Page 63 of Cross Check Daddies
The silence after that feels cleaner. Not solved. Just cleared. Like the space between us finally aired out something rotting.
He stands, pats my shoulder.
“You don’t have to move out.”
I blink. “You sure?”
He nods once. “We’re still brothers.”
I smile, the tension finally lifting between us just enough to let the room breathe.
“Cam,” I say before he leaves.
He looks back.
“Thanks. For saying that.”
He gives a short nod and disappears into the hallway.
I leave the apartment without a destination in mind. The street air is heavy with the promise of rain, but the sky hasn’t opened up yet.
My hands stay jammed in my jacket pockets as I walk without purpose, letting the conversation with Cam sit where it landed.
I pull out my phone and stare at her name for a second too long before I finally call.
She picks up after two rings. “T?”
“Yeah,” I say, exhaling. “You at the office?”
“I am. Why?”
“No reason,” I say. “Okay.”
She laughs quietly. “Tanner, what are you up to?”
I smile despite myself. “I’ll see you later.”
I hang up before she can ask again and cut across the street to the bakery on the corner. The windows are fogged from fresh bread and heat.
Inside, the smell is lethal—sugar, butter, and vanilla. I don’t need a reason for what I’m doing. I just need something that tells her I see her. Even if she doesn’t pick me. Even if this thing ends with me sitting in my apartment alone, wondering what might’ve happened if I’d done more sooner.
I step up to the counter, tap the glass.
“That one,” I tell the girl behind it. “With the raspberries. And whatever frosting that is.”
“Cream cheese,” she says with a grin. “Good choice.”
“Yeah,” I murmur, smiling faintly. “She’ll like that.”
Brooke’s always spoken about GameHatch like it’s her sanctuary, her second skin. Being inside it feels like stepping through a version of her I haven’t seen yet.
The girl at the front desk points me to her office.
Her door is cracked when I reach it. She’s behind her desk, fingers flying across the keyboard, brows pinched, a stylus tucked behind her ear like she forgot it was there. She looks up, startled when I knock gently against the frame.
“Tanner?”
“You eat yet?”
