Chapter 10 — Luke Time #6
"Nutritionally balanced theft," Tatum said, stealing one of my grilled vegetables.
Penny laughed.
It was quiet, but it got me.
She had been quieter since they got back. Not cold. Not distant. Just holding something inside herself, turning it over. The party. The dress upstairs. The card in her pocket. The fact that Tatum had just crossed a line Penny still had waiting in front of her.
Her hand found my thigh under the table.
Not high.
Not enough to make a scene.
Enough to remind me.
I looked at her.
She looked back.
Tatum, because she missed nothing when she wanted to miss nothing, leaned against my chest and said, "Penny found a murder dress."
Penny blinked. "A what?"
"A dress designed to murder Luke."
Shay pointed at her with her fork. "It's absolutely a murder dress. I saw it. I approved it. I briefly considered buying a hat so I could attend the funeral with proper respect."
"No funeral," Kiki said.
"Symbolic funeral," Shay said. "For his composure."
Penny's cheeks warmed.
That was rare enough to make the entire table notice.
She set her fork down.
"When we go to the party," she said, and all the laughter eased into quiet, "I want to introduce you as my boyfriend."
Nobody moved.
Not in a bad way.
In the way people get quiet when something true finally stops circling and lands.
Penny's hand stayed on my thigh. Her voice was steady, but I could feel the tension in her fingers.
"Not as Luke. Not as my friend. Not as the family friend everyone knows. My boyfriend. The man I'm with."
The word did things to me.
Boyfriend.
It sounded too young until it didn't.
Until Penny said it like public claim. Like risk. Like want sharpened into language.
I covered her hand with mine.
"I already am."
Her breath caught.
"You are?"
"Yeah." I looked at her fully, with Tatum still on my lap and Kiki and Shay watching and the whole impossible shape of this thing sitting around my patio eating steak like it was normal. "I'm your boyfriend."
Tatum patted my chest. "Mine too. For record-keeping."
"Noted."
Shay lifted her glass. "Group administration is getting complicated. We may need forms."
Kiki smiled, but her eyes were wet-bright. "No forms."
"A spreadsheet?"
"No."
"Color-coded tabs?"
Penny laughed then, soft and relieved, and leaned in to kiss me.
It wasn't the kind of kiss from behind the tent.
Not hands in shorts, tongue and risk and almost getting caught.
This was different.
Public enough for the table.
Private enough to promise there would be more.
When she pulled back, I kept her hand in mine.
I looked at Kiki. At Shay. At Tatum, still stealing my food like a menace in a bikini. At Penny, glowing with the kind of happiness she would probably deny later if anyone called it too sweet.
"Penny," I said.
Her eyes lifted.
"You should take a room too."
The patio went still again.
This time it was Shay who spoke first, but quietly.
"Luke."
I looked at her. "You and Kiki too."
Kiki's lips parted.
"Pick rooms," I said. "Move things in. Clothes, toiletries, chargers, whatever you want. You don't have to live out of bags in my guest bathroom."
Kiki pressed her fingers to her mouth, then dropped them like she was annoyed at herself for needing the second. "I want the one with the good closet."
"Of course you do," Shay said. "You fold emotionally."
"I fold correctly."
Penny looked toward the stairs. Not long. Just enough for me to know she was thinking about the dress hidden up there, about a room that could hold it, about Friday waiting on the other side of all this warmth. "Can I leave the dress here?"
The question was small.
The answer wasn't.
"Yes," I said. "Leave it here."
Her smile softened in a way that made the party feel closer and the patio feel quieter around us.
Tatum turned in my lap, grinning so hard she looked like sunlight had gotten ideas. "Window seat is mine."
"We know," I said.
"I'm announcing it."
"Consider it announced."
Shay stared at me for a second, then her smile hit all at once. Bright. Wicked. Soft around the edges in a way she probably didn't mean to show.
"I call the room near the bathroom."
Kiki laughed through something that sounded a little like a breath catching. "Of course you do."
"Hydration matters."
"You mean late-night snacks matter."
"Also hydration."
Penny's hand tightened around mine.
"Are you sure?"
There it was.
The responsible question.
The one I should have been asking myself all along.
I looked at the patio. The plates. The wine. The pool. Shay's sandals by the door. Kiki's groceries in my fridge. Tatum's wet thigh warm across mine. Penny's dress upstairs, waiting for a party that would make us more public than we'd ever been.
My house was already theirs.
I was just catching up.
"I'm sure."
Kiki stood, came around the table, and kissed my cheek. Warm. Lingering. Full of things she didn’t need to say yet.
Shay raised her glass. "To rooms."
Tatum raised a piece of stolen steak. "To my window seat."
Penny lifted her wine, eyes on me. "To boyfriends."
That one got quiet.
Then everyone drank.
The evening settled around us, warm and blue and alive.
Tatum wriggled closer on my lap. Penny leaned into my side.
Kiki started talking about closet space with the practical joy of a woman who had already begun making lists.
Shay immediately tried to negotiate for "emergency drawer rights" in everyone's rooms and was denied by unanimous vote.
My house glowed behind them.
Not empty.
Not quiet.
Not mine in the lonely way it had been.
Ours, maybe.
Beginning to be.
And Penny's party waited out there somewhere, dressed up as something innocent.
But for now, there was steak, wine, pool water, wet skin, stolen bites, and four women claiming space in my life like they had every right to be there.
They did.