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‘What? No. Of course not.’

Jax raised an eyebrow. ‘Not even five years ago?’

‘No,’ Ashley muttered, her throat tight. ‘Things got big so fast. It felt like… I don’t know. I was overwhelmed by the way she made me feel. I didn’t see how she could feel like I did. And then…’

Jax waited patiently.

‘Then she did say it. And I didn’t. I panicked, I guess. And it turned out to be our last conversation.’

‘Why didn’t you just call her back?’ Jax demanded.

‘I tried. She’d blocked me.’

‘Then you should have gotten on a plane and gone to her and told her.’

‘Easy to say that now. But she hated me by then. She wouldn’t have cared.’

Jax let out a short, dry laugh, shaking their head. ‘You two are fucking exhausting. Look at me. I have Toby and Elena both ready to skin me alive in the middle of a Welcome Break. And you two are sitting on a tour bus acting like MI5 agents.’

‘It’s different for us,’ Ashley said. ‘She doesn’t want it. She literally told me five minutes ago that the real part of us makes her want to jump out of a moving bus.’

‘She could be feeling the same things and protecting herself in the same way,’ Jax said, their tone suddenly shifting into something older and wiser than the messy bassist Ashley had always known. ‘But neither of you will know for sure if you don’t actually grow a set and say it. So you can keep protecting yourself, or you can risk rejection. But nothing changes until one of you two risks something.’

Ashley looked at her friend, then down at the table. The advice felt like being told to jump off a roof and hope there was a mattress at the bottom.

‘I can’t say it,’ Ashley said quietly. ‘She won’t let me.’

‘That’s a pathetic excuse.’

Ashley groaned. ‘But what if I say it and she laughs… How the fuck do I come back from that?’

Jax sighed, their phone buzzing against the table again. They picked it up, thumb already flying across the screen. ‘Suit yourself.’

‘Look. I’m gonna say it. Why aren’t you lot making a go of it together, the three of you? Why are you doing all this bullshit instead of the obvious thing?’

Jax looked at Ashley like she was stupid. ‘Because,’ Jax said, setting the phone down with a heavy, deliberate click, ‘a throuple requires three people who possess basic honesty and maturity. What we have is a volatile three-way Mexican standoff.’

Jax leaned back in the plastic chair. ‘I think a throuple only works if everyone wants similar things,’ Jax added, fixing Ashley with a pointed, heavy look. ‘And Toby wants a quaint, domestic life. Elena wants an open-ended polyamorous playground.’

‘Right,’ Ashley said slowly. ‘And you?’

‘I want to play bass. Beyond that, I don’t know,’ Jax said.

Jax’s phone buzzed again, skittering an inch across the laminate. They didn’t even look down.

‘But how do you know if you’re on the same page if you don’t talk?’ Ashley asked.

Jax laughed. ‘Look, don’t deflect your tragic love life onto my tragic love life. I know what this is. I’m not blind. It’s a mess, and we all like it that way. I might have had enough, though.’

Ashley sighed deeply and wondered… could she? Could she just say it? Be honest? Let herself walk into the chainsaw of love face first?

She stood. ‘I’m going.’

Jax looked up. ‘Where?’

‘To talk to Molly.’ Ashley took off at a brisk walk.

‘Don’t fuck it up!’ Jax called after her.