No pause. No internal debate. No last stand from the part of me that usually insists on caution. His mouth shifts against mine, deeper this time, and something in me gives so fast it feels like betrayal. He touches me like he already knows I bruise in places nobody can see.
That should not feel this dangerous.
It does.
Because some awful, hopeful part of me is already answering a question he hasn’t actually asked. When we break apart again, he still hasn’t moved his hand from my face, and mine is still fisted in his jacket like I need the leverage.
Neither of us steps back. My phone rings.
Fuck.
Of course it does. I answer because apparently I’m still me, even half-melted and furious about it. He watches me the whole time—steady, tracking every shift in my expression like he’s reading a play develop in real time. I hang up. Look at him.
“The rival outlet wants a comment by morning.”
He doesn’t say anything.
“About us.”
The air shifts. The space between us is gone, and neither of us seems in any hurry to fix that. That feels like an answer.
Maybe not a safe one.
But definitely an answer.
Chapter ten
Jax
Brickisonmychest at six AM.
I didn’t sleep. could’nt.
Still awake at two, running the parking lot back like a bad goal — frame by frame until there’s nothing left I haven’t seen. That’s how it works. You keep going until it stops changing.
It doesn’t take long.
You know what happened. Where you were. Where you shouldn’t have been.
Doesn’t take long with this either.
The second kiss.
I’ve run it enough times to know regret isn’t the problem. That’s the part that sticks. Not the kiss. The fact that I knew exactly what I was doing and did it anyway, and if you put me back in that parking lot right now nothing changes.
Brick shifts and puts more weight on my sternum like he’s got an opinion.
“I know,” I tell him.
He blinks once and settles in.
I get up at five. Make coffee. Stand at the counter because it’s something to do with my hands that isn’t thinking. The house is too quiet. I don’t turn anything on.
By practice, I’m sharp. Too sharp — three hours of sleep and nowhere to put it except the crease. The net doesn’t care what happened in a parking lot at midnight. It needs one thing from me. I give it that.
Nothing gets through.
It’s easier when there’s something in front of me to stop.
