“Don’t be a dick, Oliver. You know this helps me relax.”
He held my eye and spoke quietly. “You’re freaking out the staff and clients. You’ve been a caged animal all afternoon. Chill out. Take a break. In the office, away from the floor.”
“I know you were here at five a.m. beating the shit out of a punching bag.”
“Maybe I was,” he said, arms crossed. “But by the time the floor got crowded, I was cleaned up and ready for the day.”
We stared at one another for a moment, a blink of time as far as the history of our relationship went. I knew he was right. I’d been riled up since seeing Heaven the night before. Upset, depressed, sad, angry. The emotions ran through me but I ended in the same place time and time again: lost and lonely.
Oliver opened the cage gate and I reluctantly walked out.
Going on the blind date had been the first mistake. Not turning around the instant I saw her was the second. Not kissing her was the third.
I regretted all three. All fucking three.
Ignoring the looks of everyone else on the gym floor, I grabbed a clean towel from the bin and wiped my face as I headed into the office. I sat on the leather couch and Oliver shut the door behind me, sitting in the chair behind the desk. The office was an example of our success. Fine leather furniture. A sleek stainless-steel desk. A huge glass wall so we could look out over the gym. The warehouse was massive, big enough for almost any kind of training our elite clients needed.
Neither of us planned to attempt a pro career like Anderson and Hayden. We were good athletes but not major league material. We planned for it and Oliver got a combined degree in sports training and management. I focused on business and marketing. When everything fell apart with Heaven, we were lost—floundering—until we channeled everything into our other passion and built this place.
It was a rough first few months, but we had two heavy hitters in our back pocket. Two rising stars in their respective sports; Anderson Thompson and Hayden Pierce. They bought in financially and allowed us to use their faces to sell our program.
It worked.
It also kept us so busy I wasn’t sure we had time to miss Heaven, other than the dull ache that lingered as a daily reminder.
Until last night.
I groaned and leaned back against the cushion, wanting to tell Oliver to fuck off with his worrying, but I saw the same haunted look reflected back at me. He felt like shit, too. Finally, I said, “Last night was unexpected.”
“Totally.”
I twisted the towel in my hands and stared at them. “She looked good.”
“Healthy.”
Her eyes had been bright. No trace of the dark shadows that lingered for so long. Her skin was clear. Her body looked strong. I tried not to be obvious as I looked for the signals of depression and self-harm, but there were no dark circles under her eyes. No new scars on her wrists. All of that felt like a wave of crashing relief. We’d been through so much pain together and I never knew if she’d falter again. Depression wasn’t something you just beat. It was something you survived, and Heaven was a fucking survivor.
“She didn’t look pleased to see us,” I added.
“Well, we made rules, and in one night they were smashed.”
“Stupid blind date.” I glanced up at him. “I knew we shouldn’t go.”
“Dude, you were the one that convinced me!”
I tossed the towel in the bin by the door. “I know. I’m sorry. I just had no idea…”
“Of course you didn’t.” He sighed. “It’s not the end of the world, Jackson. We exist in the same city, maybe it’s time we tried to work through some of it. Get to a stable, functional place.”
I studied him to see if he was being genuine, because opening that wound…it may go someplace we couldn’t control. “I don’t know,” I told him. “With Hayden and Anderson gone, it feels wrong.”
“To be friends?”
“Friends is a tricky concept. You know that.”
His eyes flicked to the glass windows behind me and he stilled.
“What?”