Page 68 of The Heart

It’s then that I notice the subtle shaking of his body.

Is he…crying?

I figured he would make some wise-crack about stealing all of our shit or something when we gave him that key. Butthis,I was not prepared for.

Not even a fucking bit.

I step closer, and he notices. He quickly wipes at his eyes and grabs the envelope, crinkling it as he shoves up from the counter.

“Sorry,” he says quickly, heading toward his room. “Goodnight,” he adds, his eyes looking at the floor.

Before he can brush past me, I stick a hand out, placing it flat on his chest and stopping him dead in his tracks.

When he finally looks up at me, I can see his eyes are still red and glassy. He was fucking crying. And I don’t know why, or what the fuck I’m supposed to do about it.

So we just stand here, my hand and my conscience preventing him from moving forward as we stare each other down.

“This past week was fun, that’s all,” he says quickly, pressing his chest against my palm, but I don’t let him move.

“Funenough to make a grown man cry?” I feel him take a deep breath, then settle back on his heels. He looks at me while I search his face for some sort of fucking answer. Then he puts his own palm on my chest. I glance down at it, then back at him. My brows furrow.

“Whatever you have going here, Seb. Don’t ever let it fucking go.”

I stare, and the silence settles between us as I take in his words; Take in the hollowness in his eyes and the way his jaw is clenched.

His hand slides away, then he’s gone, leaving me standing alone in the hallway.

I walk toward where my phone is sitting on the counter, and I swear I barely see it, even as I grab it and make my way back to our room.

I walk inside, closing the door and staring at the little device as if I’ve never seen one before.

“Seb?” Luke asks, sounding concerned. I look up to find him sitting alone at the end of the bed.

“She in the shower?” I ask, tipping my head toward the other door.

“Yeah. What’s wrong?” he asks, standing and stepping toward me.

“We need to talk about Colton.”

—

When I wake up, my arms are still wrapped around Luke. Leena is still crushed between us. Because yeah, maybe what Colton said got to me a little.

Maybe I don’t want to let them go.

And I know they’re mine, but I also know I’m shit at relationships. I always have been. There’s still time for me to fuck this up. Still time for something to go wrong on this next op.

I hold them tighter.

Because seeing the pain in my friend’s eyes made me realize how much they fucking mean to me. Seeing him hurting because he’s alone broke my fucking heart.

I recognize that loneliness. I had that same look in my eyes for a long fucking time. Too long. But even then, I still had Luke. I’ve always had Luke.

Colton doesn’t have anyone.

I close my eyes and think about that damn note Luke gave to me, about how I feel about it.

I squeeze the two people I care about harder.

---