"I disagree."
"Are you gonna play or talk my ears off?"
Scowling, Tristan made his move, then picked up his dice and persisted.
"So, what's the deal? Your personal life too?"
Cade sighed with resignation. "I guess."
"So what, did someone let you down and now you don't trust people?"
"Something like that," he evaded as he shifted his pieces.
"So who? A partner?"
"I don't have one."
"That's good considering what we did earlier. But I meant in the past."
"Never had one."
Tristan's eyebrows shot up. "You've never been in a relationship? Never loved someone?"
The words cut deeper than Cade expected them to.
"No. Can you move now and stop talking about my love life?"
Huffing, Tristan took his turn, and it was blissfully quiet for a while until he eventually asked, "What about your family? You don't rely on them either?"
"Don't have that either."
Tristan froze and flicked his eyes to Cade's. "Like, you're estranged from them? Because of your job?"
"No. I don't have any."
"Like at all?"
"No."
He had tried to sound detached and unbothered, but Tristan must have read between the lines, recognizing his isolation and maybe even his loneliness, because his mouth turned down, and he quietly responded, "I'm sorry."
The compassion etched on the other man's face was so unexpected and unfamiliar that it flustered Cade to the point of discomfort.
"What happened to them?"
Too overwhelmed by all he had already disclosed, he insisted, "It doesn't matter."
"That sounds like a lie you've always told yourself."
Internally blanching at that truth bomb, he avoided his opponent's eyes and prompted, "It's your move."
Eyes squinting, Tristan studied him, maybe assessing how much to push the issue.
"Sometimes it helps to share things with other people, you know."
"I'm good," he insisted, ignoring the pressure in his chest.
"Are you?" Tristan asked quietly.
