Page 97 of Fight or Flight
“Did you really?”
“Yes?”
He shoots me a little grin. “Are you sure? You don’t sound sure.”
“Only because my brain is going a million miles an hour and I feel like I just downed a half dozen energy drinks.” I put my hand on my chest as we log our entry onto the grounds at the gate. “Can you have a heart attack at twenty-one from getting too excited?”
He laughs and tucks his ID back in his pocket. “I’m sure it’s possible, but highly unlikely in this situation.”
“I’m going to hold you to that,” I tell him. “And I’m gonna come back as a ghost and haunt your ass if you’re wrong and I drop dead.”
“Fair enough. Come on.” He waves for me to follow him around to the side of the house.
“Why?”
“So I can keep an eye on you and make sure you don’t drop dead.”
A part of me wants to tell him to fuck off and go the other way just because, but the bigger part of me doesn’t want to be alone right now.
So instead of saying anything, I follow him to the side door.
“Has anyone ever told you that you’re bossy and overbearing?” I ask him as he unlocks the door with his ID.
“Nope.”
“Really? I find that hard to believe.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re you.”
He tosses me a grin as we climb the stairs together. “And you think I’m bossy and overbearing?”
“Obviously.”
“What if I’m only like this with you?”
“Then I wonder what terrible things I did in a past life to deserve this special treatment.”
He laughs as I pull open the door to the second floor and wait for him to walk through first.
We fall silent as we walk down the hall, and I’m hyperaware of everything around me as I unlock my door and usher him inside.
He walks over to my bed like he owns the place and sits on the foot of it. I kind of run out of steam and pause a few feet from the bed as everything hits me at once.
We just pulled off something that should have been impossible, and a rush of that nervous/excited energy hits again as my mind spins with what-ifs and I start picturing all the things that could still go wrong.
“Shane,” Jace’s quiet voice cuts through the noise, and I lift my eyes from the floor to look at him. “You’re okay.”
“I don’t feel okay.” I put my hand on my chest as my heart starts pounding again. “This doesn’t feel okay.”
“You’re okay,” he repeats. “It’s just the adrenaline.”
“Are you sure? Because it feels like my heart is trying to escape through my chest.”
He pulls a silver cigarette case out of his pocket. “Will this help?”
I shake my head. “I only smoke when I’m drinking.”
