Page 96 of Push

ShouldI be back home?

Gwen didn’t want me here. She didn’t want me at all…

And the thoughts spiraled—down, down, darker and darker until my mind was at the bottom of a pit. Desperate, my pulse thumping, I looked over my shoulder. I wanted to anchor myself to someone. I wanted to hold Gwen. I wanted to squash Noah in a big, tickly hug. I wanted myfamilyback. The air thinned, my chest straining to drag in each shallow breath.

“Gwen, I’m so fucking sorry,” I said to the empty backyard. “Iwilldo better.”

The vow may have been made to the grass at my feet, but that wouldn’t stop me from honoring it. I pulled out my phone, called Dylan’s office, and scheduled some extra appointments. Stopping by once a week wasn’t enough, and it wasn’t like I didn’t have time now that I was on my “vacation.” A small step, but it was enough for me to wander into the kitchen with my chin up.

I propped my phone against an empty mug and tapped into a podcast about counting macros. White noise filled the background, softening the rough edges of the silence, while I scrolled through the baby-friendly fish and chips recipe Zach had sent me.

Gwen flew into the kitchen. Every one of her stomps to the fridge was punctuated with a different curse word.

“You all good?” I asked her.

“Everything will be just fine and dandy when I strangle that man with my bare hands.”

“Your brother?”

Gwen stuck her head in the fridge, but I still heard the huff. “Who else?” Her voice was muffled as she dove deeper for whatever she was hunting. “He and I will be havingwordswhen I’m next in the office. He wanted me to proof a preliminary prospectus in two hours.” She barked a short laugh. “I don’t freaking think so. I don’t even understand what a preliminary prospectus is!”

My eyes narrowed on the carrot I was hacking with my knife. I’d already had a day of taking out jerks who’d done wrong by Gwen. Liam and I stood roughly eye to eye, and I had more than a decade of anger to direct at that guy, so I wasn’t above taking a whack at him, too.

I sighed.

Gwen wouldn’t want that. I hadn’t always been patient with her work problems before, and she wouldn’t admit it out loud,but I knew she was over the moon to have that ungrateful bastard of a brother back in her life, even if hewasa colossal asshat. I needed to trust she could handle this situation without me rushing in to take care of it for her.

So, I kept my feet firmly stuck behind the kitchen counter and let the wave of Neanderthal dumbass wash over me without losing my cool.

“You give him hell, doll,” I said.

Gwen’s head popped out of the fridge. “Oh, I will.” She grinned. “Don’t you worry.” And with a squishy tube of cookie dough in her hand, she disappeared back to the study.

I didn’t see her again until late in the afternoon when I knocked on the doorframe and stuck my head in the study. Gwen was jammed in a chair, still in her yoga pants and cute pink socks, a mug in one hand and her index finger furiously jabbing at the keys on her laptop as she gulped a sip of coffee.

Her eyebrows rose when she looked up. “Oh, hey.”

“Sorry to interrupt.”

“No, please,do.” She put her mug on the coaster and stretched her arms above her head. “I feel like I’ve been a lump in this chair all day.”

“Busy?”

“Eh, not exactly. I’m just behind the eight ball on a few things because I’m not into all this corporate junk.”

“Corporate?” I made a stink face. “Boring. What about the blood and gore and crime scene photos?”

“Right?”Gwen laughed.

“If you’re still in the zone, do you want me to pick up NoBo?”

Gwen shook her head. “I should take a break to clear my head.”

“We could go together?”

Her eyes widened. I’d overstepped the mark.

“Or not,” I mumbled.

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