Cole’s POV
The whiskey burns less with each swallow, which means I'm either getting numb or getting close to the answer I'm looking for at the bottom of this bottle.
My apartment looks exactly like it always does at 2 AM—shadows in the corners, that water stain on the ceiling shaped like Florida, the same worn path in the carpet from three years of restless pacing.
But everything's different now because Ryan's words keep echoing in my skull, bouncing around like pinballs: I want you to be with Grace.
I drop onto the couch and the springs protest under my weight, same as always, but the familiar sound does nothing to ground me.
The memories come uninvited, flooding in like they do when I drink enough to let my guard down.
My mother's voice drifts through time, muffled by the bathroom door: "Baby, Marcus just wasn't ready for a family. It's not about you, sweetheart. Some men just can't handle the responsibility."
Marcus was boyfriend number seven. He'd lasted four months, which was longer than most.
He taught me to throw a curveball in the backyard, bought me ice cream after Little League games, and then packed his truck one Tuesday morning while Mom was in the bathroom with the water running.
She came out with mascara streaking down her cheeks, forced a smile, and made pancakes like nothing happened.
"We're better off without him," she'd said, but her hands shook as she poured the syrup. "Just you and me, baby. That's all we need."
Then came Anthony. Then Roberto. Then James who lasted two weeks.
By the time I hit thirteen, I'd stopped learning their names—just called them all "Mom's friend" and waited for the inevitable morning when their trucks would disappear from our driveway.
I stopped counting on fifteen boyfriends, stopped hoping one might stay, stopped believing in anything permanent.
"You get too attached—you get left behind," Mom told me once, drunk on wine and honesty. "That's the Jensen curse, baby. We love too hard and hold on too tight. So you've got to play it cool. Never let them see how much you need them."
I learned that lesson well. Maybe too well. Never stayed the night, never made promises, never let anyone get close enough to leave marks that wouldn't fade.
It was cleaner that way, safer, like performing surgery with emotional anesthesia. Touch and go. Feel nothing and keep moving.
But Grace... Fuck.
I close my eyes and she materializes instantly behind my eyelids, a fantasy so vivid it steals the breath from my lungs.
I can see her spread across my bed, that light brown hair fanned out across my pillow like spilled honey catching sunlight.
Those hazel eyes would be dark with want, pupils blown wide as I hover over her, as I position myself between her thighs that would tremble with anticipation.
"Cole, please," her voice in my imagination is breathy and desperate, nothing like the careful distance she maintains in real life. "I need you. I've needed you for so long."
In my mind, I grip her hips hard enough to leave bruises she'd hide under sundresses, marks that would remind her for days that she's mine.
I'd slide inside her slowly, watching her back arch off the bed in a perfect curve, watching her mouth fall open in a silent scream of pleasure.
The sounds she'd make—Christ, not those polite little moans I've heard through the walls when Ryan used to touch her, not those performative gasps that sounded more like obligation than desire.
No, with me she'd make raw, primal noises torn from her throat, sounds that would make her blush afterward, sounds that would echo in my apartment for days.
"Is this what you wanted?" I'd ask her, driving deeper, watching her fall apart beneath me. "Is this what you think about when he's lying next to you?"
"Yes," she'd gasp, nails raking down my back hard enough to draw blood. "Always you. Only you."
My phone buzzes on the coffee table, yanking me out of the fantasy with jarring suddenness. Derek's name lights up the screen. I consider letting it go to voicemail, but he'll just keep calling.
"You alright?" His voice is careful, probing. "Ryan said you left weird."
"Yeah, just tired." The lie comes automatic, practiced from years of deflection.
There's a pause where I can hear him debating whether to push.
"Look, man, whatever happened between you and Ryan tonight, you guys will work it out. You always do. Twenty years of friendship doesn't just disappear over one weird evening."
"I know what we have," I say, sharper than intended.
"Do you? Because from where I'm sitting, it looks like you're ready to throw away the best friendship you've ever had over some stupid argument. What was it this time, fantasy football? Who pays for beer?"
The anger flares hot and immediate. "It's not that simple."
"Jesus, Cole." Derek's voice shifts to something like concern. "You sound wrecked. Did something serious actually happen? Ryan seemed off when I texted him earlier, but he wouldn't say what was up."
I almost tell him everything—the proposal, the arrangement, the contract with its neat little rules that are supposed to keep everyone safe.
I almost tell him about the fantasies that have haunted me since their wedding day when Grace smiled at me over champagne, radiant in white lace, and I had to excuse myself to the bathroom to get my shit together.
I almost confess that I've wanted her since the moment Ryan introduced us six years ago, that every woman since has been a pale imitation, a placeholder, a distraction from the one person I could never have.
"Yeah, just tired," I repeat instead. "Long day at the gym. New client who thinks he's training for American Ninja Warrior when he can barely do a push-up."
"Right." Derek doesn't believe me, but he lets it go. "Get some sleep, man. Whatever's eating at you, it'll look better in the morning."
"Sure. Thanks for checking in."
"That's what friends do."
Friends. The word tastes bitter. Friends don't fantasize about their best friend's wife. Friends don't consider accepting insane proposals that will destroy everything.
Friends walk away from temptation instead of drowning in it at 2 AM with half a bottle of whiskey for company.
After Derek hangs up, I find myself reaching for the pencil and napkin on my coffee table, remnants from last week's takeout order.
My hands move on autopilot, muscle memory from art classes my mother couldn't afford but somehow managed to pay for anyway.
The curve of Grace's jaw materializes first, delicate but strong, then the way her nose crinkles when she laughs at something genuinely funny, not those polite laughs she gives to Ryan's terrible jokes.
I spend the most time on her lips, those perfect lips I've imagined wrapped around my cock more times than I can count, those lips that part slightly when she's thinking, that she bites when she's nervous.
In my sketch, they're slightly swollen, like they would be after I'd kissed her the way she deserves to be kissed—deep and consuming and desperate.
The drawing stares back at me when I'm done—beautiful, forbidden, impossible. Everything I want and everything I'll destroy if I'm stupid enough to reach for it.
Because that's what Jensens do. We touch beautiful things and watch them shatter. We love too hard and hold too tight until people run.
We're hurricanes dressed as summer breezes, and Grace deserves better than the destruction I carry in my DNA.
But God help me, I want her anyway.
I pour another whiskey.