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Chapter five
Present
Ben
“This is getting fucking ridiculous.” I slam my coffee cup down on the desk, grunting as its contents splash out over my hand, and grimace as the idiot in front of me clears his throat. “What won’t she come and say this time?”
“Well.” To his credit, Max tries to stop himself from smiling but I can see the amusement in his eyes. “Your three o’clock has pushed back by twenty minutes and she won’t be available this afternoon to minute your meeting with Jamie and the other investors, so I’ll be stepping in.”
I shake my head as I frown. It’s been two weeks of avoiding each other and Jamie is already riding my back about it. Two weeks of picturing that asshole touching her every time I so much as glance in her direction. I’m going to need to fix it somehow.
“Tell her, if I get any messages she needs to bring them to me herself. It’s her fucking job, not yours.”
“Would you like me to use that exact expression, or do you maybe think that might not work?” Max quips back with a smirk.
“No.” I admit with a sigh. “I don’t want you to say that. But you have to admit, this isn’t exactly working.”
“I don’t know.” Max shrugs. “My watch is clocking almost three times my normal step count these days.”
I stare up at him with mild disinterest and he grins like an idiot.
“Get out, Mr Kingford.”
“Okay. Yep.” He pushes out of my office, papers piled high in his arms for his boss, and I swivel in my seat.
In the front of the office she’s packing up her stuff, her hips swaying slightly as she moves around her desk, and Jamie sits in her seat. His feet are on the glass surface and he’s twisted back to look at me. He frowns and I grimace.
Yeah. I need to fix this.
Mikaela
Jamie sighs dramatically as he twists back to see Max scuttling out of Ben’s office. I chance my own glance, meeting Max’s eyes and mirroring the small smile that still plays on his lips. One unintentional perk of avoiding Benjamin Haston like the plague is the amusement it brings to the man who is quickly becoming my closest friend. I’m sure the second I leave the building Max will text me a play by play of Ben’s complaints, but, for now at least, I need to focus on getting out. And not looking back at the blue eyes that feel like they’re boring a hole in my skull.
“I’m worried about him,” Jamie muses aloud and a far too familiar feeling settles in my stomach; like thousands of little needles pricking me with the constant reminder of the approaching anniversary. “You know it’s ten years since his dad passed tomorrow.”
“I know.”It’s hard to forget.
Jamie continues on as if I haven’t spoken. “He’s always moody around this time, you know?” I watch as my brother picks up a pad of post-its from my desk and flicks through them as if they’re uncovering a story for him. “But this year it’s worse. I don’t know. I think he’s drowning in it.”
Somewhere, buried deep within my subconscious, is an image of Benjamin Haston I wish I could forget. He is tired and sad and vulnerable and there is nothing but open air and half-truths between us as we hold onto each other. Jamie’s words tug that image to the surface and I chew my lip as I bury myself into tidying up papers that are already organised on my desk.
Ten years could change a lot, but it doesn’t mean the idea of his pain doesn’t still leave my own chest hollow.
“I have three places to look at this afternoon.” My attempt to change the subject doesn’t go unnoticed, and neither has the fact I’ve actively avoided being in the same room as Ben for the last two weeks, but this time Jamie makes no comment.
“You know, I really don’t mind you having the spare room for a while longer, MikMak.” He shrugs as I grab my phone from the top drawer and roll my eyes.
“Call me that in public again and you’ll regret it, JimJam.”
He grins when I shove his feet from my desk.
“And I don’t want to stay at yours,” I continue. “I want some space - something that is mine - for once I want to have somewhere that no one else gets to control.” I swallow the lump forming in my throat as the weight of my words settle over me like an inescapable fog. “I think Ineedthat.”
Jamie reaches forwards to take my hand and squeezes tight. Three times. Just like Mom.
“I can come with you?” he offers, his words soft and his eyes littered with unasked questions.
I smile at my big brother, always trying to protect me, even when I haven’t let him, and close my eyes for a moment.
