Page 71 of Hazel and Elijah Find Out: First They F*cked Around

“No problem. Brooks said he’ll work for you tomorrow, but only if you stay home and sleep.”

Rolling my eyes, I swallowed back my irritation. “So, his help comes with stipulations?”

“Can you blame him? If you were watching him work at this level, wouldn’t you try to stop him?”

“You can all stop hovering.”

He paused, halfway standing, and turned his head to glare at me. “That’s hilarious coming from you.”

Glaring back, I crossed my arms over my chest. But my annoyance softened slightly at the memory—back when I’d made it a point to call and text at least once a day after his divorce. “That was different. Alicia was your wife, and you were… wrecked when she left.”

His Adam’s apple bobbed on a swallow. “And you don’t think you’re wrecked currently?”

Tears that were never far away stung my eyes. “The relationship only lasted a couple of weeks… It’s not like it defined my life.”

“Is that all it was?”

My throat hurt from holding back my feelings and my jaw clenched. My walls built of muscle and bone were the only barrier between me and the flood of emotions.

Elijah had fit into my life so easily, even if my workflow had suffered. He’d found pockets in my days to see me—lunch here, breakfast there, and every night together. We’d ended things just over two weeks ago, and I still couldn’t sleep in my bed. I ached for him, for his body pressed to mine, his arms around me, him inside me.

No matter how often I told myself I missed him disproportionately to the amount of time we’d spent together, I still couldn’t make missing him go away.

I couldn’t fill the need having him had invoked in my life.

Remi tilted his head, and his features softened with sympathy.

I squeezed my eyes shut, tears leaking down my cheeks. “I’m okay.”

He was kind enough not to argue with me.

“I don’t want to be a burden,” I forced a whisper after a few seconds of silence.

“You’re not.” He was using the same tone he used to soothe scared animals, and I appreciated it.

I needed to take a steadying breath between each word, but I managed to say, “I. Miss. Him.”

It might not have been the boldest declaration of my loss, but it was more than I’d allowed myself since Elijah had left. I wiped the tears from my cheeks and the back of my hand came back streaked with a fine layer of mud. Remi nodded in understanding, the kind of knowing that didn’t have to be imagined, the kind that remembered.

“How did you get past it?” I asked.

The haunted look in his eyes told me he hadn’t. His pain was still there, present.

Then it was gone. Somewhere under the surface—somewhere close, but hidden.

He lifted a sandy-brown eyebrow. “At first, I did the same thing you’re doing. My distractions were a little less… productive.” His mouth pulled to one side. “That’s not true… I learned a lot.”

“What were your distractions?” We’d stayed in touch while he was going through his divorce, but he never confided much in me. At the time, I assumed, hoped, that he was talking to his friend, Owen, from vet school. I probably should have pushed Remi to talk more the way he was for me.

He winced. “Fucking.”

My jaw dropped, and I coughed a laugh.

He shrugged. “My body count is… vast. I had quite the ho-phase.”

“I mean, I know that. But I didn’t realize it was a coping mechanism at the time.”

“Yeah. I didn’t realize then, either. Therapy helped me identify what I was doing. Someone else touching me made me feel present, but without it, I… was empty.”

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