“What I said. About not being friends. That was?—”
“Bullshit?” Jax offered when he broke off.
“Yeah.”
The corner of Jax’s mouth twitched. Not quite a smile, but close. “You broke my heart, Ghost. Had to eat a whole pint of ice cream just to cope.”
The response was so unexpected that he almost laughed out loud. “Nowthat’sbullshit.”
Jax’s smile was real this time. “Idideat ice cream. It was just off Nessie’s?—”
“Yeah, I don’t need to know. Jesus. You’ve been hanging out with River and X too much.”
Jax chuckled and finished his cider, then turned to set the mug in the sink. When he turned back, his expression was serious again. “You did hurt me.”
“I know. I was out of line.”
“You were an asshole,” Jax agreed easily. “But that’s your default setting, and at least you’re here now. Which, if I’m honest, is more than I expected.”
The tension in Ghost’s shoulders eased a fraction. He hadn’t expected it to be this simple. Hadn’t expected to be let off the hook so easily.
“The mug,” he started, then stopped. How to explain what that stupid piece of ceramic had meant, how its loss had scraped him raw in places he’d thought long scarred over?
Jax shook his head. “I get it.”
“You don’t.”
“Maybe not exactly. But everyone’s got their things, man. The stuff that matters more than it should.” His eyes drifted to the mantel, where a small black box sat, out of place among the river rocks that Oliver collected and a menagerie of hand-carved animals. Ghost knew what was inside without asking—dog tags, maybe a letter, something Jax had carried out of hell and couldn’t let go.
“Yeah, well, I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.”
“No,” Jax agreed. “You shouldn’t have.”
Ghost nodded, taking the hit. He deserved it. “It’s... been a long time since I had to explain myself to anyone, and I didn’t react well.”
“But I wasn’t asking you to explain a damn thing,” Jax said. “All I wanted was to check that you were okay.”
When was the last time someone had done that—just checked, no agenda, no angle? Ghost couldn’t remember, and the realization made his throat tight.
He cleared it, shifting his weight. “Well. I’m fine.”
Jax huffed. “Yeah, you’re the picture of mental health. Should put you on a poster.”
There it was again—that easy back-and-forth that had somehow slipped past his defenses over the months. Not friendship, he’d insisted to himself. But what else would you call it?
“I’m working on it,” he admitted, the closest thing to vulnerability he’d allowed himself in years.
No, that wasn’t true.
He’d been vulnerable with Naomi last night over the phone, and again today in his truck cab.
And look what that had gotten him.
Jax nodded. “That’s all any of us can do, right?”
He opened his mouth to respond, but his phone vibrated against his hip. He reached for it automatically, hoping it was Naomi.
It wasn’t.
