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I have half a mind to shake him and wake him up. The memory of him punching Chad has just drifted to the surface of my mind, and I feel justified in cursing him out for thinking he needed to create such a scene like that.
But only for a moment. Because the bigger part of me is relieved. Relieved that there's someone else out there who wants to defend me, even when I don't need to be defended. And relieved that the Jace Andrews I fell in love with so many years ago still exists, the one who wants to protect me and put himself smack dab in the middle of conflict for me for no other reason than so that I don't have to contend with it. It's soothing to know that he still feels strongly enough for me to have gone up against Chad like that, no matter how misguided his actions might have been.
Again, it occurs to me that my actions were just as misguided, and still are, and that I need to remember the pain and heartache Jace put me through. But my train of thought is quickly derailed.
“Anyone would be able to hear you coming down those stairs, Izzy. Were you purposely stomping your feet to wake me up, or still buzzed enough to not realize you're doing it?” Jace rolls over on the couch, his smug smirk already plastered across his face, despite his sleepy, half-lidded gaze.
“I didn't realize you were here,” I say defiantly, though my heart’s pounding at being caught staring at him. “I thought you'd have gone back to wherever you came from.”
It’s a harsh thing to say, but, damn it, he’s being cocky already and I haven't even had my first sip of coffee yet. “Why didn't you go home?” I ask, trying to soften my tone a bit.
Jace sits up, running his hands through his hair then down over his face. “I don't know,” he admits with a shrug. “I just didn't want you to be alone in this house. I haven't been around in a while, but I still know you enough to know that you’ve always handled your alcohol pretty well and might’ve been drunker than I maybe thought you were.”
“So, you're telling me you stayed in case I was shit-faced?” I contort my face disbelievingly. “Just wanted to watch the show, in case I ended up with my head in the toilet bowl?”
“Jesus, Izzy, it's not like that.” Jace stands and smooths out his wrinkled t-shirt. “I just told you, I didn't want you here alone. And if you had ended up getting sick, at least I'd have been here to help you through it.”
“How noble of you,” I bite out.
Jace steps towards me, and at first I think he's going to try to envelope me in his arms. I flinch despite the fact that he's a few steps away, and if he notices, he doesn't say anything.
He passes by me and heads into the kitchen. “Another thing I know about you,” he says over his shoulder, “Is that you’re not a morning person. Never have been. And obviously, not a damn thing has changed.”
I let the veiled insult slide, turning to watch him curiously. “What are you doing?”
“Making coffee,” he says simply. “By the sounds of your surliness, you need it.”
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“I can make my own coffee,” I state. “I don't need you to do it for me. I'm fine. I'm not feeling sick, and I've only got a headache to remind me of how stupid I was last night. So, you can go. You don't have to be here babysitting me.”
Jace is just filling the coffee pot with water. At the sound of my declaration, he turns the tap off and whirls around to face me, one eyebrow arched high. “Wow,” he scoffs. “I'm not sure whether to be more offended that you deem some of the things said and done last night as you just being stupid, or that you're dismissing me like being here is some dirty little secret.”
“You know as well as I do that half the town will have seen your truck in my driveway by now, Jace,” I inform him, crossing my arms in front of me. “I can just hear the fucking rumors now.” I hope I seem more confident that I am.
“So, you don't want me to leave, per se. You just don't want anybody else to know I'm here.”
“Don't read more into this than there is,” I snap. “Everybody probably already knows by now that you punched Chad and made that big scene at Tonk's last night, so your truck still being parked in my driveway this morning is not going to help the rumor mill.”
“To hell with what people say,” Jace replies, now sporting an edge in his voice as well. “They’ll always find something to talk about, you know that.”
I run my hands through my hair, frustrated as hell. Not only by Jace's blatant argumentativeness toward me, but also by the fact that he's right—I don't want him to leave. And that is exactly why he has to. “You're not listening,” I stammer. “I really do think you should go.”
“Speaking of going, where exactly are you going?” Jace's gaze flits around the room, and for the first time I take in the fact that he's staring at the disarray of my living room and kitchen, cluttered with cardboard boxes and totes in various stages of being packed up.
Damn it. “I’m moving.”
Suddenly, Jace is eerily still in front of me, and only the sputtering of the coffee pot is heard in the room. “You’re moving,” he repeats, as though testing the words on his tongue. “Where?”
His tone makes it sounds like I’m doing something wrong by even suggesting such a thing. It makes me feel like I am, too. “Frankly, it’s none of your—”
“Where, Izzy?”
I huff a loud sigh. Everyone in town is eventually going to find out anyway. “Los Angeles.”
Jace doesn’t even bother to try to hide his surprise. “Los Angeles? Izzy, that’s halfway across the damn country.”
“Thanks for the geography lesson.”
