3. Chapter Three
Chapter Three
Reaper
The living room is dim except for the low light spilling from the kitchen. I descend the stairs slowly, every muscle tense like I’m waiting for a verdict I already know will split me open. Wrenley stands in front of the couch, arms crossed, but her face, fuck, her face is soft. Hopeful.
“You,” she says, pointing straight at me. “Sit.”
Already doing it, Little Warrior.
I nod, keeping my mouth shut. Max doesn’t say a word either, his fingers laced loosely in his lap, watching her like she’s already the center of gravity.
She takes a breath. “Okay. Max, I love you. And Reaper, I think I love you too. So how do we make this work?”
Silence. The entire house is holding its breath. Then Max shifts, casual but calm. “We talk. That’s rule number one, constant communication. No hiding shit.”
I nod, feeling the truth of that settle into my chest. “Agreed. No lying. Not to each other, not to ourselves, and definitely not her.”
Wrenley lifts an eyebrow. “You guys realize this is going to be messy, right?”
Max leans back, lips twitching. “That’s life with you, baby. Beautiful chaos.”
“We’ll follow your lead, Little Warrior.”
Wrenley giggles a little. “Alright, ground rules." She says sitting on the coffe table in front of us. "No comparing. You each get a relationship with me, separate and equal.”
“Wait,” she says, her voice teasing, eyes glittering with leftover tequila courage. “Just to be clear… You both want a relationship with me, not each other. Right?”
Max barks out a laugh. “God, yes, just you.”
“I love him,” I say, nodding toward Max, “But only as a brother. And not the kind I’m interested in fucking.”
“That’s comforting,” Max says dryly.
Wrenley snorts. “Just making sure. Okay, what else?”
“No egos,” I offer.
“No guilt,” Max says. “This only works if we all want it to.”
Before I can respond, Elias walks by, Hugo at his side. “Yup, no egos,” he tosses out like a grenade, not even slowing his stride. “It won’t work otherwise.”
We all blink. I look at the walls. “We should remodel. These fucking walls are too thin.”
As if on cue, Riot strolls past, slapping the doorframe. “Nah, Margot made us stand outside and listen.”
Wrenley explodes. That chaotic, unfiltered laugh that comes from the core of her and breaks everything in me wide open. I would kill to protect that laugh.
Max and I look at each other over the top of her head. We’re in this now. I’ve never wanted anything more.
Cooking with Wrenley has always been easy. Natural. We move around each other like we’ve done it a hundred times, because we have. But tonight… It’s different. Every brush of her shoulder against me feels charged. Every accidental touch burns like it means something.
Because now it does.
She’s barefoot, wearing an oversized t-shirt that hangs just enough to drive me insane. Her hair’s a mess, cheeks a little flushed from the heat of the stove, and when she bites her bottom lip in concentration, cutting vegetables like a Goddamn assassin, I nearly groan.
I’m supposed to be browning the meat, but I keep watching her instead. The way her hips sway as she shifts from counter to sink. The smooth motion of her fingers gripping the knife. The way her collarbone peeks out from the stretched neckline of that worn shirt.
She glances up at me and catches me staring, her lips curl into a slow smirk. Like she knows. Of course, she knows.
“I can’t believe I’ve never asked you this before,” she says, not looking at me this time. Just slicing through a bell pepper with precision. “What’s your real name?”
I step closer, close enough that I could rest my hand on the small of her back.
I don’t. But fuck, I want to. I glance around the room.
Torque’s balancing a biscuit on Hugo’s nose and muttering encouragement.
Riot’s head is half in the fridge, probably debating whether to steal cheese or beer.
They know my name, but no one has said it out loud in over a decade.
I lean in, just enough for my breath to skim the shell of her ear.
“Liam,” I whisper
She stills. For half a heartbeat, she just freezes there, knife hovering over the cutting board.
Then she hums. Slow. Like she’s testing it.
“Liam,” she says softly, tasting it. Owning it.
I grit my teeth, jaw flexing. It’s just my name, but coming from her mouth? It feels like she’s undressing me with it.
We get through dinner, somehow, but the tension clings to us like smoke.
She sits across from me, and every time our eyes meet, it’s a silent war. I watch the way her lips wrap around the rim of her glass. The way she runs her foot along the floor, bare toes brushing my boot. She’s playing with me. She knows exactly what she’s doing.
Wrecker knocks his chair over again. Margot calls him a meat-brained hippo.
Riot grumbles about Elias’s fork skills being ‘lethal and uncalled for’, after he attempted to stab him for trying to steal food from his plate.
Torque finally gets Hugo to hold still long enough for the biscuit to balance, when Hugo sneezes, launching it straight into Max’s glass.
Laughter erupts around the table. But all I can focus on is Wrenley, shaking with that wild laugh, her head tipped back, eyes glittering in the overhead light.
When she stands to help clear plates, Max stops her gently. “I’ve got it tonight,” he says. He doesn’t even look at her; he looks at me. And nods. Go. She kisses him like she’s pouring gratitude straight into his lungs, then turns to me with those eyes, burning, open, ready.
She doesn’t say a word. Just slips her hand into mine and leads me toward the stairs. With each step, that tension coils tighter. Whatever this is between us, it’s about to ignite.
She walks in ahead of me, and the second the door clicks shut behind us, it feels like the air changes.
Heavier. Tighter. Charged. I don’t wait.
I close the distance in two strides, reach for her hips, and pull her back against my chest. She melts into me like she was always meant to fit there.
I dip my head, my lips brushing the shell of her ear.
“I’ve wanted this for so long.” I whisper, my voice is already rough with need.
Her fingers find their way into my hair, tugging gently as she breathes, “Me too.”
I spin her around, one hand sliding up her back, the other cradling her jaw.
Her eyes search mine, and then we’re kissing, slow at first, then deeper.
Hotter. I tilt her chin and take more, like I need to taste every part of her soul.
She responds with that soft little moan I’ve only ever heard in my dreams.
Clothes start falling fast. I grab the hem of her shirt and rip it over her head without asking. She tugs at mine with equal hunger, baring my chest like she’s been waiting to do it forever.
She’s a vision, bare skin glowing in the low light, eyes wild with want.
“Get on the bed,” I say. “On your back.”
She climbs up without hesitation, and damn if that doesn’t undo something in me. I kneel near the foot of the bed, taking my time, slowly kissing my way up one of her legs, then gently bend her knee and plant her foot against the mattress.
“Keep it there,” I murmur, she does with fire in her eyes. I do the same with the other, spreading her open for me, for this.
I meet her gaze. “I want to watch how you touch yourself.”
She gasps, lips parting in surprise, but her hands move. One grazes over her chest, teasing her nipple. The other trails lower, slowly, hesitantly at first, but I can see the arousal burning under her skin.
When her fingers slip in, brushing her where she’s already soaked, her eyes flutter shut.
“Eyes on me, Wrenley,” I command gently.
Her lashes lift, barely, but they do. And I reward her with a slow circle of my finger against her clit, which makes her hips rise off the bed.
“Good girl,” I say, and I see the way the words hit her like a jolt to her core. I keep watching, undoing my belt with one hand, my eyes never leave hers. She watches too, watches as I free myself, as the tension tightens between us like a wire about to snap.
When I finally crawl forward, settling between her thighs, her breath hitches. She reaches for me, but I press a kiss on her inner thigh and shake my head.
“Not yet.”
I want to memorize this. Every sound she makes, every arch of her back, every time she trembles under my touch. Because this isn’t just about sex. It’s about finally claiming something that was always meant to be mine. Her.