picture now. He hands it back to me and I slide it back in the envelope.
“Look, I want to say something.” They all quiet down and I try to get my thoughts together. “The past few months have been insane. My mom was diagnosed with cancer again and the father I haven’t seen in years is suddenly not only in my life but making some pretty crazy demands.”
The others nod at that.
“We still don’t know what old Max is up to or what any of this ultimately means but we have a choice going forward. We can let him call all the shots or we can stick together and figure this thing out. I’m counting on us being stronger as a group than apart. And no matter what else happens, I’m happy I got some more brothers out of the deal.”
Finn raises his beer in agreement. The others follow suit. “To brothers.”
Eli raises his beer, too. “Now, you know that’s something I can drink to. To brothers.”