Page 6 of Icebreaker

“My mom says I’m like a grandma with a grudge. So now that I know something’s going on with your living situation, it’s going to bug the shit out of me until I figure it out.”

“I bet you annoyed the heck out of your parents at Christmastime.”

“I still do.” Brennen’s sunny laugh was deep and friendly. But it stopped when he went back to watching me. And waiting. And waiting some more. The silence stretched for decades. The time-lapse might have been more like thirty seconds, but it was definitely a long time. Evasion was best.

“I checked my alarm three times to make sure I was out of here.” I picked it up from the cushion next to me and turned it over and around in a faux inspection. “Maybe it’s broken. I should get it checked out to make sure, so I don’t oversleep again. I try to get up on time, but it’s so hard. I probably just shut it off.” In my attempt to distract Brennen with chatter, I waved my hand too close. He snagged my phone out of my hand and inspected it himself.

“Looks like you might have forgotten to take it off silent.”

“Ugh.”

“Or maybe switched it off instead of snooze.”

“Possibly. Good guesses, Tate.” When I called him by his last name, like everyone else did around here, he frowned with a hint of furrowed brows. I swallowed the ridiculous urge to apologize. We lapsed into silence again. He watched me without looking away, and it was…intense.

“My roommate is really into this girl, and he wants to bring her back to our room all the time. But he doesn’t want me there while they are doing whatever. It doesn’t usually matter, but he’s really into this one.”

“He locked you out?”

“Asked me to leave with a lot of whining. I ought to be able to stand up for myself.”

“That’s some bullshit.”

I’d never had so much of Brennen Tate’s undivided attention. I was a nervous wreck.

“He said…”

“He knew you needed to study?”

“Yeah, but…”

“Sorry for interrupting.”

“He said if I ever got laid or had friends, he’d clear out for me.”

Oh my god, Ellis, shut up.

In cartoons, they always show what it looks like when someone gets mad. The air around them changes and the red of their temper creeps up their neck before the top of their head explodes. Brennen was already there and the vein on this temple pulsed.

“Pardon?”

“To be fair, I said we were good after he said it.”

“To be fair…”

“That’s a good Canadian accent,” I offered helpfully.

“Not the point, Ellie.”

Who the heck was Brennen Tate calling Ellie?

“Sorry.”The golden retriever vibe I’d always associated with Brennen was gone, and this stern man, not even a boy, was in front of me. I didn’t recognize him. I wasn’t frightened, but it was a significant shift in vibe. It made me think thoughts I had no business thinking.Daddy and little thoughts.

“You can’t stay there.”

“He did apologize. Sort of.”

“His apology doesn’t mean shit.”