Chapter 41 #2
Knox set his third beer down and kept his hand around the neck of the bottle.
Three drinks was the line he’d set for himself, and he hadn’t crossed it.
He had come into the evening determined not to let his guard slip, to stay clearheaded enough that nothing careless could escape him.
And somehow, against expectations, he hadn’t spent a single moment wanting to leave.
Liam sat across from Knox in the curved leather booth, animated as ever, telling a story about an audition where he’d been asked to “show vulnerability” while eating a granola bar.
“I made a choice,” Liam said defensively.
“You sobbed over oats,” Jacob said, taking a sip of his scotch.
Liam looked offended. “The scene called for emotional repression.”
Jacob’s mouth twitched. “It was a breakfast commercial.”
Knox laughed before he meant to.
Over the past few weeks, the distance between him and Jacob had slowly started to soften. For two men equally terrible at opening up, that wasn’t nothing. They spoke more easily now, trusted silence more, and the awkwardness that had defined those first days had worn down into something warmer.
His gaze drifted to Mason. He was hard not to notice.
The man was distractingly handsome, with dark hair, broad shoulders, near-black eyes, and an easy confidence that drew attention without seeming to try.
But it wasn’t just his features that made him attractive; it was the way he looked at people as though he actually meant to hear them.
Maybe that was why, when Mason asked, “What did you leave behind?” Knox actually answered.
He stared at the bottle in his hand, watching light catch in the glass. “There was someone,” he said. “I got scared. Not of him. Of how much he mattered.”
The table had gone silent.
Knox kept his eyes lowered, his thumb moving absently over the label. “Instead of trusting in what we had… I ran.”
Nobody spoke for a moment. Then Liam asked, so gently it barely felt like a question, “You love him?”
Knox froze.
The answer was simple, but giving it voice felt terrifying. It took effort to force the word past that fear. “Yes.”
Liam held his gaze. “And does he care about you?”
Knox’s heart hurt. He thought of Dominic’s hands holding him close.
Of the groceries that had appeared in his mother’s kitchen.
Of the nurse, the apartment, the way Dominic washed him in the shower with hands so careful they didn’t match anything else about him.
The endless, steady acts of care Knox had been too scared to trust. “He hasn’t said it. But yes.”
Liam didn’t miss a beat. “Then why did you leave?”
Knox looked back at his drink. How did you explain a terror older than reason? Something that lived in your bones so long it disguised itself as instinct—whispering leave first, leave before they do—until you had mistaken survival for wisdom.
“I don’t know how to explain it,” he said at last. “Once I felt how much losing him would destroy me…”
“You left him first,” Mason finished quietly.
Knox dragged a hand over his face. “Yes.”
“Do you want to go back?” Jacob asked.
Knox hesitated. A small shake of his head, more frustration than refusal. He should have said he didn’t know. Should have lied. Instead, “Yes.”
Liam asked the only question left. “Then why are you sitting in LA instead of with him?”
Knox opened his mouth, and closed it just as fast.
His fingers tightened around the bottle, but no answer came. There wasn’t one that didn’t sound weak or irrational. Every explanation sounded worse once it was spoken aloud.
Jacob broke the silence. “Because trauma doesn’t disappear just because you know it’s ruining things.”
Knox looked at him. “Yes,” he whispered.
The simplicity of being understood hit harder than Knox expected. Of course Jacob would understand. He carried the wreckage of his own childhood. Different rooms, different voices, but the same old damage shaping reactions before thought ever had a chance to intervene.
Knox shook his head, embarrassed by how much he’d let slip. “That’s enough about me.”
Liam, merciful as ever, seized the opening. “Gladly,” he said, turning toward Mason. “Now explain why you’ve been distracted all night.”
Mason narrowed his eyes. “I have not been distracted.”
“You absolutely have,” Jacob said.
“Fine.” Mason exhaled like a man already regretting what was about to come out of his mouth. “I have a patient.”
Knox glanced up. “A patient?”
“I’m a psychiatrist at a rehab facility,” Mason explained.
Liam grinned. “Now tell us about this patient.”
Mason took a slow sip of his drink. “There’s this new admission. Old money. Public disaster. He thinks rehab is a resort and boundaries are negotiable.”
Liam laughed. “Please tell me he flirts with you.”
“Constantly.”
Jacob lifted a brow. “And? I know you. That wouldn’t rattle you. There’s more.”
Mason stared into his glass and muttered to the whiskey. “And I’m irritated that I’m still thinking about him.”
Liam slapped the table. “There it is.”
“It is not a thing.”
“That sounded like a thing,” Jacob said.
Mason looked at Knox, deadpan. “You see what I endure?”
Knox laughed—a real one.
Mason shook his head. “The worst part,” he muttered, “is that underneath all that bullshit and charm, he’s actually brilliant.”
Liam’s eyes lit up. “Oh, you’re in trouble.”
Mason drained his glass and said nothing, which said everything.
Knox watched him and recognized it—that specific bewildered look of someone who’d been blindsided by a person they hadn’t planned for. Someone who had somehow become important without permission, without warning.
He knew exactly what that felt like.