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“It’s okay,” Gabe says softly. “We’ll give you all the space you need.”

She stands there for a moment longer and then she’s gone and I can’t breathe.

Finally, when my lungs are burning, I drag in a breath.

Gabe puts a hand on my arm and I shrug it off.

“I’m going to fucking kill Seth,” he mutters, but I keep lying there, staring at the wall.

Margo left. She left because she’s scared, and I didn’t go after her. Mostly because I went after Belle and it didn’t change anything. I still ended up drunk at a dive bar during a blizzard.

I can’t go back there. I can’t do that again.

“Cole. Don’t clam up.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“She’ll be back.”

My throat works. “You don’t know that.”

Gabe goes silent, and we don’t speak for a long time. Not until Marcus comes back into the house, slamming the door behind him.

“Where’s your booze?” he barks, and that’s when I sit up.

“Thank God,” I mutter.

Gabe frowns. “I feel like drowning our sorrows isn’t the best idea.”

“Fuck you, Gabe,” Marcus snarls.

In the end, Gabe gives in and we knock down a bottle of Scotch between the three of us. I pass out in the recliner, Marcus stretches out on the couch, and Gabe takes the loveseat, curled in on himself.

We don’t speak when we wake, all hungover and emotionally wrung out. I don’t remember what we talked about last night, but I’m sure it was Margo.

And how none of us want her gone.

We arrive at the kitchen before dawn.

We wait for hours.

Margo doesn’t show.

“Should we call her? Did she make it home okay?” Marcus worries. He’s been checking his phone obsessively all morning.

I shake my head.

“She asked for space,” I say flatly. “We give it to her.”

Gabe frowns but doesn’t protest.

“We can’t let her lose this,” he says firmly.

I watch him, listless. Marcus doesn’t speak. Doesn’t move.

Gabe starts to make calls, but before he gets far, the kitchen door opens. Nobody called them.

Four women pile in ahead of the high school kids, all chattering to themselves and giving us strange looks. Gabe and Marcus teach everyone what to do.