Chapter 41
As soon as I opened the door, Joel demanded, "Where the hell is he?"
"Jake?" I stepped back. "Sorry, I don't know."
And that was the painful truth.
Without waiting for an invitation, Joel barged past me and looked around. "Jake!" he yelled. "You asshole! Come out here and face me like a man!"
If I weren't so depressed, I might've laughed. What? Like Jake was hiding under the bed or something? That wassonot his style. Joel, of all people, should know that.
Trying to keep my tone reasonable, I said, "Joel, listen. Seriously, he's not here." I tried to smile. "Come on. You know Jake. He's not afraid of anything."
"Yeah? Well, maybe he should be."
I stared up at him, wondering if I should be worried for my safety. Right now, he wasn't the Joel I thought I knew. His dark hair framed that familiar, angelic face – a face that might've lulled me into a nice sense of security, except for the fact that his eyes were flashing with unfamiliar rage.
I'd known Joel since he was a kid, since both of us had been kids, actually, even if Iwasslightly older than he was. But now, I was having a hard time reconciling the skinny kid I'd known back then with the muscular adult who stood, quaking with anger, in front of me.
If he were a stranger, I'd be smart to run. But he wasn't a stranger. He was Jake's little brother, and obviously, he was hurting in some way that I didn't quite understand.
I pushed aside my own misery and said, "Joel, seriously, what's wrong?"
He made a scoffing sound. "Like you don't know."
Of course, I had a vague idea. Just this morning, Jake and Bishop had been discussing the situation involving Vince Hammond.
To me, their concerns had been entirely justified. If Joel ended up signing with Vince, it wouldn't end well. I just knew it.
True, Vince repped some of the top names in sports entertainment. But Joel was Jake's brother. There was no way on Earth that Vince would ever do right by him.
If Joel could only see that, he'd walk away from Vince on his own. He'd tell Mister Hotshot Agent to shove it, and he wouldn’t look back.
But something told me that a decision of any kind had been, very recently, ripped out of Joel's hands.
I recalled something that Bishop had told Jake, just a few hours earlier.He's gonna fuckin' hate you.
The way it looked, Bishop had been right.
I reached out and touched Joel's arm. "Is this about Vince Hammond?"
Joel yanked his arm away and said, "Quit playing me, alright? You think I don't know?"
"Know what?"
His breathing was ragged, and his fists were tight. "What you two did."
Two?Confused, I shook my head. "Who? Me and Jake?"
He glared down at me. "You had no right."
I shrank back, surprised to realize that he was angry with me, too. "But I haven't done anything."
As if looking to gain some semblance of control, Joel took a deep, unsteady breath. In a slightly calmer voice, he said, "Look, I'm not pissed at you, alright?"
"Good," I told him. "Because I didn't do anything wrong. In fact, I don't even know why you're so mad, not specifically anyway."
His lips twisted into a pale imitation of a smile. "Right."
