Logan shifts on the couch. “You need anything before you go?”
“No,” I snap automatically.
Then I inhale and soften it by a fraction, because Pops is watching and because I’m not a monster.
“Be nice,” I add, pointing at Logan with a warning.
Logan looks genuinely offended. “To who?”
“To my dad,” I say.
Pops chuckles. “I think he can handle that.”
Logan’s gaze holds mine for a beat too long. “Drive safe,” he says quietly.
The words shouldn’t hit me.
They do anyway—because he didn’t say them like a joke. He said them like he meant them.
I force my voice back into armor. “Don’t tell me what to do.”
Logan’s lips twitch. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”
I walk out before my heart can do anything stupid.
—
Jade pulls up with Blakely in the passenger seat, both of them blasting a song that is aggressively upbeat for ten in the morning.
Jade leans across the center console when I get in and shoves a coffee into my hands. “Drink. Immediately.”
I blink at the cup. It’s huge.
“This is not coffee,” I accuse. “This is a beverage-based cry for help.”
Jade grins. “It’s a coping mechanism.”
Blakely smiles softly. “We’re starting with coffee. Then Target. Then lunch. Then…whatever you want.”
I stare at her. “Target is not girls’ day.”
Jade gasps like I slapped her. “Target is the cornerstone of female mental health.”
Blakely nods with dead seriousness. “It’s science.”
I snort despite myself, and Jade’s eyes light up like she just scored a point.
“There,” she says. “That. More of that.”
I stare out the window as we pull away from my house, the tension in my shoulders easing by half a degree.
The relief is immediate and also guilty.
Because how dare I feel lighter when Pops…and Logan…are back there.
My brain tries to drag me into that guilt spiral.
Blakely’s voice cuts through it gently. “How’s your dad today?”
