Page 7 of The Chance

Which, in hindsight, seems like the least logical decision I’ve ever made.

The dynamic has changed in my mind, yet again, and I don’t know that I can shake it off as easily as I have in the past with him up my fucking ass. Toby out of the loop. My twin so far gone for the family that he started that I have no one to run to.

I don’t want to burden them.

Even as a kid, loneliness had threatened me. That ever-present knowledge that I wasdifferentthan most burrowing down in my gut as a constant reminder to keep people at a distance. But then my twin would burst in, punch anyone thatlookedlike a problem, and sit with me in the dark.

Now?

Now … I have a man I want who in no way reciprocates the feeling, who ispaidto spend his time with me, as my only defense in keeping the emptiness at bay.

And I’m having a deal biting back the void’s demands.

It’s demanding its debt be paid and I’m all out of cash.

“Since when is this how we do shit?” I snap as Jordan’s fist lands on the release bar of the exit, and he rushes out first.

“Since you’re in your head and not paying attention,” he growls right back, grabbing a fistful of my shirt and tugging me through the threshold I’d stopped in.

He always lets me go first …

The gravel grinds beneath the soles of my Chucks as we walk, just as my jaw grinds my teeth to near dust, but as much as I want to crawl into a hole somewhere far away from all of this, I know that I can’t.

Because Toby’s home.

Chapter Three

Mac

“Toby,” I call afterthe disappearing back of the man I consider my brother.

“Just let him—” my band’s guitarist, Fin, cuts himself off when Leo takes off after the runaway bassist. I growl at the heavy hand that lands on my shoulder, keeping me in place. “Seriously?”

“Fuck off, Fin,” I snap, shrugging off his grip and spinning away from the world’s greatest guitarist.Or whatever the fuck his award was for.

I hear disappointment in his responding sigh that’s aimed at my back, but it doesn’t stop me from walking my ass straight out of the coming home party without a second glance.

Not even my twin brother’s searing gaze can stop me.

There’s a smoke perched between my lips as I blow past the band manager that’s hanging in the hallway like he’s lost. A lighter to the end of the rolled paper before the elevator’s doors can even close me in and a tremble to my hands that I shove in my pockets.

I had a drink before coming here.

Okay, two.

So what?

Toby’s not the only one with problems and the man sure as shit reminded me during every single one of our conversations that the rest of us were not supposed to change. To not hide it from him. To keep on like normal.

So maybe he smelled it on my breath when I tackled him at the door when he got here. Maybe he caught a whiff of the massive hangover I woke up with this morning that’s clung to me all damn day.

Or, and this is most likely the issue, being back in the same place he finished his last bender was a terrible idea. Having his coming home party in the same fucking penthouse that held the man’s intervention before he went and got all fixed up was a lapse in judgement.

Fuck that immersion therapy bullshit. Leo was way off base for that one.

Either way, I’ll call Toby later and confess that I feel like shit for needing the one vice my bestie was abstaining from. I know he’ll understand, or just tell me I’m being stupid because I probably am.

He said it was okay.

---