Page 327 of Face Off

“I usually do.”

“You came after me at the rink,” I remind him. “You held me together when I hit you, hated you, and made it clear I wanted to be left alone. You followed me anyway.”

“You needed me.”

“And you need me now.” I take the bottle from his loose hand before he drops it and tighten my other arm around his back. “You don’t have to earn that by fixing me first.”

His breathing catches again, but the sob doesn’t fully form. He rubs his face, accidentally strikes the bruise, and curses so violently that I have to catch his wrist before he does it again.

“What happens now?” he asks.

“Tonight, you eat my shitty spaghetti.”

“It smells burned.”

“The bread is burned. The pasta is cold.”

“Your cooking remains consistent.”

“The sauce survived.”

“Poor people sauce.”

“I survived on it.”

“You’re very brave.”

“I’ve been through a lot.”

A laugh escapes him. It sounds terrible, wet and exhausted, but it survives long enough for me to feel it move against my shoulder.

“Tomorrow, you wake up here with a hangover powerful enough to make death seem convenient,” I continue. “Then we figure out the next hour. After that, we figure out another.”

“And Lyric? What if she comes here?”

The humor loosens, but I don’t allow the fear inside his question to take the room back from us.

“She doesn’t get through my door.”

Briggs closes his eyes. “What if she knocks?”

“I ignore her.”

“What if she keeps knocking?”

“I call security.”

“What if she calls?”

“You blocked her.”

His head lifts again. “On my phone?”

“Yeah, that night remember.”

“You went through my phone?”

“You gave me the code.”