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“That wasn’t for you. I meant about the man I met after Seth.”

“When you were trying to get over him?”

“Something like that.”

It was a lot like that. Because I do remember Folk telling me about the quiet man who looked a little too much like someone else, and how he’d spent at least ten minutes wondering if he was finally over the one who got away.

He wasn’t—he isn’t—and it makes no sense that he’s bringing it up now, here, thousands of miles from whatever hellhole he met this other bloke.

Until it does make sense. “He works in there,” Folk says with a rueful grin. “Jack. Owns the place with Sol Bosanko and a couple of others. Have a look and see if you think he looks like Seth. I can’t see it now, but Rubi can, and he won’t shut up about it.”

I laugh. Folk does too and I’ve forgotten how much I love to see it. How deeply ingrained the years when he didn’t are carved into me.

We part ways.

I leave him knowing he’s watching over me and for once letting him do it. I keep walking through the urge to turn back, and slip through the old wooden doors of the Joker.

That wall of unheard noise hits me again. Thick and heavy, I imagine it pushing against me, leaving marks on my skin and bending my bones. Weird, I know. But it is what it is. The world is a strange place for me and I’m okay with it.

I have to be.

The Joker is packed. Rammed wall-to-wall with burly men and a handful of women. The air tastes of testosterone and beer. Bodies press together, moving to a rhythm I feel through my feet. Pint glasses tremble on the tabletops and the people packed around me laugh and sing.

Bass reaches me—from the band. A steady thrum under my boots, under my skin, that should swallow everything else. Should take me out of myself. But it doesn’t. The crowd takes too much work, too many moving mouths and blurred lips, and perversely, the low hum in my brain is quiet enough to deafen me.

Still, I don’t hate it here. In a room this packed and loud, everyone is fighting for something—to be heard, to be seen—and it’s hard to feel truly alone. Meaning is lost and found in every second, every thump of the drums, and most people aren’t looking for it.

I’m not looking for it.

I don’t need it.

I shoulder my way through the party, the pulse of the music following me deeper into the pub, low vibrations knotting in my gut, a pull that leads me all the way to the bar.

Jack.

I spot him immediately. And honestly, he doesn’t look that much like Seth beyond being broad and bearded with military ink on his forearms. But I get the vibe. More so as he approaches me and I catch a familiar hesitation before he speaks. Seth does it too. Checks the weight of a thought before he shares it. Shyly pays attention when someone else is talking.

There’s less of that shyness in Jack. And he’s working harder to concentrate than Seth needs to. As though he’s still learning to move through an echo in his head. He stops in front of me and glances at my mouth before settling properly on my face. A motion I notice—most hearing people don’t do that unless they already know I’m deaf—before his expression shifts too. Like he knows I’m seeing something in him in return. “What can I get you?”

“I’m looking for Sol.”

“What?”

“Sol,” I repeat.

But Jack doesn’t seem to hear me. I don’t catch what he says back and it’s a mess. It confuses him—it bothers him, I see it in how he glances around for someone else to deal with me. At least, it feels that way. Not because of him, because of me.

He’s not looking at me anymore. I take a chance and tap his arm. When his bewildered gaze finds mine again, I flash him my palm, showing him the word scrawled there: Deaf.

I tap my ear to be sure Jack understands and I think he does. By then, though, I’m distracted by that tug in my belly expanding. By warmth hitting my back and spreading through my limbs as someone steps into the space beside me.

Tall.

Solid.

The scent of sea air, jasmine, and kindness clinging to his skin—a presence so instantly addictive my body reacts before my brain catches up. Low vibration beyond my senses, whole or otherwise. That surge in my pulse and the smile on my face.

Oscar.