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He didn't reach for the phone straight away. He stared at it instead, his shoulders going subtly rigid, and something inside me sharpened in response.

Eventually he picked it up.

I watched his eyes move across the screen and saw the last traces of warmth leave his face, which told me before he said anything that whatever he was reading wasn't harmless.

“Everything okay?”

“Yep.”

The lie came too quickly.

That one bothered me more than the others had because we'd just spent the better part of an hour doing something dangerously close to normal. We’d eaten pizza, argued over whether I was hiding from my agent, thrown napkins at each other, and for a little while, Ash had looked like a man who wasn't waiting for the ground to disappear beneath him.

Now the walls were coming back up right in front of me.

“Who is it?”

Ash locked the phone and placed it face down on the coffee table with far too much care. “It's my dad, and before you ask, it's nothing.”

I stared at him. “You look like someone just put a gun on the table, so forgive me if I'm having trouble believing that.”

His jaw tightened, and the fragile ease between us disappeared completely.

“I said it’s nothing, Max.”

“And I heard you. I also saw you in that tunnel.”

I regretted pushing almost immediately, but not enough to take it back.

Ash stood and carried his plate into the kitchen even though there were still two slices on it. “He likes attention. Showing up at games gets him attention, and that's all it was.”

“That’s not what happened.”

“You were there for thirty seconds.”

“It was enough to see that you were scared.”

He set the plate down harder than necessary before turning toward me. “Max, leave it.”

I should have.

Instead, I followed him into the kitchen because every instinct I possessed was telling me there was something here I wasn't seeing.

“You were shaking, Ash.”

His head snapped toward me, and I knew instantly that I had crossed a line.

For a moment neither of us spoke. Then he gave a short laugh that contained absolutely no humor and folded his arms across his chest.

“Right. I forgot. You notice everything.”

“Apparently not, because I spent years knowing you hated hazelnut coffee and somehow missed whatever the hell is happening with your father.”

Something shifted in his expression. “Nothing is happening.”

“He shows up at the arena after God knows how long, you look like you’ve seen a ghost, and now every time your phone rings you look sick. I'm not asking because I'm curious, Ash. I'm asking because I'm worried about you.”

“I told you to drop it.”