Page 67 of Friends with Benefits

I raise one brow as I turn to face him. ‘Keep your hands to yourself.’

He chuckles and I share the moment. For now, it feels nice.

We talk about the last few years, nothing too personal, but filling in the blanks that mutual friends haven’t done for us. We talk until the lights go out at the house and Emily comes down to the beach.

‘Are my boys getting along?’ She slips down to the sand, nudging Brandon and me farther apart with her hips.

I drop an arm around her shoulder. ‘Who died and made you chief, huh?’

‘Well, when the rest of the squad is regressing, someone has to step up to the plate, right?’

‘Even regressed, I’m still chief, Ems.’

She beats her chest and growls like a silverback. I laugh, fully appreciating how ridiculous Brandon and I must have looked to the others, fighting like kids in the sand.

We talk for a while but there’s something missing. Someone. And I want her here. I want her by my side.

For the rest of my life.

‘All right, guys. I’m out. Sleep well.’

Emily stands and kisses my cheek. I pull her into a hug, trying to tell her in that move that I’ll always be there for her. ‘When he screws up…’

She hits my chest but smiles, then backs into Brandon and takes hold of his hand. In some other time and place, I might have thought it was pretty cool that my best friends hooked up and fell in love.

I’m still not quite there yet.

Brandon holds out a hand and I stare at it a beat too long before I take it. ‘You might need to get that nose seen to,’ I tell him.

‘Nah, you hit like a pussy, always have.’

‘Yeah, tell me that when you’ve had a nose job tomorrow.’

As I head up the path to the house, making my strides larger and faster until I’m jogging, my excitement builds. I want to go to bed with my girl, even if I only get to hold her. I feel… free, somehow. It’s hard to describe. It’s as if socking Brandon in the face and seeing Ems, seeing them happy and still together, has given me a blank slate. I can love Jess. I do love Jess. I think maybe I have from the day she walked into my apartment, startled that Alex opened the door naked. From the moment we realized we both secretly like black-and-white movies. Since the first time she told me how she lost her parents and I wanted to be her protector and take care of her the way she should have been taken care of all her life.

I can hear voices coming from the bedrooms but the lights in the house are out. I climb the stairs, the glass ceilings giving me enough to see by. There’s no light coming from under the bedroom door but I know she won’t be sleeping yet. Jess is a night owl.

I turn on the light and instantly dim it in case she is sleeping. But the bed is empty.

‘Jess?’

I walk through to the en suite but that is empty too. Her toothbrush is gone.

I open the wardrobe in the bedroom. Her clothes are gone. ‘What the fuck?’

And I know.

My gut falls like I’m free-falling from a clifftop toward a bed of rocks.

She ran.

I dart from the bedroom and downstairs, running out the front door. As I reach the end of the drive, I see the taillights of a yellow cab driving away, and I know who is sitting in the back.

The night seems to grow darker and a tightness settles into my chest, making it hard to breathe, making my eyes sting.

She ran.

I stand in the middle of the road, staring in the direction of the cab, praying for it to turn around and bring her back. Knowing that won’t happen.

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