Page 26 of Make the Play

Not with him.

My throat tightens as I clear it, forcing my lips into a smirk that feels brittle and foreign. But I hold it anyway, like I haven’t just made a decision I’ll spend forever justifying to myself.

“Guess you’ve had years of practice tying these things back up, huh?”

The words appear light, like our normal banter. But they taste like fucking acid on my tongue.

I avoid his eyes for the eleventy billionth time and don’t wait for him to answer, but I feel it. His eyes on me, burning into my back. The weight of something unspoken, something shifting.

And because he can never fucking help himself, right before I reach the door, I hear it.

“Zoe…”

His voice is quiet. Unsteady. His body shifts, like he’s about to move and stop me.

I grip the handle. Squeeze. Pause.

Then I walk out.

Chapter seven

Radiant and wild and utterly untouchable

Chase

The door clicks shut.

I don’t move. Barely breathe. Just stand here, barefoot and shirtless, stuck in a moment somewhere between reality and the delusion I had in my head, looking at the space where Zoe Carlson just was.

Where she’d just been standing in that sinful fucking dress, her hair still damp from the shower. Where she’d stiffened at the sound of her name leaving my mouth and walked out like I was nothing more than a regrettable inconvenience.

The same Zoe Carlson who had been in my bed, in my hands, on my fucking mouth mere hours ago.

Now she’s gone. Didn’t even look back.

And I let her.

I rake a hand through my hair, my pulse still a little erratic, body still humming with the aftershocks of whatever the hell last night was. My sheets are a mess, and the scent of her—floral and clean with a sharp edge—lingers in the air.

I should get in the shower, should shake this off. Get dressed, go meet the crew for brunch and pretend I didn’t just have the single best night of my life with a woman who spent the morning after looking at me like I was a goddamn grenade.

I move toward the nightstand, reaching for my coffee, only to realize it’s not my coffee.

It’s hers. Still full, still untouched.

My stomach twists, and I’m irrationally pissed off about it.

I’m not stupid. I knew this wasn’t going to be some soft, dreamy morning after. I knew she was going to bolt the second she woke up. Hell, at one point, I half expected her to yank the fire alarm in a dramatic escape attempt.

But even knowing that, even expecting it, watching her wrap the towel around her body and physically recoil when I offered her a damn coffee?

It got me.

And the worst part was she fucking meant it.

She meant every word ofthis didn’t happen—I fucking felt it.

Pressing my palms against my face, I drag them down slowly and take a breath. I know how to deal with shit like this.

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