Full Tilt (Full Tilt #1)(90)

“You name it, he can do it,” Jonah said, finally tucking his phone away.

The brothers exchanged glances, Theo’s gaze scrutinizing. “Tonight’s hang out with Dena and Oscar,” he said. “You still down?”

Jonah smirked sourly, an expression so unlike him, I had to blink twice. “No need to keep to any routine now,” he said. “What’s the point? I’ll shoot you a text and let you know.”

Theo’s arms dropped to his sides. “Oscar and Dena are expecting to hang out…”

“I didn’t say no, I said I’d let you know.”

The brothers faced each other down and then Jonah gave himself a shake and a dirty laugh. He got up and walked out the door without so much as a glance for me.

I smiled weakly at Theo. “I’ll talk to you soon.”

He grabbed my arm hard, then loosened his grip but didn’t let go. “If you need me… If he needs me, you call immediately. Okay?”

I started to protest and instead found myself nodding. “Okay,” I said in a small voice.

I left Vegas Ink and climbed into Jonah’s truck, which he had idling in the parking space.

He didn’t look at me when I shut the door, and finally I couldn’t take it anymore.

“What the hell is going on?” I demanded. “You just walk out and leave me there?”

“It’s f*cking hot out,” Jonah said. “I came to start the AC.”

“It’s October,” I snapped. “It’s maybe seventy degrees.”

“So you’ve been here three months and suddenly you’re an expert?”

My eyes widened. He’d never spoken to me like that. Not once. “What happened to you?” I asked. “You’ve been different since the gallery opening. Did something happen? Did Dale Chihuly say something to upset you?”

Jonah shook his head. “No,” he said, his voice softening. “No, nothing like that. He said amazing things about my work… I can’t even remember the words but I can still feel them, if that makes sense.”

“Then what’s bothering you? You can tell me.”

Jonah met my eyes for the first time in what felt like days, and for a split second, they were the warm, rich brown of the man I knew. Then a wall came down and he gave my hand a squeeze.

“Nothing’s bothering me. Because I have nothing to do. No more work. I’m in the mood to veg out today and watch a movie. Got any classic eighties flicks lying around?”

I nodded slowly. “I rented a DVD of Airplane!”

“Surely you can’t be serious?”

“I am serious,” I replied half-heartedly. “And don’t call me Shirley.”

It was a painful, awkward version of our usual humor. A poor imitation of our typical banter.

Maybe he just needs a good laugh, I thought.

Back at my apartment, we headed up the exterior concrete stairs that led to the second floor. My house keys had migrated to the bottom of my purse. Only when I wrestled them free did I realize Jonah was no longer behind me.

I turned around. The little front area was empty. “Jonah?”

I crept back the way I’d come, almost tiptoeing.

He sat halfway up the stairs, his back to me. The way his shoulders rose and fell rapidly made the horror coil in my gut like a poisonous vapor.

He can’t breathe.

I moved down the stairs on leaden legs, gripping the rusted metal railing. I sat beside him, ordering myself to be calm and not feed the panic.

“Hey.”

His elbows were propped on his knees, his hands and head dangling as he sucked in air. “I tried to take them too fast,” he said between breaths. He threw his head back, looking like a runner who’d just done a fifty-yard sprint.

“All right,” I said. “I’m here.”

My mind raced through the catalogue of every other time Jonah had taken stairs, or lifted a heavy blowpipe, or made love to me vigorously. In every instance he’d been winded, from the damage the CAV was doing to his heart. But it had never lingered like this. He’d always recovered quickly.

Always.

“I lied,” Jonah said, as if reading my thoughts. He reclaimed his breath slowly, one inhale at a time. “I wasn’t going too fast. I was walking up.”

He looked to me, breathing in, breathing out, sweat beading his brow, and his eyes… Oh God, the fear I saw in them. A foreboding that terrified me to the core of my soul. He tore his gaze away and without another word, he pulled himself to stand and begin the climb again. One foot on a step. Then the other. I wanted to touch him, to help him, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t admit to myself he needed help.

Once in my apartment, Jonah went to the kitchen and poured himself some water. He slumped against the counter, sucking in deep and even breaths.

“Is it the first time this has happened?” I asked, my own breath going no deeper than my throat.

“No,” he said. “Off and on. Since right before the opening.”

“That was nine days ago,” I said. “Did you—?”

My words choked off in a cry as Jonah swept the pill-a-day container of his meds off the counter. The pills and capsules scattered in a spray of blue, white and orange, rolling and clattering over my cheap linoleum tile.