“Thank you. Anyway”—she smiled up at me—“I was hoping we could say hi to Ronan on our way back from the movie. I made him nondistressed banana bread.”

“Nondistressed?” I ducked my head to catch her eyes. She dodged the eye contact. Everything about the platonic shit was watered down, impersonal.

“Meaning I didn’t batter it. The outside looks subpar, but the inside tastes really good.”

“The outside looks better than you think,” I murmured, knowing it was sink-or-swim time and finally—finally—deciding to get my head out of the water.

It ended up being a pleasant evening, everything considered (things I considered: I had to see Julian’s sour-ass face again, and Madison remained fully clothed for the entire duration).

After the movie, we took Booger Face to see Dad and stayed for tea. When it was time to go, Madison stopped me at the door and put her hand on my chest. My muscles jerked under her fingertips like she was fire.

“He doesn’t look very good,” she whispered, rubbing my chest in circles. “Stay with him. I’ll take the train back home.”

Normally, I’d try to buy more time with her. Today, I knew she had a point. I kissed her cheek. “Thanks for killing my libido and possibly my retinas with that movie. I will never look at ball gowns and tiaras the same again.”

“Thanks for being a good sport about it.”

She lingered. Mom and Clemmy were in the living room, doing a puzzle together. Dad was in the master bedroom. I could lean in and kiss her, and she’d let me. Her eyes were burning with that something I’d learned to recognize. A carnal hunger.

But now wasn’t the time.

And definitely not the place.

I leaned back, flicking her nose with a smile. “Bye.”

“Bye,” she said, the word thick in her voice.

As soon as she was in the elevator, I took out my phone and messaged her, knowing the reception was crappy there.

Chase: I fucking love you, Madison Petal Goldbloom. So much it sometimes hurts to look at your face.

<Chase has removed a message from the chat>

A minute later, she replied.

Maddie: What did you send and delete? I’m going to kill you for this one day, Chase.

Chase: Dad says the banana bread was just okay. Didn’t want you to get offended.

Maddie: You’re a jerk.

Chase: Someone has to be.

“Come in.”

Dad’s voice was hoarse from his lungs working at only 10 percent capacity. I pushed the double doors to his room open.

I pressed my back against the doors, hooking my thumbs into my front pockets. He lay in the shadows. Grant had explained to me that he was on a lot of painkillers but was still majorly uncomfortable. His breathing was so labored he sounded like an old car trying to spurt its last few miles before running out of gas. It had been both slow and fast coming.

“Don’t just stand there, boy. Come in. I don’t bite.” He coughed. I took a few steps in, feeling overwhelmingly inadequate for the first time in my life. He had days, maybe. Hours, more like. And still, the world turned. We took Booger Face to the movies. We went to work. We lived. Every moment I lived away from him felt like betrayal.

He propped himself on the headboard, reaching for his nightstand and picking up a rolled cigarette. I arched an eyebrow as he grabbed the lighter next to it.

“Getting high?” I asked sarcastically.

“As much as I can with the state of my lungs. Medicinal cannabis. Does wonders for the pain.” He lit up, inhaling deeply until it hit the spot. He coughed the smoke out. I sat beside him. “Maddie seems in good spirits,” he remarked.

“Are we really going to talk about Maddie?” I picked up the jar of marijuana next to his nightstand, examining it.

“No, sorry. Let’s talk about my favorite subject—my dying.”

“Touché.” I scratched my stubble. “Yeah, she is doing fine. She’s worried about you, though.”

“Are you romancing the poor girl?” He cocked his head sideways, taking another hit. It was surreal to sit here with him smoking pot. All he needed now was a backward ball cap on his head and a Pornhub Premium subscription, and he’d be every guy I’d known in college.

I chuckled. “She’s not that unfortunate yet, but I’m working on it.”

“Slowly.” He tapped the ash into an ashtray.

“Let me worry about the pace. You worry about cramming as much fun as you can into the next few weeks. Look, I want to iron things out about the whole Julian crap at the office. We never really got to talk about it.”

Dad waved me off. “No need. I knew, subconsciously, that this was going to happen at some point. The two of you needed to figure it out, and you did. The balance of power. Julian tried his luck with the leader of the pack and did not succeed. He is now tending to his battle wounds, and you’d be wise not to poke them while they’re still fresh. As I mentioned before, I see him as a son. Clementine is my granddaughter. Nothing will ever change that. Biology could never rival familiarity. But I will tell you this, Chase. Out of all my children, I see the most of myself in you.”

When he finished talking, he took a greedy, hungry breath, like he couldn’t stand the strain on his lungs of uttering a few sentences together.

“Thank you.” I bowed my head.

“It is not a compliment,” he deadpanned, surprising me. I looked up, frowning. He sighed, took another hit, and talked with the joint clasped between his fingers.

“I’m stubborn and pigheaded and extremely unreasonable at times. I love your mother, but I am the first to recognize I’ve put her through hell with my radical moods. I have no manners to speak of, and I’m sarcastic even when the time doesn’t call for it—which is always. I want you to promise me something.”

I hoped to hell he didn’t mean to warn me against being sarcastic. I’d need to cut off half of my brain and my tongue to be on the path toward not making a dark joke out of everything.

“Hit me with it,” I said guardedly.

“Give love a chance. It is rare and raw and completely life changing. A girl like Madison doesn’t fall into your lap every other day. If you miss your chance with her, there’s no guarantee another girl who is tailor made for you will just walk into your life. I know Amber hurt you, bad. You didn’t love her, though. You wanted to get settled and get the romance thing out of the way. I saw the way she looked at you. I saw the way you looked at her.”