Chapter Twenty-Two #2
He took a breath, careful. “She won’t sit without clocking the exits. Keeps her phone face down. When it’s just us, and I ask about Elise, she whispers like there are ears in the walls.”
I hated the way that sounded. Elise’s shadow in every sentence.
“We pull her out.” The words came hard. “If she wants out.”
“And if she doesn’t?” Theo’s voice was even. Not defiant. Just brutal reality.
“Then we don’t force her. But you make sure she knows what’s going on between you isn’t casual. You go public if you have to. Let Elise see Tori’s not a pawn—she’s protected. Give Tori a line she can hold if she’s ready to take it.”
Theo nodded once. “I can get her to meet me. Not at her house. Not anywhere Elise has eyes.” He rubbed his jaw, thinking. “There’s that coffee place off Grove with the back patio. Nobody from school goes there. We studied there once. She liked that no one bothered us.”
“Good.” I gave a short nod. “Tomorrow. Early. Before Elise starts her rounds.”
“I’ll text her tonight. No details in writing—just a time and place. If Elise is monitoring her phone, it reads clean.”
I weighed him. “If you want her out, she needs to feel protected. Not like she’s sneaking around for nothing.”
Theo’s eyes flicked up, steady. “I can do that.”
“Third.” My gaze cut between them. I glanced between them.
“Logan’s already foaming. The team saw blood.
Don’t feed the rumors. No posts. No subtweets.
We talk to Coach first thing. That’s the only conversation we have in public.
” It was a damn good thing he had cut out a few minutes early to take a call and had missed the explosion.
Theo’s eyebrow lifted. “What’s Logan got on the Dunn’s business, on your family’s?”
“Don’t know yet.” The truth sat heavy. “Mila’s got ears where I don’t, through her mom. Between them, hopefully we’ll know something before it becomes a headline.”
Jax studied me, like he could see I was balancing more than I’d put words to. He probably could. He wasn’t dumb.
“Now.” I straightened. “The part we aren’t leaving this kitchen without. You and Avery.”
He didn’t move.
“This isn’t a question about how you feel in the moment because she lights you up.
” My voice cut steady. “This is me, as someone who cares about Avery, making it clear—are you all in? Not a secret. Not until it’s easy.
Not when it’s fun. All in. Because if you’re not, you walk away now.
You don’t give her half. I won’t let you. ”
Theo’s chair creaked as he leaned forward.
Jax shut his eyes, briefly. Opened them. The ice pack had melted to slush against his shirt. He set it on the counter and braced both palms there as if he was taking an oath.
“I’m not walking. I’m in.” He drew a breath. “I’ve been in a long time, if you want the truth.”
The tension in Theo’s face eased a notch.
Jax kept going. “I kept my hands off because of Chase—because our team. Then everything with Elise went sideways, and it wasn’t safe to have anything that looked like a soft spot.
And then… it was just habit. Not looking straight at it.
” He dragged a hand through his hair. “Tonight wasn’t a mistake.
It wasn’t a heat-of-the-moment thing. I was going to talk to Chase this weekend and take the punch he gave me anyway.
” A humorless twitch of a smile. “Guess we just moved the clock.”
“Ground rules,” I stated.
Jax arched a brow. “You giving me a curfew too?”
“Don’t be an asshole,” Theo said, but there was no heat in it.
“Rule one,” I said. “No lies. Not to us. Not to her. Not to yourself. You can hold things when safety’s on the line, but you don’t play us.”
He nodded.
“Rule two. No power plays.” I held his stare. “You don’t use us to pressure Chase. You don’t use Avery to get to him. You don’t use any of this to punch up at Elise. We do this clean, or we don’t do it at all.”
Another nod. Slower.
“Rule three.” The one that mattered most—even if it made me taste blood saying it.
“You don’t disappear on her when it gets ugly.
You don’t go quiet; you don’t take space without saying you’re taking space.
” I exhaled, felt the ghost of Mila’s text in my chest. “We show up. That’s the only way this works. ”
Resolve settled over Jax. “I can do that.”
I believed him.
Theo stood, chair legs scraping. He walked to the sink, ran a hand towel under cold water, wrung it out, and tossed it to Jax. “Your face looks like you tried to kiss a train.”
Jax caught it one-handed, pressed it to his cheek, and winced. “You should see the train.”
Something small and almost normal loosened the air.
My phone buzzed again.
Mila: Avery asked if Jax is okay.
Me: He is. He’s all in with her. We’re setting rules.
Mila: Good. Then Chase can work with that.
I slid the phone face down. “Theo—text Tori.”
He was already on it, fingers quick, no wasted motion. He typed one line, sent it, then locked the screen.
“What if she doesn’t answer?” Jax asked.
Theo didn’t look up. “She will.”
The confidence there—quiet, iron—made me believe it.
“Coach?” Jax asked.
I rubbed a hand across my jaw. It was a damn good thing Coach had taken a call before we got off the ice.
“I’ll call him at seven tomorrow. Before the rumor crew has coffee.
He hears it from me. Basic. No details about Avery he doesn’t need but enough he doesn’t get blindsided by whatever Logan’s planning to whisper about the fight. ”
Jax’s mouth flattened. “Logan’s a vulture.”
“Then we stop bleeding where we can. You and Avery stay dark on socials. If anyone asks, we’re focusing on the next game. That’s it.”
He gave me a look. “Avery’s not a no-comment kind of girl.”
“Then text her before she torches herself in a comment thread,” I said. “Tell her the plan. Tell her I said please.”
That pulled a faint smile out of him. “You? Please?”
“Don’t get used to it.”
Theo’s phone buzzed. He opened the message.
“Time?” I asked.
“In a half hour. Coffee place on Grove.”
“Good,” I said.
We let that settle. The plan had substance. It wasn’t pretty, but it would do.
Jax leaned back against the counter, eyes on the far wall. “What about Chase tomorrow? Where?”
I pictured him. The version of Chase before tonight—loud, loyal, a fist you wanted on your side. And the version after—fury with nowhere to go. I picked the only place that made sense.
“The pier,” I said. “Early. He can see his exit if he needs it.”
“You want me there?” Jax asked.
“Not for the first ten minutes. If he’s calm, I’ll text you. You’re close, you walk up slow, you say your piece, and then you let him work it. If he swings—”
“I won’t.” Not bravado—a line drawn in concrete.
Theo put his phone down, arms crossing over his chest. Silence settled between us. Not hollow this time. Full. Intent spilling into the room carrying weight.
Jax broke it first. “And Mila? You two back on?” His chin tipped toward my phone.
I didn’t hesitate this time. “Yeah. We are. But it’s not smart to go public right now. Not until we know Elise’s next move.”
Theo leaned forward, arms braced on the table. “So you keep her in the shadows?”
“For now.” The words grated, but they were the only play. “When we move, it has to be clean. Permanent. Not another weakness Elise can spin or a way for her to hurt Mila.”
Silence settled, heavy but certain.
We cleaned the kitchen on muscle memory—ice packs in the sink, towels on the counter, lights clicked off. I grabbed my hoodie from the back of a chair and shrugged it on. Theo held the door. Jax walked out then followed.
On the porch, the night pressed cool against my skin. The ocean breathed somewhere out there in the dark, steady and indifferent to our mess.
Jax paused at the steps. “Luke.”
I looked over.
He drew a breath, pain flickering across his face. “Thank you.”
“For what?” I asked.
“Not telling me to stay away,” he said. “Not after that.”
I thought of Avery’s face when she said “I care about Jax,” chin up, eyes bright. I thought of Chase’s fist, the sound of it.
“Don’t make me regret it.”
He nodded once. “I won’t.”
Theo clapped his shoulder as they peeled off toward his car. “Text when you’re home, idiot.”
“You too,” Jax muttered. He slid behind the wheel, engine coughing to life, headlights cutting across the street. He lifted a hand in a short wave and pulled away.
Theo lingered. “You good?” he asked.
“No,” I said honestly. “But I know what to do.”
He grunted approval. “Good luck tomorrow.”
He left, and the night took him. I stood there another beat, the smell of eucalyptus and brine threading through the air, hands shoved in my hoodie pocket until my phone dug into my palm.
We weren’t fixed. Chase was a live wire. Elise was a knife under the table. Logan was circling, teeth out. And somewhere behind all of it, Dunn had his thumb on the scales.
But for the first time since the punch landed, I felt it—the click of something real sliding into place. Tomorrow, we would take the first swing.