Page 125 of The Chance

“When?” I rasp out, my vision blurring all over again. “How long?”

There’s a hand on my shoulder even though I didn’t see Rex move around the bed and I break just a little bit more.

“Six years ago, Jordan.” There’s a pause so loaded that I hold my ragged breath, the weight of his words pulling me so far under that I couldn’t stop the sob that breaks. “When a Thompson knows, heknows.”

Love him back.

Love him back or let him go.

Chapter Seventy-Four

Jordan

“Quédate abajo, hijo mío.”

I shake my head.

“Hay fuego.”

Pinch the bridge of my nose.

“Mi hijo!”

Scrub my hands down my face.

“Fuego!”

I jerk around, blinking dry eyes into focus.

Except there’s nothing but the night staff watching me wearily from the station right outside Mac’s room.

“You good?”

Blowing out a long breath, I turn back to Lugh, who’s on hallway duty, and shake my head. “Honestly … no.”

He juts his chin in understanding.

“You don’t have to go in.”

“I …” I swallow and it clicks. “How bad is it?”

His nostrils flare, his laser focus analyzing me. He must settle on something, some way to tell me the truth gently, because he nods once.

“He looks better than Peach,” he admits on a rasp that I wasn’t expecting. “But it’s damn difficult to see, Jay.”

The wind rushes out of me. My pulse spikes in my ears.

I have to try.

As much as I know this is all my fault, the pain ofnotseeing him has been just as difficult to breathe through. It feels like a part of me is lost. Asleep. Too far away from the rest of me.

And it’s not until Mac came home, came and found me, that I realize I’ve been fighting that feeling since he left.

Sending an acknowledging tip of the chin to Lugh, I steel myself against my past and step into Mac’s room with a racing heart and held breath.

The tube beneath his nose is the first thing to draw my attention. The bit of dried blood beneath it that someone missed. The dark coloring. The bandage taped to his temple.

My eyes well up.

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