Page 93 of End Game

Logan shifts on the couch. “You need anything before you go?”

“No,” I snap automatically.

Then I inhale and soften it by a fraction, because Pops is watching and because I’m not a monster.

“Be nice,” I add, pointing at Logan with a warning.

Logan looks genuinely offended. “To who?”

“To my dad,” I say.

Pops chuckles. “I think he can handle that.”

Logan’s gaze holds mine for a beat too long. “Drive safe,” he says quietly.

The words shouldn’t hit me.

They do anyway—because he didn’t say them like a joke. He said them like he meant them.

I force my voice back into armor. “Don’t tell me what to do.”

Logan’s lips twitch. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”

I walk out before my heart can do anything stupid.

—

Jade pulls up with Blakely in the passenger seat, both of them blasting a song that is aggressively upbeat for ten in the morning.

Jade leans across the center console when I get in and shoves a coffee into my hands. “Drink. Immediately.”

I blink at the cup. It’s huge.

“This is not coffee,” I accuse. “This is a beverage-based cry for help.”

Jade grins. “It’s a coping mechanism.”

Blakely smiles softly. “We’re starting with coffee. Then Target. Then lunch. Then…whatever you want.”

I stare at her. “Target is not girls’ day.”

Jade gasps like I slapped her. “Target is the cornerstone of female mental health.”

Blakely nods with dead seriousness. “It’s science.”

I snort despite myself, and Jade’s eyes light up like she just scored a point.

“There,” she says. “That. More of that.”

I stare out the window as we pull away from my house, the tension in my shoulders easing by half a degree.

The relief is immediate and also guilty.

Because how dare I feel lighter when Pops…and Logan…are back there.

My brain tries to drag me into that guilt spiral.

Blakely’s voice cuts through it gently. “How’s your dad today?”