Chapter 35
LAINE
Two weeks. That's how long it takes for something to start feeling like home.
I'm tucked into a chair at the table, watching Reid pour coffee while Blake flips pancakes at the stove. Morning light streams through the kitchen windows, catching the steam rising from my mug, and I have this surreal moment of how did I get here?
Not in a bad way. In the way where you suddenly notice you're happy and it startles you.
"You're staring," Reid says, sliding into the seat next to me. His thigh presses warm against mine.
"I'm admiring the view."
Blake snorts from the stove. "She's talking about the pancakes, not you."
"She's definitely talking about me." Reid's arm stretches along the back of the chair behind my shoulders. "I'm the one who made her coffee."
"You pushed a button on a machine." Ooh, he's still a little salty. But Reid and I ganged up on him. His coffee was going to wear a hole through my stomach lining. Reid's is so much better.
"I pushed it with love."
This. This right here. The easy banter, the way they orbit each other in the kitchen without bumping into anything, the complete absence of tension. Two weeks ago, I wasn't sure this could work. Now I can't imagine mornings any other way.
I love that they both try to have breakfast with me after a night shift. Reid has to rush off usually, but for a few minutes, it's all of us, together. Connected.
We're starting to feel like a family.
Blake slides a plate in front of me. Two pancakes, butter already melting, syrup on the side because he learned I like to control my own syrup distribution. Such a small thing. Such a Blake thing, noticing details like that.
"You're off tonight, right?" he asks, settling into the chair across from us with his own plate.
"Yeah.."
He nods, and I catch the slight furrow between his brows. He's been watching me more carefully lately. They both have. I know I look tired—the night shift is starting to catch up with me in ways it didn't used to.
"I've got to put in some hours in the workshop today," Blake says. "Hendricks wants his mantelpiece by Friday."
"The Victorian restoration?" Reid asks.
"Yeah. I'm close, but the detail work is killing me." Blake rubs the back of his neck. "Might be another late one tonight."
That's been the pattern this week. Blake's been chasing a deadline, which means workshop time stretches into the evening hours.
I miss him when he's out there, but I also love watching him disappear into his work.
There's something about the way his whole body changes when he's focused on a project—like all that restless energy finally has somewhere to go.
Other than being channeled into me I mean. Because he does that very very well.
"We'll save you dinner," I say.
Blake's eyes soften when he looks at me. "Yeah?"
"Obviously."
Reid's hand finds my knee under the table. "She's been domesticating us, Moore. Haven't you noticed?"
"I've noticed my fridge has actual vegetables in it for the first time in years."
"Right! Who knew there was a whole food group we were missing?"
I laugh at how ridiculous they are. Both of them. They've made room for me in so many ways. Yeah, I have my own room, not that I've slept there. But there's a hook just for my coat by the door, and a spot for my boots on the rack. Tiny things. But all those tiny things add up.
My apartment feels like a storage unit now. I've slept there maybe three nights in the past two weeks, and each time I couldn't wait to come back here.
Home. The word keeps surfacing, and I keep shoving it down because it feels too big, too fast. But sitting here with syrup on my lips and Reid's hand warm on my knee and Blake watching me with that quiet intensity of his—it doesn't feel fast at all.
It feels like something that was always going to happen.
The conversation flows, then jumps, and eventually it's just me and Blake sitting at the table, plates pushed to the side. And I can't stop the giant, jaw cracking yawn.
"Bed time, baby," Blake says, voice low. And I don't fight him, not even a little bit, as he pulls me up the stairs and into his room.
I go willingly, letting him tug me toward the bed. I know what's coming, and my belly clenches low and tight. "I'm not even that tired yet."
"Liar." His hands find my hips, pulling me against him. "You've got circles under your eyes."
"Rude."
"Observant." He kisses my forehead and my eyes drift close. I am tired. But not too tired. "Let me take care of you."
I'm still not used to this. The way he asks permission with his hands, checking in with every touch. The way he's learned exactly how I like to be held, how much pressure, where to put his mouth to make me gasp.
He's learned me. And that's terrifying and wonderful in equal measure.
We fall into bed together, and it's slow this time.
Slow and deliberate, Blake's body covering mine, his forehead pressed to my temple as he moves inside me.
Nothing like our first frantic times, all that desperate hunger.
This is something else. Something that feels like it means more than either of us is saying.
"God, Laine." His voice is rough against my ear. "You feel—"
He doesn't finish. Just groans and hitches my leg higher, changes the angle in a way that makes me arch off the mattress. He's figured out exactly how to take me apart, and he does it with the same patient attention he gives his restoration work.
Afterward, we're tangled together in his sheets, my head on his chest, his fingers tracing slow patterns on my shoulder.
This is my favorite time with him. He puts off his whole day to be here with me.
Tucking me in, he calls it. Which often includes falling into an orgasm coma.
And he stays, holding me until I drift off.
His room smells like him. Sawdust and soap and something warm underneath all of it. But there's a hint of my shampoo on his pillow too. My stuff has migrated here without me really noticing. A hair tie on his nightstand. My phone charger plugged in by the bed.
"You should sleep," he murmurs.
"I know."
But I don't want to. I want to stay right here, with his heartbeat under my ear and his hand warm on my skin. There's something I should say. Something that's been building for days now, pressing up against me every time he looks at me like I'm something precious.
I love you.
The words are right there, sitting on my tongue like they already know the way out. But they won't move, and I don't know why. I said them to Reid and it felt like breathing. With Blake, it feels like jumping off a cliff.
Maybe because with Reid, it felt inevitable. Like the words were just catching up to what already existed between us. With Blake, it feels like a choice. A declaration. Something that will change things in ways I can't predict.
So why does that scare me more?
"Hey." His hand stills on my shoulder. "Where'd you go?"
"Nowhere." I press a kiss to his chest. "Just tired."
He doesn't push. That's one of the things I love about him—God, there's that word again—the way he gives me space to have my own thoughts. He just pulls the covers up over my shoulders and holds me a little tighter.
"Sleep, sweetheart. I'll be in the workshop when you wake up."
I want to tell him. I will tell him. Just... not yet.
My eyes drift closed, and I let his heartbeat lull me under.
I wake up alone in Blake's bed, late afternoon light slanting through the blinds.
For a moment, I just lie there, taking stock. His sheets are soft and rumpled around me. The pillow still smells like him. Somewhere in the distance, I can hear the faint whine of a power tool from the workshop.
My phone buzzes on the nightstand, and I reach for it without thinking.
Three texts from Joyce about a schedule change. One from Jamila about yoga tomorrow. And there, in my email, the notification I've been avoiding for a week.
Reminder: Day Shift RN Position - Application deadline in 5 days.
I stare at it for too long.
The night shift is killing me. I know it is. I can feel it in my bones, in the way I'm dragging even on my days off. My body wants sunlight. My joints ache. I need a normal sleep schedule.
But I can't hit apply.
My job is magic. The crew is like family, and the idea of giving up that weird 3 AM camaraderie when we're all punchy and exhausted together, makes me physically sick.
And this house. These mornings. Reid's terrible coffee and Blake's silent pancake deliveries and the way they both just... make space for me without asking for anything back. And the way Blake puts me to sleep after breakfast. More magic.
What if switching shifts ruins the magic? What if I lose the mornings and come home exhausted at night and realize I screwed up the only good thing I've built?
I lock the phone. Shove it face-down on the mattress.
I need to move.
Blake's t-shirt is draped over the chair in the corner. I pull it on now, breathing in the smell of him, and pad out into the quiet house.
My stuff is everywhere. A sweater on the back of the couch. My favorite mug in the dish rack. A pair of my shoes by the front door. When did that happen? When did I stop being a guest and start just... living here?
I wander through the rooms, taking inventory. Reid's book on the coffee table, bookmark halfway through. Blake's reading glasses folded next to the TV remote. A grocery list on the fridge in my handwriting—I don't even remember writing it.
We've built something here. Something real and strange and wonderful. And I'm terrified to change anything. I don't think we're that fragile, at least I hope we're not, but I'm not brave enough to test it yet.
The workshop hits me with a wall of warm air when I push through the door, Blake's plate balanced in one hand. He's bent over the workbench, sanding something with the kind of focus that blocks out the entire world, and he doesn't hear me come in.