Chapter 4 – Rafael
RAFAEL
May doesn't look up when we walk in. Just points to our usual booth in the back, the one with sightlines to both exits.
I head toward the booth, already working out the seating arrangement in my head. If I sit across from them, there's distance. Space to breathe. Room to pretend my brain isn't still short-circuiting every time I catch a whiff of Phoenix's scent mixed with Bells's suppressed undertones.
Distance is good.
Distance is safe.
My hand is on the back of the booth, ready to slide onto the bench across from them, when Bells's fingers close around my wrist like a manacle.
"Nope."
I blink down at her. "What?"
"You're the aloof one." She yanks me sideways with surprising strength for someone her size, shoving me into the booth beside her. "That means you sit with me. Phoenix needs more room anyway."
"I do need more room," Phoenix agrees, already folding his massive frame into the opposite bench. His knees knock against the table as he settles, and he has to angle his legs to avoid kicking me in the shins. "These booths were not designed for alphas my height. Or these shoulders."
And just like that, I'm trapped.
Bells is between me and the open restaurant, her shoulder warm against my arm through the thin fabric of my polo. The wall is at my back. Phoenix sits directly across from me, and when our eyes meet, neither of us looks away fast enough.
That's new.
Or maybe it's not new. Maybe I've just stopped pretending I don't notice.
Fuck.
I grab the menu even though I've had it memorized for years. May comes over with waters and a knowing look that makes me want to sink through the floor.
"Three today?" She peers at Bells. "New friend?"
"Bandmate," Phoenix supplies with that golden retriever smile of his. "Bells, May. May, Bells. She's been keeping us fed since we were broke nobodies playing dive bars."
"Still nobodies," May sniffs, but there's affection underneath the gruffness. "Just less broke. What do you want?"
We order on autopilot. The usual for Phoenix and me, pad thai for Bells. May nods once and disappears toward the kitchen without writing anything down. She's never needed to.
All three of us go silent.
Phoenix is studying the laminated drinks and desserts menu. I'm still pretending to read the regular menu even though I already ordered.
And Bells is watching us both, a smirk tugging at her lips.
"So," she says, breaking the tension like it's made of glass. "Jamie has this whole system for feeding Cheeto. Apparently tigers are picky eaters? Who knew."
I grab the conversational lifeline with both hands. "Picky how?"
"He'll only eat salmon on Tuesdays. And it has to be wild-caught, not farmed. Farmed salmon smells different." Bells takes a sip of her water. "Orion tried to trick him once with the cheap stuff and Cheeto didn't speak to him for three days."
"Speak?" Phoenix asks, eyebrows climbing.
"You know. Tiger sounds. Chuffing or whatever." She waves a hand. "Jamie showed me videos. It's actually kind of adorable."
"You're describing an apex predator that could eat a person," I point out.
"An apex predator with heart, Raf. There's a difference."
Phoenix laughs. It's that warm, easy sound that used to be background noise and now makes something twist in my chest.
I look away. Look at the menu. Look anywhere except at him.
Bells resumes chattering about Jamie's mask workshop and the hundreds of creations covering every wall.
About the weird horror props scattered throughout the tower.
About how Orion looks and acts like a gothic prince.
And how she thinks Rex and Jamie might actually be sort of friends even though Rex hates everything with a pulse.
My eyes flick to Phoenix. He leans forward when Bells talks, genuinely interested in everything she says even though he's usually so distractible, he checks out five words into every other conversation. His eyes keep finding mine, too, and I keep glancing away awkwardly.
Every time I look at Phoenix, my mind is like, "Hey! Look! Phoenix's giant fucking cock in your face! REMEMBER?"
May slides our plates onto the table and adds a basket of spring rolls that definitely wasn't part of our order.
Phoenix's whole face lights up.
"Thanks," he says, already reaching for one.
She pokes his shoulder affectionately. "Big alphas need to eat more."
She walks away and Phoenix is still grinning when he looks back at the table. At me. He flexes his biceps playfully, earning a giggle from Bells, who already has a mouthful of noodles.
I stare at my plate like I might be able to disappear into it if I stare hard enough.
Then Bells makes a happy sound next to me, this little hum of pleasure that goes straight to places it shouldn't. My eyes lock on her just in time to see her tongue curling out to eat off her spoon.
Fuck yeah, brain, think about THAT. That's better.
"This is really good," she says. "Like, really good. Way better than the takeout. Why have you been holding out on me?"
"We've been a little busy," Phoenix points out. "What with the blackmail and the stalker and the..." He cuts himself off, glancing around the restaurant. "Other stuff."
"Other stuff," Bells repeats dryly. "Is that what we're calling it?"
"Do you have a better term?"
"I was thinking 'absolute clusterfuck,' personally."
I snort before I can stop myself. Bells grins at me. "Clusterfuck works," I admit.
We eat in something closer to comfortable silence after that. The food is good—it's always good here—and having shit to do with my hands helps. I focus on the flavors, the textures, the familiar routine of a meal I've had a hundred times before.
I'm halfway through my noodles when Bells's fork invades my plate without warning.
"The fuck?"
She snags a piece of chicken before I can stop her, popping it into her mouth with zero shame. "Wanted to try it."
"You could've asked."
"And miss that look on your face?" She's already reaching for another piece. "Never."
Phoenix shakes with laughter across the table as Bells grins at me like she just won something. My chicken, specifically.
"You're a menace," I tell her.
"Absolutely." She steals a baby corn. "But I'm your menace now. You're stuck with me."
Your menace.
The possessive pronoun shouldn't hit as hard as it does. Like she belongs to me. To us. Like whatever this is has already been decided and we're just catching up.
Her hand finds mine under the table and her fingers lace through mine, palm warm against my skin. Her thumb traces the lines of my palm and I fucking melt.
Guess not everything that happened at the hotel was a one-time thing.
"Speaking of menace, Rex has been weird," Phoenix says, and the subject change is so abrupt it takes me a second to catch up. "Even by Rex standards."
Bells nods, her spoon pausing mid-theft. "He followed me into the bathroom to check the stalls for my stalker. That's... a lot, even for him."
"I did warn you he was chivalrous," Phoenix reminds her with a smirk.
"He's been spending every night at the studio," I say, not about to let the conversation take off into another direction. Bells is just as distractible as Phoenix. Maybe even more. "Sometimes he doesn't come back until dawn. And when he does, he shuts himself in his room and won't talk to anyone."
"Your room," Phoenix corrects.
"My former room. It's Rex's now, since a certain someone has holed herself up in Rex's fortress."
"What can I say? I like security," Bells mumbles around another mouthful of noodles.
Phoenix pushes his empty plate aside with a sigh. "Something's eating at him. More than usual, I mean. He's always been..." He trails off, searching for the right word.
"A dick?" Bells supplies.
"I was going to say 'difficult,' but sure."
"He's grieving," I say, and both of them look at me. "Nash was his twin. His other half. And he never got proper closure because he was too busy planning revenge against Stephen. Now that revenge has kind of... stalled out, he doesn't know what to do with all that pain."
The words come out before I can second-guess them. More than I usually share. More than I usually admit to noticing about anyone.
Phoenix is quiet for a moment. His eyes have that distant look he gets when he's thinking about Nash, when the memories are closer to the surface than he'd like.
"Nash would hate what Rex is becoming," Phoenix says finally. "He'd hate the anger, the isolation, the way Rex is destroying himself from the inside out."
"Nash would hate a lot of things," I say quietly.
Another loaded silence.
Phoenix's gaze meets mine across the table, and there's something raw in it. Something that has nothing to do with Rex or Nash or any of the bullshit we're supposedly talking about.
My throat goes dry.
Bells looks between us, clearly sensing there's something deeper here. Something about Nash that neither of us is saying. But she doesn't push.
She squeezes my hand under the table instead.
What the fuck is happening to me?
Just a few weeks ago, I knew exactly who I was. A commitment-phobic disaster bassist who never let anyone close enough to leave marks.
Now I'm doing math about how to sit so I don't accidentally touch Phoenix and make things weird again while simultaneously calculating how close I can scoot to Bells without crowding the fuck out of her or being too obvious about it.
I'm a goddamn mess.
“So yeah, the mask Jamie made is actually perfect," Bells says, picking up the conversation like we didn't just have a minor emotional crisis. "Rex probably thought he was being clever, ordering something boring. But it's exactly what I wanted. Something I can make my own."
"You're going to customize it?" Phoenix asks, perking up.
"Maybe. Or maybe I'll leave it the way it is. Haven't decided yet." She shrugs. “The point is, I have options. Rex tried to make a statement and accidentally gave me a gift."
"That's very on-brand for Rex," I mutter. "Failing upward into kindness."
Bells laughs, and her shoulder shakes against mine with the force of it. Her thumb keeps caressing the lines and callouses on my palm, and I find myself leaning into the touch instead of away from it.
When did I stop fighting this?
Phoenix is watching us from across the table.
Not with jealousy, not at all. More like he's trying to figure out where he fits in this equation. Whether there's room for him in whatever's happening between Bells and me, or if he's on the outside looking in right now.
I catch his eye and hold it, trying to communicate something I don't have words for. Because I'm just the lucky bastard who happens to be sitting next to her right now.
He perks up more, hopeful and… cute.
Fuck. FUCK.
"We should probably get the check," he says, clearing his throat. "Before Bells steals the rest of your lunch."
"Too late," Bells says cheerfully, snagging the last piece of chicken from my plate.
"You're the worst," I tell her.
"And yet you're still holding my hand."
She's right.
I am still holding her hand.
Like we're just three people who touch each other casually, who share space and food and aren't a blossoming fucking pack.
I signal to May for the check mostly to give myself something to do with my free hand.
The argument over who's paying is familiar territory. Phoenix insists he's got it because he's the one who suggested lunch. I counter that I'm the one who actually has cash. Bells tries to pull out her card and we both shut her down immediately.
Phoenix is already slapping his card down, and I have this irrational, stupid alpha urge to fight him for the check. Maybe even physically fight him. I stamp that down quick, but it feels like there's an angel on my shoulder and a devil on the other, and they're both kind of alphaholes sometimes.
We slide out of the booth and Bells goes back to being physically distant now that we're in front of other people. Phoenix falls into step on her other side, close but not touching.
Even with the distance, we look like something.
I don't know what yet, but… something.
The rain has eased to a drizzle, and Bells tilts her face up to catch it, laughing at something Phoenix says. His grin goes soft in a way I've only seen directed at one person before.
Nash.
He used to look at Nash like that. When he thought no one was watching. When he forgot to hide it.
Phoenix catches me staring. His smile falters, vulnerability flickering across his face before he shutters it away.
Too late. I saw it.
I saw him.
"You okay?" Bells asks, looking up at me. "You look like someone just walked over your grave."
"Fine," I manage. "Just... thinking."
"Dangerous habit." She grins up at me. "Try to keep it to a minimum."
We pile into the car, Phoenix and Bells in the back, clearly making up for lost contact time at the restaurant while I grip the fuck out of the steering wheel and turn on the radio so I don't have to talk.
Because I'm not just falling for Bells.
I'm falling for my best friend too.
And I have no fucking idea what to do about either.