Chapter 6

6

ISAAC

" Y ou are not going over there, Isaac!"

"Yes, I am," I said, starting to get frustrated. Jordan was blocking the door with his body now, arms and legs spread wide. I'd find it funny if I wasn't gonna be late. I hated being late to anything. Just the thought had anxiety buzzing through me. Anxiety that had nothing to do with the butterflies currently swarming through my stomach over getting to see Brody again. Nothing at all.

"You will have to kill me and crawl over my dead body if you want to leave this room!"

"Oh my god, dude, you're so fucking dramatic. And unoriginal. Just move, Jordan!" I tried shoving him, but he wouldn't budge.

A knock sounded through the thin wood, and we froze. "Everything okay in there?" said a muffled voice.

"Everything's fine, Josh, I'm just trying to save Isaac's life and he won't let me!"

"Isaac, let him save your life," said Josh The Traitor.

"Go away, Josh!" I yelled.

"Fine. I tried," he said, then I heard his feet moving down the hallway. That's what he called trying?

"Jordan," I said, giving him a fierce glare, "please move. Seriously. I made a deal with Brody and I need to keep my end of it, okay? Nothing is going to happen. And if I need help, I'll call you, okay? Okay??"

Jordan squinted at me. "You promise you'll call me?"

"I promise."

"Fine. And I already texted Jamie to be my eyes and ears."

Jesus Christ. With a disgusted scoff, I pushed him aside and he let me. "I'll see you later," I said. Then I was out the door and in my car and at Jamie's house in no time. Which, I guess technically it wasn't just Jamie's house, but before Brody, he was really the only person I knew who lived here.

As I walked up the front path my heart was pounding, almost arrhythmically, and the erratic beats were a little concerning and did nothing for the anxiety pummeling me from every direction. My palms were sweaty as I lifted my hand to knock on the door, and it swung open before I even touched it.

"Isaac," said Brody, smiling like just seeing me made him happy or something. "Hey. Come on in."

He looked good. Really, really good. His hair was slightly damp and slicked back, like he'd just taken a shower, and he had on a black long-sleeved shirt and black sweatpants and I swore I saw the outline of his dick before he turned to lead me to the basement. My eyes were glued to his ass the entire time, and fuck, what an ass. Firm and round and Christ, how thin were those sweats anyway? Was he even wearing underwear? I was placing all bets on fuck no . I could practically see every single magnificent muscle flexing beneath the cotton and I was hard before we even got to the stairs.

Brody led me down to his room—rooms, actually—and my first thought was that it was as neat and tidy as a psychopath's house. Nothing was out of place, there were no clothes lying around, no dirty dishes left on surfaces. It smelled like incense, which I liked because I'd come to associate that smell with Brody. The main area was a big open space that had a long black leather couch facing a huge flat screen on one side and a pool table on the other. There was a plaid blanket over the back of the couch, and I imagined Brody lying down and watching TV, one arm crooked behind his head and the other sneaking beneath the blanket, where he was completely naked. All that tan flesh on display, his long fingers trailing down a black line of soft hair on his lower stomach that would lead straight to?—

"—thought we'd be more comfortable in there," Brody said.

"What now?" I felt like I was coming out of a daze, and my cheeks grew warm at the direction my thoughts had taken.

Brody's eyes drifted over me, pausing on my flushed cheeks, and then he licked his lips. "I was saying I thought we'd be more comfortable in the bedroom," he said, and was his voice huskier?

Wait, the bedroom? Hell no. "What's wrong with right here?" I asked, gesturing to the couch.

"Is this where you want to work?"

Why did I feel like I was being tested? "Um, sure?"

He shrugged. "Okay. We'll do it out here."

Why did everything from those plush lips of his sound like some kind of come-on? Why did I like it so much? "Okay," I said.

"I'll be right back," he said, turning and giving me another long look at that beautiful ass as he walked down a short hallway and disappeared through an open door.

It was then I realized I'd given up berating myself for looking at him like that. I'd given up denying that I wanted Brody. But I was not about to give in to any of it. I'd never wanted a relationship—physical or emotional—before, had never been very taken with anyone I'd met anyway, but there was something about Brody. About the way he made me feel, the way he treated me, that made it hard for me to think around him. But I had made a promise to myself, all those years ago, that I'd never let another person have that kind of power over me again, that I'd never let anyone in, never lower my guard enough to let someone destroy me like Ethan had. I intended to keep that promise.

Brody came out of what I assumed was his bedroom carrying a laptop and a textbook and stopped in front of me. "You can sit," he said, his lips twitching.

"Oh. Yeah," I said, walking around the arm of the couch to sit at one end. I needed to shake this shit off and get myself together.

Brody sat down at the other end, and the couch had seemed a lot bigger before he'd come along. It felt too small now, and I couldn't look away as he propped his bare feet up on the coffee table, long and elegant and broad. My gaze kept going up his calves to the thin cotton clinging to strong thigh muscles. My eyes went even higher and almost bugged out of my head when I could absolutely, one hundred percent, see his cock. It was big. So fucking big, and my mouth started to water as I stared. Brody moved then, and his cock moved too, shifted a bit where it rested on his thigh, and a strangled cough erupted from my throat.

I was agonizingly, brutally, pitifully hard, so I grabbed the little throw pillow next to me and pulled it over my lap, refusing to meet Brody's eyes. He'd probably caught me staring, probably knew what was happening right now, but there was nothing I could do about it.

Fuck, this was going to shit already.

Thankfully, Brody said nothing about my strange behavior. He got right down to business. "Here," he said, leaning down the couch to hand me the book I was supposed to read to him. He had his laptop open on his lap now, and when I took the book, I looked at the title. The Fundamentals of Business . "You can skip the foreword. She wants us to read chapters one through sixteen, so I figured we could do a chapter a day? Start with chapter one today and go in order from there?"

I cleared my throat. "Uh, yeah. Sure. I mean, when do you not go in order outside of choose your own adventure books?" To my surprise, Brody actually laughed at my stupid joke, and of course I had to look at him. His eyes were crinkled at the corners, and he was shaking his head as if acknowledging that my attempt at humor was lacking but he appreciated it anyway. At least he was putting up with me, and looking damn good while doing it.

I looked back down at the book in my hands and sighed. I hoped I didn't fall asleep while reading this. I wasn't knocking his interests, but I couldn't claim to share them. I glanced at Brody, who was watching me expectantly, fingers poised over the keyboard. He looked fucking adorable like that, alert and intent and ready to take notes. Focused and tuned in. It hit me how…I don't know, intimate, it was to read to another person. I'd never done that in my life, and I'd never had anyone read to me, either. I was almost excited to do this for him, to be able to help him with something like this, to give him what he needed.

"Okay, so," I said, just to fill the silence, even though I was about to be filling it nonstop for two hours. I flipped the book open, found the first chapter, and started to read.

And I liked it. Not the book, no. I really liked the easiness of just reading words already written, of not having to understand or dissect the concepts myself, of listening to the constant clicking of the keys as he took notes. Every so often he'd stop me and ask me to re-read a line or two or three, and I liked that, too. His attentiveness to detail, his desire to make sure he understood the information being presented, the way he would mutter something to himself as if coming to some realization or grumbling about its usefulness. There was a comfortability here, in witnessing Brody be so devoted to his schoolwork. There was a deep satisfaction, too, at being able to help him. By the time the chapter had ended, I was—well, I was really thirsty, and my throat was a little sore, but I felt fulfilled in a way I never really had before. But, then again, I'm not sure I'd ever helped someone like this.

When I closed the book and Brody got up without a word, I thought—disappointedly—that that was that, and maybe my cue to show myself out. But he just went over to a little mini-fridge I hadn't noticed near the TV, pulled out two water bottles, and handed me one. "Oh, thanks," I said, unscrewing the cap and chugging almost the entire thing. "Yeah, that destroyed my throat."

The look Brody gave me was sharp and heated, but he said nothing, just sat down at the other end of the couch and spread his legs wide. One arm went over the back of the couch, angling him toward me, and the other draped over his lap, his fingers curled into a tight fist.

"You've got a nice reading voice," he said. "I could listen to you read anything, I think."

Pleasure curled low in my belly, and I'll admit my ego was a little inflated, too. I liked compliments. I didn't get a lot of them, but I always felt like I was floating when I got them.

"Well truthfully I was hoping you'd hate it and just call the whole thing off," I lied.

Brody chuckled. "Tell me something," he said, fingers picking at the blanket hanging over the back of the couch. Anticipation coursed through me, and I turned fully toward him. His eyes roamed lazily over me until they returned to mine with a searing intensity. "Who hurt you, Isaac?"

I felt like I'd just dropped fifty feet headfirst into cold water. I shoved to my feet and said bitingly, "Okay, we're done here. I'll see you on Saturday." Anger pulsed through my veins, thick and stinging, and I wasn't sure it was entirely directed at Brody.

I was halfway to the stairs when his soft voice stopped me mid-stride. "Hey. I just want to know you. Understand you better. Make sure I never make a mistake like that again. You don't have to run."

Without turning, fists clenched by my sides, I gritted out, "I'm not fucking running." And then I ran up the stairs and out the door and got in my car and left.

When Saturday morning rolled around, I realized that Brody and I had never discussed a time to meet. And he hadn't tried getting in touch with me, either. Probably because of the way I'd left, and although I felt a little bad about snapping at him and running away, I wasn't about to answer his question.

The cowardly part of me hoped that he'd come to the conclusion that this little arrangement wasn't what he'd thought it would be, that he didn't want to continue the affair, and maybe I should just not show up today. But I'd made a deal and I wasn't going to back out of it.

While Jordan snored across the room, I found the unknown number that I'd saved in my contacts as Brody and started a new text conversation.

Me:

Hey, what time did you want to meet today?

And then I waited. While I waited, definitely not checking the time every thirty seconds and wondering with each passing minute why he was taking so long to get back to me, I tried finding Brody on social media. Then I realized I didn't even know his last name, and stalking Jamie's friends lists didn't turn anything up because they weren't friends in real life, so why would he be friends with him in the virtual world? Giving up on finding him online, I opened my Kindle app and tried to read. But my mind kept wandering, my eyes kept checking the time—still no response—and so I gave in and let myself think about what I'd been trying to avoid and ignore since I met Brody: this weird, inexplicable attraction I felt toward him. And why. And how.

The only way I could explain it was that I'd been starved of any kind of sexual contact since, well, ever. Excluding what Ethan did to me when I was fourteen, that is. But what happened back then had such a profound impact on how I approached sex—meaning it was incredibly traumatic—that I ended up…not approaching it at all.

I tried once. There was a really sweet guy I met freshman year of college. He was a junior, and we were in the same Lit class. He asked me out, and, feeling particularly brave that day, I caved. Over the course of a few months, we spent a lot of time together, and I started feeling somewhat comfortable with him. I told him I had issues with touching and consent, and he respected whatever I asked for. I didn't let him touch me, and I didn't touch him, not sexually, but there was some…cuddling. It was all I felt I could handle. But there was no judgment from him, and when he finally asked if maybe I wanted to try something with him, I panicked and ended things.

I couldn't do it. The thought of having someone inside me again, the fear that it would be excruciating like that first time, the possibility of reliving that pain…I wasn't going to go through that again. The guy was just as understanding as he'd been all along. There were no hard feelings, no uncomfortable moments in class; it was as if our time together had never happened.

But ever since then, I'd really retreated into myself and refused to even consider doing all that again. It was humiliating, honestly, and I'd rather save myself from all that shame and embarrassment. Why go through it when I didn't have to? Plus, it's not like I was really missing out on anything.

So I wasn't sure why Brody, of all people, had caused this intense ache, a deep yearning for things I hadn't wanted in a long time.

And I wanted him. Bad. It was getting to the point that every time I saw him, I seemed to get painfully hard. But it wasn't just physical, and that was the worst part of all this. I could tell he was trying to respect my wishes, that he was actually sorry about triggering me, and the way he'd calmed me down…I couldn't think of another time in my life that anyone had cared enough to do that. Usually, whenever I'd have those kinds of episodes in high school or even the few I'd had since starting college, people tried to get as far away from me as possible. They didn't hold me. They didn't rub my back. They didn't whisper soothing words while I sobbed uncontrollably. They didn't wait it out with gentle hands and patient whispers.

They didn't see right past my prickly front and find it amusing. They didn't try to talk with me, ask me questions. They weren't patient and kind and funny.

Besides that first day at the vending machines and later at the party, Brody had been unerringly considerate and aware of my needs. That just didn't happen in my life—outside of that one guy who'd been really nice but I hadn't felt anything truly genuine for—and I found myself wanting more of whatever Brody had to offer. I thought about him way too much, like right now.

Glancing at the time again—how had an hour already passed? Was he still sleeping?—I looked at Jordan, who was snoring away even though it was almost noon, just a big lump under the covers, and got dressed as quietly as I could. Then I grabbed my keys and was out the door before I could chicken out.

I sent Brody another text, telling him I was coming over, then started driving.

When I got to Brody's house, I didn't see his big black truck on the street. But I still made myself knock on the door, and when no one came after the first round of knocks, I tried again. After my fist started to go numb, the door was ripped open and Jamie was standing there like a vampire who'd never seen the light of day before.

"What the hell, Isaac? Why are you here so early?"

"Dude, the day is already half over," I pointed out.

"Tomato, potato," he grumbled. "What's up? The party doesn't start 'til four."

Four? What was he gonna do, just wake up and start drinking? "Is Brody home?" I asked.

Jamie scratched his stomach while yawning, then blinked rapidly. "Um." He looked out at the street, left then right, then scratched his head. "I don't see his truck. I don't think he came home last night."

Uneasiness started to slither through me. "Oh. Are you sure?"

"No. I was pretty drunk, so…"

Right. "Okay, well, thanks," I said. "If you see him, could you tell him I stopped by? Or, no, don't tell him that. Just tell him that my time is precious and if he misses a day then I'm not making it up another time, deal or no deal."

"My guy, that's too many words. I haven't even had coffee yet."

"Fine, tell him whatever you want. I'll see you—later," I said to the door slamming in my face. Irritation was starting to build now, but I couldn't shake that strange apprehension that something was wrong. I had a history of ignoring gut feelings that turned out to be spot on, so instead of going home, I drove down to Big Boone's even though that was the last place I wanted to be. But Brody's truck was sitting in the lot, and a rush of relief quickly doused any annoyance that had been brewing. He wasn't ignoring me, he was just working.

Bri was behind the counter when I walked in, and that uneasiness—which hadn't dissipated, despite seeing Brody's car—only grew when her evil eyes didn't light up with malice when she saw me. Instead those eyes were swarming with an emotion I couldn't figure out.

"Hey, Isaac," she said. Her voice was flat and almost sad, and I didn't like that. "Your car already falling apart again?"

"Um, no, not yet. I was actually looking for Brody," I said. "Is he here?"

"No," she said.

I waited, but she just kept staring at me. "So…uh, do you know where he is then?"

She sighed. "Yeah."

I waited, again, for more information, but she didn't elaborate. "Well where is he?"

"Do you really care?" she huffed.

What? What the hell was going on? "I mean…" I said, confused. "What? What are you talking about? I'm just trying to find him so we can do his schoolwork, but he's not answering my texts."

"That's because he doesn't have his phone," she said.

"And…why doesn't he have his phone?" What in the ever-loving fuck was going on and why couldn't Bri just tell me where he was? Was he in jail or something?

"Because he left it here."

"Oh my fucking god Bri can you just tell me where he is?" I cried. Worry and anger were beating at me now, and I just wanted her to spit it out.

"Only if you tell me if you care about him or not," she said.

I wanted to strangle her. "Fine! I fucking care about him! Where is he," I yelled.

Finally, she smirked, and I was relieved to see her weirdly blunt and aggressive personality show through. "Gotcha," she said. At first, I thought she'd been fucking with me this whole time just to get me to admit that I cared about Brody and that he'd been in the back fixing cars all along, but her next words threw that theory in a ditch. "He's in the hospital. Room 402."

My stomach dropped, my mouth gaped open, and all that uneasiness from before multiplied and morphed into a gut-wrenching panic that had me gripping the counter. "What?" I breathed. "What happened? Is he okay? Oh my god, why didn't you just tell me that? Bri, is he okay?"

Her eyes pinged back and forth between mine, and she said, "Yeah. You totally care." Then she leaned back in her chair and said, "Go see him. He'll be okay."

For a moment, we just looked at each other. Then I muttered, "Thanks," and left.

"Bring him some flowers!" Bri called after me.

I was not bringing Brody fucking flowers.

With the stupid potted cactus clutched in my hands, I sped down the hallway, reading numbers on doors until I got to room 402. The door was cracked and, without bothering to knock, I nudged it all the way open with my foot and walked into the room.

Brody was lying on the bed, awake, with an IV hooked to his arm and one of those heart monitor things they clip to your finger. There was a small bandage on his forehead, right at his hairline. He was staring at the wall in front of him, a hopeless expression on his beautiful face, his shoulders sagging under the white hospital gown, and I wanted to go to him, hold him, tell him that everything would be okay even though I had no idea what was wrong. The sight of him like that, broken and beat down, unraveled something in me, and my heart was thundering in my chest as I took another step toward him.

When he saw me, his eyes wide and his lips parted, his hands clutching the sheets, he whispered, "Isaac." There was hope tangled with shock and torment in the way he said my name, and it had me moving swiftly to his side.

My eyes wandered down the bed, where his legs stretched out under the thin white sheet and his feet were practically hanging over the edge. When I looked back up at Brody, he was smiling gently. He looked exhausted. Fatigue was written in the dark circles under his eyes, in the drawn lines of his face, in the pallor of his usually tan complexion.

"Brody," I said quietly. "What…what happened?"

He huffed a self-deprecating laugh, then said, "Oh, you know. Just my usual cry for attention."

I didn't understand what he meant by that, and I didn't like the way he seemed to be denigrating himself for some reason. "What are you talking about? You are like, the least attention-seeking person I've ever met."

He looked me over, his eyes landing on the cactus I'd forgotten I was holding. "So are you," he murmured.

"Brody, what happened?"

He looked away. "I fainted and hit my head while I was working in the shop yesterday, got a concussion so they kept me overnight for monitoring."

What? "You fainted?"

His gaze collided with mine again, and the depth of pain I saw churning in those gray eyes made me want to hold him. To protect him from that pain and whatever was causing it. "I have a heart condition," he told me, and I stopped breathing. "My mitral valve is fucked up. Has been since I was born, but I didn't know. It doesn't close all the way, which makes blood flow backwards sometimes. And sometimes my heart gets overloaded, like yesterday, and can't pump enough blood if I'm doing something strenuous. It was never an issue until a few years ago, when I first fainted because of it. It's been happening more and more, and the doctors have told me I'll probably need surgery to fix it. Don't look at me like that," he said.

I tried to swallow around the sizable lump in my throat, and speaking around it was even harder. "Like what?"

"Like I just killed your cat," he said.

"I hate cats," I said, clearing my throat. "If I had any pet for you to kill, in this analogy, it would definitely be a dog. Or maybe something simple, like a hamster."

His lips quirked. He nodded at the cactus and said, "What's that? You gonna try and prick me to death? Your personality wasn't cutting it?"

I looked at the cactus, then pushed it toward him. "Oh—it's…" Nerves were swimming in my stomach now, and I felt so, so stupid for bringing him anything. Even with this new heart-breaking revelation—and fuck, was it breaking my heart—Brody and I barely even knew each other. "That's…for you," I finished lamely.

But the way his eyes lit up, the way a genuine smile transformed his face into something truly breathtaking, I was glad I'd gotten the stupid thing. I'd stood in the flower section of the grocery store just staring at all the options with disdain until I saw the row of succulents and decided on something less…flowery. Plus it was like two dollars.

He stared at me for a long moment, then curled his big fingers around the pot I was still holding out. "Thank you," he murmured, looking down at the cactus like it was the most precious thing in the world. He set it on the little table next to the bed, which I noticed was uncluttered and everything on it arranged neatly. I wasn't sure if that was his doing or the hospital's, but based on the state of his basement room, it felt safe to say that it was probably Brody's doing.

"How'd you find me?" he asked.

"Well…uh, Bri told me you were here."

"You went to the shop?"

I rubbed a hand through my hair. "Yeah, I—well, I texted you but didn't get a response, and you weren't at home, so I went to the shop and Bri told me you were here. It's Saturday, we were supposed to meet up."

He looked at me for a long moment, his eyes taking in the flush that had steadily crept higher and gotten deeper the longer I was here. "Isaac?"

"Yeah?"

"Maybe you could…" He seemed hesitant, wasn't meeting my eyes now, and I wanted to grab his hand and squeeze reassuringly. But it was the intensity with which I wanted to do that that had me shoving my hands in my pockets. "I'm supposed to be discharged in an hour, but maybe you could read to me?"

My eyebrows flew up, and my heart was aching in my chest. It was such a simple request, and I felt like I couldn't deny him anything right now. Not when he was this vulnerable. Not when it was making me feel this weird need to protect him, to comfort him. "Uh…yeah, sure. I've got some books on my phone," I told him. I looked around the room for a place to sit, found a plastic chair in the corner, and pulled it up to his side.

"Thank you," he said, and I didn't trust myself to speak because the relief and gratitude in his voice were killing me.

I pulled up a horror novel I'd only read a few pages of, flipped back to the beginning, and started to read. An hour later, when a nurse walked in with discharge papers, I looked up from my phone to find Brody staring at me with an unreadable expression. Then he spoke with the nurse, who helped unhook him from everything, and sat up in the bed, swinging his bare legs out from under the sheet.

"Do you…do you need a ride? Somewhere?" I asked, trying not to look at his legs.

He stood up and grabbed a pile of clothes from the chair by the window, and I looked on with horror as he started shoving his legs into his pants. He lifted the hospital gown up once the pants were on his hips and tucked it between his teeth, holding it out of the way so he could zip and button his jeans.

And I'd been right, the other day. He had a delicious line of black hair that started at his adorable outie belly button and disappeared beneath the waist of his jeans. That small hint of hard stomach sent fire shooting through my body, but when he reached one arm behind him to pull the gown off completely, my jaw dropped open and I went up in flames.

Holy…fuck. I already knew Brody was gorgeous, and the way his shirts fit him, there was no denying he was in shape. But I wasn't prepared for how all those muscles, all that skin, and all those tattoos would look together. I wasn't prepared to see that he had barbells through both nipples, nipples that were a dusky brown and pebbled from the cool room. Tattoos covered his hands, arms, and crept across his collar and down his pecs, stopping above a six pack of abdominal muscles that flexed and bunched with his movements. The ink across his upper chest was gorgeous—a detailed array of branches woven with pink and white cherry blossoms that curved and twisted over his pecs, and there were single petals falling to his sternum, where the picture ended. His obliques formed a delicious vee of muscle that angled sharply toward his groin, and I wanted to lick along the smooth skin down to?—

"If you're offering, yeah, that'd be great," said Brody. He pulled on a plain white t-shirt that was stained with oil and grease and whatever other fluids he worked with, covering up what was the most incredible body I'd ever seen in person. Maybe ever.

I stifled a moan of disappointment and made myself meet his eyes. He was staring at me with an intensity that only made my heart beat harder.

"We goin'?" he prompted after a long bout of staring, raising one black brow as he pulled his flannel coat on.

"Yeah. Yep. Let's go," I said, watching him as he slipped his boots on.

He headed to the little side table, picked up the cactus, looked at it, then smiled at me. "It's like you gave me the plant version of yourself," he said.

A bark of laughter erupted from me and, shaking my head, I led the way out of the room. When we were in the car and on the road, I asked him, "Where do you want me to drop you?"

"The shop, if that's okay."

"Sure," I said. And then, "So, wait, was no one coming to get you from the hospital?"

Brody sighed and said, "No. My uncle had to take my shift today and Bri's working too."

"But…what about—" And then I remembered Bri saying their mom had passed away—although in very different words—and I had no idea if their dad was still around because neither of them had ever mentioned him and I didn't feel like putting my foot in my mouth, so I said, "What about, um, your friends?"

Brody drummed his fingers on the side of the pot holding the cactus. "I don't really have any," he said.

I was silent for a moment, because his admission made my already-aching heart hurt even more. "Well, you know, if you…" I took a deep breath. "If you ever need, like…a ride again, or…help or whatever, you could, you know, you could call me." Eloquent, as always. I could feel Brody's eyes boring into the side of my head, but I kept my own on the road.

His tone was wry when he said, "Is that so? Feeling sorry for me, Isaac?"

Yes. "No," I scoffed. "I'm just saying. It's not a big deal. I mean, I only have one friend, basically, and he kind of sucks sometimes, so…" Then I changed the subject, as I did whenever anything got too difficult or went down an emotional road I was desperate to avoid. "Do you still want to do your reading today?"

Brody's fingers paused their drumming. "Oh. I forgot about that," he said. "It's up to you. You've already done more than any—" He cut himself off. "You've already done a lot for me today," he finished.

"Yeah but a deal's a deal," I told him, wondering what he'd been about to say. "This was just one of those unexpected curveballs that life likes to throw sometimes. It wasn't your fault."

Brody was quiet for a few minutes, and I wasn't sure he was gonna speak again. I thought maybe I'd offended him when he finally said, "If you're up for it."

Honestly, this day had been completely bizarre and sad and my head had been buzzing with nothing but thoughts of Brody. A reprieve from him was being offered, and I should take it. I should. But I didn't want to. "Yeah, I'm up for it. But are you ? Shouldn't you just rest?"

"I'll be fine," he said. I wasn't so sure, though. I wanted to order him to rest, but I was no one in his life. It wasn't my place to tell him what to do.

"Do you want to meet at your place around…" I glanced at the clock on the dash, shocked when I saw it was nearly four. "Five? Or is six better?"

"Five is good," he said, sounding tired. I glanced at him, and he was resting his head against the seat, his eyes closed. Still clutching that stupid little cactus.

When we got to the shop, I was sure he'd fallen asleep, but those gray eyes cracked open and were immediately fixed on me. Little slivers of steel that made my heart quicken and my palms sweat. Then he looked around and sat up. "Thanks, Isaac," he said. "See you soon." With a small smile, he got out and went inside the shop.

When I got home, Jordan was in the kitchen covered in what I assumed was flour.

"Oh good, you're back!" He yelled over the loud drone of the cake mixer. "Taste this," he shouted, shoving a spatula covered in batter at my mouth.

"What—Jordan, stop," I said, pushing it away from me. "Are you trying to give me Salmonella?"

"Oh please, that's an urban legend. Nobody died from eating cake batter."

"Um, plenty of people have died from eating cake batter made with uncooked eggs that carried a deadly strain of Salmonella." I stared him hard in the eye. "Plenty."

He stared back. "Name one person."

Fuck. I couldn't. He smirked when I didn't say anything, then tried to sneak the spatula up to my lips again. I grabbed it and flung it across the room.

"Isaac!" he gasped. "Oh no, it went behind the oven—that was my favorite spatula!"

"Ugh. I'll get you a new one," I told him.

He glared at me, then asked, suspicion heavy in his tone, "Where have you been all day?"

"Out."

"Out where?"

"Out and about."

"Out and about where?"

Jordan was relentless, and I tired easily, so I sighed and said, "I was supposed to meet up with Brody today—" There was a gasp from Jordan. "—but he wasn't responding to my texts—" A muttered why do you even have his number? which I ignored, "—so I went over to Jamie's—" Oh my god how is my favorite person after you? "—but Jamie said he never came home last night—" Oh my god why is Jamie keeping track of Brody's comings and goings are they fucking they better not be fucking . "—so I went down to the shop and Bri told me that Brody was in the hospital. So that's where I was."

"What? Oh my god that poor baby, what happened?"

What happened to wanting to kick Brody's ass? Now he was a poor baby?

"He fainted because he has a heart condition and hit his head and got a concussion."

"Oh my god ! Is he okay?"

I sighed. "I guess? I don't really know, honestly. He says he is. I'm going over to his place to do his school reading soon."

"Isaac…" I looked at Jordan, who actually seemed concerned. "Is he safe?"

I blew out a breath, knowing what he meant. "Yeah, I really think he is, Jordan. I mean, he didn't mean to trigger me. I believe that. And the way he got me to calm down…fuck, no one's ever done that for me. So, yeah, I think he's safe. He hasn't touched me again, or even remotely tried." Even though I really wanted him to. Fuck. I wanted to shower him with all my consent. Among other things.

Jordan's expression softened, and then he said, "Good. Get me another spatula while you're out, too. Bitch."

Ugh.