Forced Proximity (Bluebell House Duet Book 1)
Forced Proximity: Chapter 40

Evelyn was all about picking at infected wounds these days. Metaphorically, not literally. She would never do something that stupid in real life. But mentally and emotionally, she was creating scars. I didn’t want to sound like an asshole but also didn’t want to lie when she asked me why I wasn’t better to Lacey.

It wasn’t like I was bad with her. We didn’t fight, ever, and I’d rather sit on a barbed-wire dildo than hurt her. I loved Lacey…but I wasn’t in love with her. She felt the same, I was sure of it. We’d been together for almost five years and in that time barely spent more than a couple of months together at a time. We were friends. We occasionally hooked up. And we both knew what was expected of us.

That was the crux of it. Our relationship was never born out of love—it was business. Our families had been forcing us together for so long that Lacey only had two options for her future. Me or Ethan.

“Wanna get your ass kicked?” Haze asked, tossing me an Xbox controller as I entered the living room. Eve had been fully patched up from her grazes and Lacey had taken her over to the campus medical center to get her ankle and wrist checked out. I’d tried to tag along, but Eve had firmly declined. Fucking brat was starting to think she actually called the shots around here. That needed to change soon.

I sighed, flopping down onto the couch. “Sure. What are we playing?”

“Street Fighter,” he replied with a toothy grin. Haze almost never smiled, so clearly something had him in a good mood. It made me suspicious as hell.

I squinted his way as the game booted up and old-school title credits rolled. “Why are you so cheerful? Blow up another building or something?”

He huffed. “That was an accident, and I already apologized to Eve.”

“Okay…but you’re still in an unusually good mood. You kill someone?” It wouldn’t be the first time. There was a reason Haze Michaels was a wanted man, and not just because of who his parents were.

“Shut up and play the game, Sullivan,” he growled. “If I wanted to talk about my feelings, I’d have called my therapist.”

I snickered, selecting my character, E. Honda, on the screen. “You don’t have a therapist, dickhead.”

“Exactly,” he muttered. “So shut the fuck up.”

Chatting about our feelings wasn’t exactly my vibe either, so I focused on the game for a while and whooped my victory as I took down Haze’s character over and over with E. Honda’s Hundred Hand Slap move.

“Eat shit, Zangief,” I snarked, delivering the final smackdown of the match. “What was that about getting my ass handed to me, Haze?”

The big guy just rolled his eyes and clicked rematch. “Whatever. Best out of three.”

My phone buzzed, and I pulled it out to check the message. It was from Lacey, letting me know that Eve was fine.

“All okay?” Haze asked, watching me a little too intensely.

I quirked a brow. “I thought you didn’t wanna chat with me.” He just stared. Blank expression, staring, no blinking. Creepy as fuck, honestly. “It’s just Lacey.”

More staring. He was fully prepared to wait me out apparently.

I sighed. “She said Eve is fine. She’s just bruised, not sprained. They’re heading back now with Brodie.”

Twenty minutes later, the front door opened, and as hard as it was, I didn’t glance at the trio as they walked in, more focused on destroying Haze once more, though he’d learned a few moves from my last annihilation and was holding his own much better. The fucking genius learned at a rate that was impossible to keep up with.

Eve ended up being a distraction for our resident mercenary, though, as he gave up trying. “You okay?” he asked her, and I swear I felt her fucking presence tracing down my spine. Annoying brat. Here to drive me crazy in every which way.

“Yes, just a few bumps and bruises,” Eve said, her smooth voice warming up as she hovered behind the couch. “Lace and Brodie all but carried me home, and now I’m all dosed up on painkillers. I need to rest apparently.”

“I’ll help you upstairs, babe,” Brodie said, which fucking annoyed me for reasons I wasn’t about to delve into.

Forcing myself to keep playing the game, I knocked Haze’s character out again, and he threw his controller down, apparently too distracted to give a fuck. “I feel absolutely terrible about what happened,” Lacey said, her perfume growing stronger as she moved in behind me and rested her hand on my shoulder. I glanced up into her familiar, comforting features while she stared at Eve—who I still refused to acknowledge, since she’d insisted on heading out without me to begin with. “Keep me updated with how you’re feeling. I think I’ll head into town to grab some groceries for you guys and maybe look around the shops.”

Haze glanced my way like he thought I would object, but I just shrugged. “Yeah, sounds good. Let me know when you’re back on campus.”

Lacey leaned down and pressed a warm kiss to my cheek, and I breathed her in, wishing that there’d be even the smallest stirring inside for my oldest friend. I couldn’t lose her, but I also didn’t want to marry her like was expected. We needed to have that chat soon.

“I’ll call you later, Connie.”

Hated the name, but from her, I tolerated it. “Okay, Lace. Stay safe out there.”

Her laugh was light and sweet. “You know I can take care of myself.”

Turning back to the game, I heard Eve shuffle away and head for the stairs with Brodie. It took every fucking ounce of control not to follow her and make sure she wasn’t more injured than she’d let on, but she’d already told me to fuck off once.

When Haze settled back into the chair beside me, I felt his probing gaze once more. “What?” I snapped with a huff. “You’ve clearly got something on your mind.”

He ran his hand over his mouth, brows furrowing. “You seriously don’t mind if Lacey heads into town on her own?”

Was he for real? “Why would I mind? She’s a grown fucking woman. I don’t control her.”

I didn’t even want to control her. Our relationship worked because we didn’t live in each other’s pockets. She’d just gotten back from all the dangers of Africa, and I never cared.

Haze was silent for a few seconds, and I decided it was time to switch up the game. I was done with this old-school shit. As I leaned over to grab my controller, he finally said, “I wouldn’t let my girlfriend out in the world without me. We know what’s out there, Con.”

I shrugged. “Lace can handle herself. Now, are you ready to play? Or are we booking that therapy session?”

Thankfully the pitbull motherfucker finally gave up on questioning me to within an inch of my life, and we got back to trying to destroy each other via a video game. A few hours later, when my bladder screamed at me, I took a piss and leaned against the stair railing, wondering if anyone had checked on Eve. Maybe she needed a snack or a drink?

It was just being a good roommate to make sure she hadn’t died from her injuries, and as I placed my foot on the first step, Haze careened around the corner of the house, his phone in his hand. “Bro, get the fuck up there and make sure Eve’s in her room.”

Knowing his stalking ways had picked up on an issue, I tore up the stairs three at a time, slamming my shoulder against Eve’s door, but it was one of those old, reinforced frames, and I bounced right off. “Brat!” I shouted as I banged my hand against the door. “Why is your door locked? Are you okay in there?”

Haze hadn’t followed me, but he appeared a few seconds later with a key in hand. When it slipped right into Eve’s lock, I side-eyed the crazy bastard. “You’ve had a key to her room the entire time?”

Brodie popped his head out of his room a few seconds later, looking ruffled like he’d been taking a nap. “Eve with you?” I barked, and he immediately shook his head, concern marring his pretty-boy features.

“No, she said she wanted to rest. Is she not in her room?”

Haze clicked the lock over, and we all pushed inside to replace it completely empty. Bed nicely made. “What did you notice?” I snarled, getting right in Haze’s face. “Why did you think we needed to check on her?”

He flipped his phone up, and there was a red dot beeping in the middle of the screen. A screen which was showing up in the middle of downtown Meadowridge. “I put a tracker on her phone ages ago, but I don’t fucking check it every second, especially not when she’s supposed to be sleeping in her room. I thought it had malfunctioned or something.”

Utter rage darkened my vision, and I reached out and grasped his shirt. There was no way I could throw around Haze easily, but he didn’t appear to be thinking clearly as he let me jerk him close. “Are you telling me Eve is in fucking town? Without one of us?”

Haze’s eyes narrowed as he slapped my hands away. “You didn’t care when it was Lacey.”

Fuck. Fucking fuck FUCK. “This is Eve. It’s completely different. Or have you forgotten that someone shot and killed over twenty people at her last school while aiming for her?”

He looked like he was gearing up to probe into my psyche, and I’d have to shoot him if that happened, so I turned to Brodie. “We need a car, Brodes, and we need it now.”

With a nod, Brodie took off down the stairs, his face wreathed in panic. I’d never seen him look so pale, and it was clear that what he felt for our Eve was much more than just infatuation. Her fucking witchy ways were taking all of us out.

Haze was trying to call Eve, so I quickly dialed Lacey. She didn’t answer on the first call, but I immediately hit her number again. “She knows she’s not supposed to be out without us,” I snapped. “Which makes it likely that both of them will avoid our calls until they’re ready to come home.”

Lacey because she didn’t know about the danger, and Eve because she was my little brat and needed a firm hand on her ass.

“Why the fuck did she go out without us?” Haze rumbled, and I was surprised by the tinge of true worry in his voice. It took a fucking lot to rattle him, and I did not like that he was. “It’s not like her to be so risky.”

That was true, but she also didn’t understand the full risks. We hadn’t told her everything with her dad and Andrew being coerced slashed blackmailed into keeping her safe.

She had no fucking idea what waited out there for her.

As we raced down the stairs, we almost crashed right into Andrew and Ethan, who were heading through the hallway into the kitchen. Probably to start dinner. A dinner that was never going to be made tonight.

“Eve’s in town,” I barked. “She must have snuck out and joined Lacey for some fucking reason.”

Ethan was the first to react, and I had to give it to my half brother, he also seemed to care for Eve in a way I’d never seen with any other woman who’d passed through his life. “What? Are you sure? There’s no way Eve would take off without telling any of us. Why would she?”

The color drained from Andrew’s face at those words, and I knew my best friend well enough to recognize the expression he now wore. I’d have fucking killed and died for this guy in a heartbeat, but as red tinted my vision, I slammed him into the wall, my hand around his throat as our gazes clashed. “What the fuck did you do?” I demanded, pulling him off the wall only to slam him against it again.

Ethan and Haze got to me in a second, tearing me off our friend, but they didn’t let Andrew skulk off into the shadows like he was prone to do. “Drew?” Ethan said with soft menace. He was almost as dangerous as me, just with stronger morals.

Andrew let out a frustrated sigh and shoved me away. “We had another fight. She got into it today with Laura, and then she was all banged up. I’m sick of replaceing her fucking hurt under our watch. We’re supposed to be keeping her safe.”

The rumble from my chest surprised even me; I’d never lost it like this with Drew before. “You drove her out into danger, asshole,” I said calmly, even as the rage burned. “You better start fucking praying she’s okay.”

A horn from outside broke through our tension, and after checking my gun was secured in my jeans, I headed out the door and threw myself into the passenger side. The other three were right behind me, with Haze’s phone our only means of replaceing Eve.

“We’ll get her home safe,” Brodie said, his voice wavering as he stared blankly through the front windshield. “She’ll be fine. I mean, no one even knows she’s out there.”

Andrew remained silent as he slid into the back seat, and I threw a dark stare back at him. She’d better be fine, or we’d all have a huge fucking problem.