Page 131 of Double or Nothing

I bite my lip.

Bryce glares at him. “You’re unbearable.”

“I’m just telling the truth,” Jack says, but it’s lighter now. “Should have prepped earlier and brought your laptop with you, because here’s what’s actually going to happen. You’re going to stay until the last possible second. You’re going to pretend you’re not staying until the last possible second. Then you’re going to panic and sprint out of here like the world is about to collapse on itself over an Excel spreadsheet.”

Bryce glares at him.

I start laughing again, because Jack has got it nailed. Sad, but true.

“I do not sprint,” Bryce says. “And it’s PowerPoint, actually. It needs revising.”

“You absolutely sprint emotionally,” Jack replies. “You’re like Usain fucking Bolt.”

“Hardly.”

“You are when you’re legging it back to normality. Alice, back me up.”

I look at Bryce, at his ruined hair and tired eyes and the stubborn line of his mouth. The man I’ve loved for years. The man who has spent so long mistaking fear for discipline. The man who is still here, despite everything.

“Don’t do it,” I say softly. “The PowerPoint can wait.”

Bryce gives me a look of wounded betrayal. As though I’ve just shit on his life’s parade.

Jack points at him. “See? Expert testimony.”

Bryce groans. “We’re all going fucking insane here. All three of us.”

“Yes, we are,” Jack says. “So stop fighting it. You’ll be back later. Both of you. Be more prepared and bring your bloody laptop next time around. And your toastie maker.”

It should be a joke.

It is a joke.

But it isn’t only a joke.

Bryce doesn’t answer. I watch his breathing slow, watch the fight leave him in degrees. Because Jack’s right.

I just hope Bryce knows it. I pray he doesn’t resist.

I’m so relieved when he nods along in confirmation.

“Fine. Laptop. Not toastie maker, though. That’s pushing it too far.”

He’s still worried. Of course he is. Worry is stitched into Bryce so tightly, I doubt he’d recognise himself without it. But he stays until the last possible minute, checking his phone at least fifteen times for the time before finally calling the cab to take him home.

And when he leaves, he does it with a see you later kiss for both of us, and a smile still bright enough to light up his eyes.

Somehow it feels like the bravest thing in the world.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

BRYCE

Jack is right, the bastard. Just like always.

I was fighting the inevitable.

Every day I hide behind a fake smile at work, completing every single one of Bill’s commands like a good boy, but every night I’m off to Jack’s, as soon as my schedule will let me. Kudos to me though, I haven’t yet taken my toastie maker.