Page 65 of Enemies with Benefits (Finding the Right Brother #1)

"If you want to pretend everything is just the way you want it, then be my guest. But unlike everyone else, I'm officially over catering to your delusions and fantasies.

Especially since half of them lately seem to involve what I am or am not doing or being like.

Just know that if you're alone after all is said and done, then it was your choice, not anyone else's. "

His eyes blazed, and I could finally see under the anger to the fear and the pain.

It was bright enough for me to feel a lot more than a twinge of regret for digging in and dragging out the thing that, at the core of everything, was who he was, what drove him.

It was his fear of being alone, and even though he did everything he could to keep people from getting close, he was always deathly afraid of truly being alone.

"You're done?” he asked softly, turning his back to me. "No, I'm done."

A jolt shot through me as I watched him, suddenly unable to move as he drifted into my apartment.

I didn't need to hear the soft sounds of rummaging to know he was gathering what few things he’d brought with him, including the jingle of keys.

My chest tightened as he came back into view, pulling on his over shirt, holding his keys in one hand and his phone in the other.

"Wow," I said softly, turning to look at him and briefly considering the idea of standing up but staying right where I was.

I had known I was going to cross a line, but this was.

..something else. It was unsettling, and not just because he hadn't lost his shit, but because there was a hard look in his eye that I’d never seen before.

I couldn't even say that it was a product of him having made a decision, because instead it felt like.

..well, like something had locked up inside him, the shutters had come down, and every window and door was locked and boarded.

Well, I guess I hadn't set fire to everything, I’d activated Fort Knox.

"I'll see you," he said, his eyes going to his phone and staring for a moment before tapping it, and I watched as it lit up.

His face, cast in the light of the phone, twitched again, and I could have sworn I saw his stony expression threaten to crack right down the middle.

Unless whoever had messaged him had sent him a novel, he stared at his phone for far too long. "Yes. I'll see you."

"Jace," I began, an alarm bell going off in my head that had nothing to do with his attitude toward me and everything to do with whatever had just happened.

It wasn't like he had said or done anything to give me the idea that something else had happened, but every intuitive voice in my head screamed that, yes, something had just happened, and he needed?—

"No," he said, turning to walk off. "I'm leaving. And since you seem to know me so well, maybe you can figure out how serious I am, and what I'm serious about, without me needing to say it."

I didn't, but I couldn't bring myself to confirm it either, the words catching in my throat.

In fact, nothing in me seemed to want to work, down to the muscles in my legs.

I could only watch as Jace kept walking, the door soft as it closed behind him.

For a moment, I could picture him marching down the hallway, his shoulders hunched.

..and then I heard his voice, distant and deep, too far away to detect the tone.

Something was wrong, and not just a normal, everyday, slightly dramatic kind of wrong either.

Yes, as surprising as it had been to see him completely shut down and lock everything out and everything else in, that at least made some sense.

But something had cracked that stony mask, but every instinct in me said it shouldn't have slipped for even a second, not for anything.

Nothing short of something serious, the life-altering, world-shattering kind.

I twisted to lean over the balcony, watching as he came out onto the street.

He was speaking too quietly for me to hear, and his back was to me as he walked toward the corner, so I couldn't make out his expression.

What I could make out was the hunch of his shoulders and the heaviness to the way his head hung forward, phone pressed to his ear.

His pace was quick, and though I couldn't prove it, I would swear he was trying to keep himself from bolting.

Christ, I had demolished whatever we had tentatively built between us just seconds before he got some sort of news.

My mind flashed over the possibilities, hopping up to grab my phone from just inside my balcony doors, where it sat on its charger.

There were notifications and texts, but none stood out as anything that told me what might have happened.

If it was something with Micah or Moira, I would have been called before Jace, especially if it had been Moira.

No matter how furious he was, no matter how done he was with me, I didn't seriously consider that Jace wouldn't tell me.

That only left two people in his life who were important to him.

One was currently standing, listening to the sound of Jace's truck go down the street with the same haste that he had refused to let his feet move at, and the other?—

Shit.

I slid open my phone and tapped, listening to it ring, and I prayed that Moira answered because she would be the only one who might know something.

"Pick up," I muttered, watching the taillights of Jace's truck disappear as he flew around a distant corner, while all I could do was observe the whole mess.