“Bad dream?” he murmurs softly, tightening his grip a little.
I nod. Flashes of the dream parade through my mind, making my stomach sour. There were others throughout the night, I’m almost sure of it. I wonder if I cried during those too, and if Theo got any fucking sleep at all, curled up next me.
“I tell myself he might still be alive,” I murmur thickly. “I keep telling myself that. But I’m…”
“You’re grieving anyway.”
New tears sting my eyes as I nod again. Something in Theo’s voice tugs at me, and I turn around in his arms, rolling over onto my other side so we’re face to face. His arms stay wrapped around my waist in a loose hold, and we’re so close that my eyes have to bounce between his.
I wasn’t wrong about the roughness I heard in his voice. Tears glisten in his blue-green eyes, turning his irises a deeper, more vivid color. He makes no effort to brush them away or hide them, but his throat works as he swallows.
“My dad died five years ago,” he says quietly.
I bite my bottom lip. “I’m sorry.”
He shakes his head, dislodging a tear that was hovering at the corner of his eye. It slides down his temple, soaking into the pillow.
“It’s fine. We were never all that close. When he died, I felt sad, but in a way that made sense. In a way I could handle. Honestly, I was worried for my mom more than anything. My dad founded a massive tech company that made him billions, and ever since his death, my fucking uncle has been trying to take over the company.”
“Can he do that?” I frown. “Just take it over?”
Theo scoffs. “No. But my dad left the company to him and my mom, and my uncle keeps trying to push her out. I never really wanted anything to do with running the company, but if I step away entirely, he’ll steamroll my mom.” He shifts his arms around me, resting one hand on my hip. “I keep trying to get out, to build a life of my own, but I always end up getting dragged back into it.” His jaw clenches. “My uncle was the one who convinced my mom to sign me up for this fucking game.”
My eyes widen. When the guys explained the arrangement Luca D’Addario has set up to choose his successor—the person who will basically run Halston when Luca steps down—I could barely wrap my head around the fact that their own parents had signed them up for this shit. I still can’t, really.
I grew up in foster homes that ranged from hellish to merely shitty, so it’s not like I have an actual reference for what a healthy family dynamic should be.
But even I know that signing your kids up for what’s essentially a battle to the death is super fucked up.
Theo catches the expression on my face and rolls his eyes. “Yeah. My uncle’s a fucking asshole.” Then his expression grows serious again, pain reflecting in his eyes. “When my dad died, I just focused on getting my mom through it. I felt sad, but it was manageable. Now…”
He trails off, blowing out a breath.
“What?” I whisper, leaning a little closer as if I could lend support that way.
Theo makes a noise in the back of his throat. “There’s no body. We don’t know for sure that Marcus is dead. But I feel fucking wrecked anyway. I feel…”
“Empty,” I whisper.
I’m not entirely sure whether I’m filling in the answer for him or just describing how I feel, but Theo nods.
“Yeah.” His jaw clenches, and the hand resting on my hip flexes convulsively, digging into my flesh a little through the thin, soft material of my pants. “Ryland and Marcus are like brothers to me. More than fucking brothers. Better than brothers, because we chose each other. We aren’t in each other’s lives because of some accident of DNA or whatever. We’re in each other’s lives because we want to be. I’d do anything for either one of them. Lay down my fucking life.”
He stops, closing his eyes for a second as another tear slides down his temple.
“If someone told me where to go, what altar to lay myself down on to bring him back in one piece, I’d do it. I’d fucking run to do it.” His eyes open again, and the pain inside them burns so bright it nearly steals my breath. “But I don’t know where to go or what to do. I don’t know how to fucking fix this, and I don’t know how to live without him.”
Theo’s body shudders slightly, and I feel it in my own. His heartbreak is a visceral, palpable thing. I realize with a sudden rush of clarity that what he was doing yesterday—taking me to Doctor Adelman, making sure I took painkillers, bringing me a fresh change of clothes—was the same thing he did for his mom after his father died. He was trying to help me through it, to shoulder his own pain and help me bear mine at the same time.
And he’s known Marcus for most of his life. I’ve only known him for less than a month, even though it’s impossible to remember my life without him in it anymore.
My grief is eating a hole in my heart.
Theo’s must be a hundred times worse.
Bringing my hand up between us, I rest it against his chest. His skin is warm, and I can feel the heat on my palm even through his t-shirt. His heart gives a little stutter, pounding hard against his ribs as if in reaction to my touch.
I don’t think, don’t logically decide what to do next. I just reach out to the pain inside him, trying to soothe it and my
