“It’s distressing,” I managed. “I’ve only been home for two weeks, and it’s like I can hear her in my thoughts again. Making me feel bad for things that happened years ago. Every moment with my family is precious to me but, you know…” I trailed off, emotion constricting my chest. “It’s better, for me and for them, if I leave.”

Dean’s nostrils flared, a line forming between his eyebrows. “Is it better though?”

The unsaid sentiment hung in the air between us, mingling with the now bright morning light. Could you stay? If he wasn’t thinking it, I clearly was. But I must have taken too long to answer because the very real, very un-temporary hurt that flooded his features for one harsh second felt like taking a hit to the solar plexus. I fully understood, in that moment, how far I’d fucked this up—that avoiding our tricky reality while giving in solely to pleasure had been a surefire way to hurt us both.

And hadn’t that been my mother’s preferred method all along?

“Dean,” I said nervously, “we should probably—”

His body went rigid again, pulling away from me on the couch even as I wasn’t entirely sure how I planned on finishing that sentence. But I already wanted to snatch him back, snatch back the past two weeks. His phone started ringing, and I flinched at the piercing sound. Dean sat up with a ragged breath and grabbed his phone, scowling at whatever he saw on the screen. Then he stilled and swore under his breath.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Is today Thursday?”

I scratched my head. “Yeah, because tomorrow is Friday and that’s when I leave.”

His eyes darted up to mine, then dropped back to his phone. He silenced the ringer and dragged a hand down his face. “My agent scheduled a meeting this morning with the Game Time producer who wants to hire me. It’s…fuck, in thirty minutes, and I totally forgot about it.”

The sound of a truck parking on the street snagged my attention. But I shook my head and refocused on Dean, tugging on his underwear and raking a hand through his curls. “Wait, you mean for the boxing job in Vegas?”

He nodded as he tugged on his jeans and peeked out the curtains. I could hear voices now and the beep of a truck backing up.

“I thought, well, I guess I assumed you weren’t taking that,” I said cautiously. Why I felt that was safe to assume I had no idea—we’d only spoken about it that one morning in bed.

Dean cleared his throat. “I haven’t given Harry an answer yet.”