“Don’t even think about it, Francisca,” he snaps, and I freeze. “Even if you’re pissed, I open the door for you.” Getting out, he slams his door and walks around the hood to my door, swinging it open. When my feet are on the ground, he shuts the door and walks at my side to the front of the building, opening that door too.

Stepping inside, I avoid meeting his gaze. “I’ll see you later.”

“When?” he asks my back as I start to walk down the hall to my apartment.

“I don’t know. I’ll call you.”

“When?”

“I don’t know.” I look back at him. God, why does he have to be so fricking beautiful?

“That’s not a good enough answer, Franny,” he growls, and I squeeze my eyes closed.

“I don’t want to do this right now.” I’ve never had to do this. “If I told Matthew I didn’t want to talk, he’d just leave me be. He’d go away an⁠—”

“And I’m not Matthew,” he cuts me off while I’m scrambling mentally, trying to figure out why I even said that.

Why did I bring up Matthew right now? That was stupid and careless and so mean.

“I’m—” I start to apologize, but he cuts me off again before I can.

“I don’t give a fuck that he felt okay leaving you alone to figure shit out on your own. This is me and you. If we have an issue, we talk and sort it out.”

“Okay, we’ll talk tomorrow.”

“No,” he states.

“You just asked when we would talk, and I told you. Now you’re saying no.”

He shakes his head while staring me straight in the eye. “I’m not giving you an entire evening to sit alone in your apartment and overthink shit, Francisca.”

“Fine, let’s talk.” I give in. It’s obvious that he’s not going to just let me go, and maybe I shouldn’t want to. Leaving after feeling slighted didn’t work in my last relationship, so doing the same thing with him and hoping for a different result in the end is just setting up my own demise.

“Good, but we’re not having this conversation in the middle of a fucking hallway.” He wraps his hand around mine and leads me to the elevator.

Once PJ and I are inside with him, he presses the button for his floor. When the doors open back up, PJ runs to Dayton’s apartment and jumps up, resting his paws on the wood in a wasted attempt to get inside before us. He loves being at Dayton’s as much as I do, and over the last two weeks, we’ve both gotten comfortable in his space, since we’ve stayed over every night since Dad was released from the hospital.