Page 78 of Two Chambered Heart

“Sure.”

Jason’s attention turned back to the alcohol cupboard as his brother left him standing in the kitchen, alone once again. He kept staring, his mind unravelling, the pull becoming strong enough that his heart started racing. Though he should probably go train to sweat the booze out, his discipline was slipping. He could black out for the rest of the day, hole up in his bedroom, numb, until he felt ready to put himself back together again. His concern was that he wouldn’t be able to find all his pieces if he went that far.

He lost track of time, standing there spiralling, his self-hatred bubbling up like blood in his mouth from a punctured lung, making it hard to breathe around the ache. He knew what he needed to turn his brain off, but his coping mechanisms were just another knife that dug into his wounds, soothing and harming in equal parts, a vicious cycle that he couldn’t seem to escape.

Instead of drinking, Jason decided to do the next best thing—something just as toxic.

He walked away from the kitchen and down the hall to the closed door. Then he opened it, stepping into her room.

Corey looked up at him sleepily, blinking her eyes open. He released a breath, already feeling lighter, wading out from the hellscape of his mind just from being in her orbit. He raked his eyes over her naked body, just barely covered by the cloudlike duvet. Her cinnamon hair was wild around her face, freckles flashing at him from across her nose.

“How are you feeling?” she asked him, a slow smile spreading across her face.

He ignored her question. “Do you want to go to the garage with me? I need to work on a bike.” He waited for her rejection, hoped for it. Hedeserved it. He’d been fucking with her for so long, culminating in the beautiful disaster of the other night.

“I’d love to.” She beamed at him and sat up, stretching her arms over her head and lengthening her spine like a cat. The blanket fell away from her and her perfect breasts arched out towards him, the blush of her nipples blending smoothly with her tanned skin.

He couldn’t look away—the bite marks around her neck were a beacon. Maybe she thought he was Kayden.

“Alright, get changed. I’ll make you a coffee and meet you in the front hall.”

Turning away from her in the bed was a challenge. She was so fucking alluring in her post-sex, post-sleep haze that it was like a physical assault to his system. His stomach still somersaulted every time he looked at her and heard nothing. It was a sweetness he was having trouble denying himself.

But he made it out of her room and to the kitchen, starting up the espresso machine and pulling a sweatshirt hanging from the barstool over his naked torso. He made a coconut milk latte and put it in a travel mug, bringing it to the front hall with him. He had gone through his usual steps of outfitting with his knife holster, gun holster, boots, and leather jacket before she even made it to the front hall.

She was in matching grey sweatpants and a sweatshirt, mirroring his own outfit. Even though he’d ordered her a whole closet full of clothes, and he knew Kayden had taken her shopping numerous times, she still ended up in one of their sweatshirts a majority of the time. That did something to him, fueling a possessive desire to get his hands all over her.

He passed her his old leather jacket, which had somehow become hers now—just another splinter of himself burrowing into her. She pulled her arms through and then put her sneakers on before he handed her the mug.

She took a sip and groaned. This girl really fucking loved coffee.

“Thanks, Jason,” she said after another sip.

“I wasn’t sure you knew who you were agreeing to spend the afternoon with.”

“I mean, I figured it was you, but I saw your back when you left my room.” She looked at him sheepishly. He had been topless, and she would have seen his marred skin. That familiar anger blistered.

“I was surprised you asked me,” she whispered, like she didn’t want to go there but couldn’t help herself.

He deflected. “Kay needs to recover. If I leave you at home with him, that will not happen.”

She blushed furiously at his assumption, hiscorrectassumption. Those two couldn’t keep their hands off each other. It wasn’t jealousy that he felt over that. It was something else, something very much like longing, and he didn’t want to think too hard about it.

“No helmet?”

“No, we’re taking the Rover.” He scanned his thumbprint to call the elevator.

“You going to tie me up in the back seat again?” she said with a cheeky grin and an elbow to his ribs as she walked into the waiting elevator, like it was some inside joke they had and not a reference to her literal kidnapping.

He was willing to play along with her, if only to keep himself from falling off the precipice of his depression for a little while longer.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” He forced a grin, following her through the doors and pressing the button for the underground.

“Oh, yeah. Then you can take me to the dog park and flaunt me off, show everyone how much better your dog is than theirs. You’re lucky I’m housebroken, or you’d be cleaning my piss out of all your expensive rugs.”

He barked out a genuine laugh at her crassness, dripping in fake honey.

She gave him a half-smile that was more like a smirk. “Or maybe you’re into that? What do they call it… golden showers?”

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