Page 143 of 10 Rings I Hate About You
“It did.” His answer was flat. Tired.
I laid my hand on his thigh. Felt the muscles beneath my palm tighten once and then release. “I know it feels like a week isn’t enough time.”
“It’s what we have.”
His thigh flexed again under my hand—once, twice—like his body couldn’t stay still. His gaze stared straight ahead on the road, but had taken on that distant quality I’d started to recognize as his internal spiral. His thumb tapped the steering wheel. Stilled. Then started repeating the same pattern.
I knew what it meant.
He was running scenarios, step-by-step, variable by variable.
If this happened, or another thing failed, he could pivot and do something else. Every possible outcome, every weak point, every way this could go wrong next week, lined up and tested all in his head.
And he wouldn’t stop. Not until he’d run through all of it. Not unless I interrupted the loop and got him out of head.
“It is,” I said. “And we’ll do it together.”
A single stiff nod. His eyes stayed on the road. “Where do you want to go tonight?”
“My place, if that's okay.”
He flinched. “Of course. I’m in a terrible mood. You’re right to want to go home.”
I stared at him. “You can be a spectacularly dumb man when you put your mind to it.”
His head turned fast and the look of surprise on his face was genuine and unguarded. “What?”
“With me. I want you to be at my place.With me. Can your family check on Chaos?”
“Of course, I’m sure one of them will. I can text them. But we don’t have anywhere to sleep.” He stopped. Snapped his mouth shut. It didn’t matter that he only stated the obvious.
I winced.
“Shit, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean?—”
“Marc.”
“I know. I?—”
“Stop.” I squeezed his thigh. “I’m okay. You’re in your head. I get it. You didn’t mean anything by it.”
He exhaled through his nose.
Soon, we’d turned onto Main Street, then down the small alleyway beside my building to the tiny parking spaces in the back. He cut the engine and sat there with his hands on the wheel.
“Maybe I should?—”
“Kingsley.”
His head snapped toward me, his attention hitting me all at once.
“Will you shut up and get your beautiful, tight ass up and into my apartment right this instant?”
His mouth tilted up in the corner. “Tight ass, huh?”
“That’s what you’re focusing on?”
“It’s a good detail.”
