Chapter 39 #2
Ryan looked between us and the island like he was doing measurements he absolutely did not need to do. “I’m never eating off these counters again.”
Cade wrapped one arm around my waist automatically, steadying me against him like this was just our normal morning routine now. “For the record,” he said calmly, reaching around me for the coffee pot, “the counter incident was extremely respectful.”
Charm stared at him. “Sir, there is absolutely no respectful way to phrase counter sex.”
Cade looked offended. “Wow. Way to make it sound trashy.”
Aura pointed at him with her bagel. “You folded our friend like a lawn chair in a shared mansion.”
Ryan coughed into his coffee.
Briggs pointed both hands at Aura like she’d just delivered a line on Broadway. “I love the ABCs’ vibe.”
“That is slander.”
“It is poetry,” Charm corrected.
“It’s a visual I didn’t ask for,” Ryan added.
I made a horrified sound into his chest. “I’m getting new friends.”
Cade kissed the top of my head immediately. “No, you’re not.”
Briggs leaned toward Ryan and stage-whispered, “She says that like we’d let her leave.”
Ryan nodded seriously. “Team property now.”
Aura aimed her bagel at both of them. “Don’t make it weird.”
“It was weird before we got here,” Briggs said.
The ease of it hit me right in the chest again. No awkward morning-after energy where we suddenly pretended last night hadn’t changed everything between us.
It had changed everything.
And somehow we were both just… standing in it now.
In the middle of Hockey House. With Aura and Charm behind the counter like two tiny emotional assassins, Ryan drinking coffee like he was taking field notes, and Briggs sitting on the counter like he had purchased tickets to my humiliation.
Cade handed me a mug of coffee before leaning back against the counter beside me, one hand still resting low on my waist like he physically couldn’t stop touching me now that he’d started.
Every few seconds, his thumb moved absentmindedly against my hip beneath his shirt, grounding me without even realizing he was doing it.
Aura noticed, of course, her eyes narrowing immediately. “Okay. So y’all’re in deep.”
Ryan’s gaze dropped to Cade’s hand on my waist and then lifted back to his face. “Oh, they’re buried.”
Cade took a sip of coffee completely unashamed. “Very.”
Heat rushed into my face again.
Charm looked between us dramatically. “You guys are giving disgustingly happy.”
“Actually nauseating,” Aura agreed.
“Honestly offensive,” Briggs added, then bit into a piece of toast.
Cade looked down at me. “You nauseated?”
I bit back a smile. “A little.”
“That’s fair. I’m very handsome this early in the morning.”
Charm gagged loudly.
Ryan gave Cade a flat look over his mug. “You look like you got mauled by a tiny animal.”
I choked on my coffee.
Aura pointed toward the hallway. “Do you know how horrifying it was hearing pre-sex fighting at like midnight?”
Cade’s brows lifted. “Pre-sex fighting?”
“Yes,” Aura said flatly. “There are phases now. We’ve mapped them.”
Briggs held up one finger. “As a house representative, I would also like to confirm there are phases.”
“Oh my gosh.”
Charm started counting on her fingers. “There’s flirty kitchen banter. Then laughing. Then suspicious silence. Then one of you says something emotional. Then more silence.”
Ryan added, “Then Mercer starts pacing like he’s about to call a team meeting.”
Aura nodded seriously. “Then either Bliss starts crying or Cade starts yelling things in that voice.”
Cade blinked once. “What voice?”
Both girls mocked his frustrated be-reasonable voice simultaneously.
“Pip.”
Briggs immediately joined in from the counter in a deeper voice. “Pip.”
Ryan, because apparently death by humiliation required full participation, added a dry, gravelly, “Pip.”
Cade whipped his eyes to me for clarification or defense—I didn’t know. I nearly spit coffee everywhere at how personally attacked he looked. “That is wildly exaggerated.”
“It is not,” Charm argued. “You sound like an angry lumberjack, but in love.”
Aura lost it instantly, wheezing into her coffee.
Ryan pinched the bridge of his nose, shoulders shaking. “It’s so true it’s insane.”
Briggs looked at Cade with academic seriousness. “Spot-on accuracy.”
Cade looked down at me slowly. “Our friends are terrorists.”
“You love us,” Charm informed him.
“Debatable.”
Ryan lifted his mug. “You live with us. We are going nowhere.”
“Unfortunately,” Cade muttered.
Briggs grinned. “And yet you brought her here. To us. For approval and a hint of judgment.”
Charm pointed at the side of his neck and squealed. “Ohemgeee.”
My stomach dropped instantly.
Cade barely reacted. “What?”
“You have hickeys,” Aura told him.
His eyes narrowed slightly. “Interesting accusation.”
“Not accusation.” She leaned farther over the counter. “Evidence.”
My face became nuclear.
Charm gasped dramatically. “Bliss Danielle Bennett.”
Ryan leaned closer, eyes narrowing. “Oh, that is evidence.”
Briggs hopped off the counter and took one step toward Cade like he was inspecting a crime scene. “Brother, did you or did you not enter this kitchen wearing visible bite marks?”
“I hate this house.”
Cade looked way too pleased with himself now. “Oh, I love it here.”
Aura stared at the scratches by his neck. “Seriously though, B, what happened to him?”
Cade answered immediately. “Passion.”
I slapped his chest. “Stop talking.”
“Can’t.” He grinned down at me. “I’m thriving.”
Briggs pressed both hands to the side of his face. “I hate when emotionally unavailable people discover happiness. They become unbearable.”
Ryan nodded. “He was easier when he just glared at everyone.”
Charm leaned toward me like she was narrating a nature documentary. “Notice how hockey boy here has entered full mate-for-life behavior.”
Cade shrugged casually. “She bought me a marble. I’ve been unwell ever since.”
That shut me up instantly because the way he said it wasn’t entirely a joke.
His eyes flicked toward me afterward, softer now, quieter beneath all the teasing. Like he was still looking at me with disbelief underneath the happiness. Like part of him still couldn’t believe I’d finally stopped running from him long enough to let him have me out loud.
The realization wrapped around my ribs warm and terrifying all at once.
Aura noticed the shift immediately because she noticed everything.
Ryan noticed it too, his teasing easing just enough that his expression softened behind his coffee mug, while Briggs went still in that rare way that meant even he knew not to wreck the moment too hard.
Aura’s expression softened slightly before she pointed toward the toaster. “Okay, but serious question. Did either of you actually sleep?”
Cade snorted. “Absolutely not.”
“That explains the shower round,” Charm muttered.
Briggs’s mouth fell open. “There was a shower round?”
Ryan pointed at him without looking. “Don’t ask questions you don’t want answers to.”
“Is it sick that I want the answers?”
I covered my face again.
Cade moved my hands gently away immediately. “Nope. None of that.”
“You are making this worse.”
“You’re cute when you’re embarrassed.”
“I’m going to pass away.”
“No, you’re not.” He leaned down slightly, voice dropping lower just for me. “You’ve got a hockey game to attend tonight.”
Butterflies exploded violently in my stomach.
Aura looked between us. “Oh, he’s gone-gone.”
“Catastrophically,” Charm agreed.
Ryan hummed into his mug. “Terminal.”
Briggs nodded sadly. “No recovery window.”
Cade grabbed a bagel off the counter finally, completely unbothered by the chaos around him. “You guys done roasting me, or should I call Easton for backup?”
Aura pointed accusingly. “Easton already knows too much.”
“That sounds like a personal problem.”
“It became my personal problem when he started following me on every social site known to man ever since junior year.”
Cade nearly choked on his coffee laughing. “Oh no,” he said immediately. “The group chat is gonna be violent.”
“It already is,” Charm informed him.
Ryan’s eyes sharpened. “Wait. Why does Charm know that?”
His eyes widened slightly. “You have access to Chirp Kings?”
Aura smirked over her mug. “Women are smarter than you.”
Briggs snapped his head toward Ryan. “We have a leak.”
Ryan looked personally betrayed. “There is no way Aura has Chirp Kings screenshots.”
Aura’s smile widened. “You sure about that?”
“That’s actually terrifying,” Cade said, dropping a kiss to my lips.
“You should be scared,” I muttered, looking up at his stupid perfect face.
“Too late. I fell in love with you.”
The entire kitchen went dead silent as every molecule of oxygen left my lungs.
He said it so casually. Like breathing. Or saying the sky was blue. Like truth.
Cade himself seemed to realize what came out about half a second too late because his eyes widened slightly before locking onto mine.
Nobody moved. No jokes about his admission. Just a still silence as if we all were on pins and needles.
And then very quietly, very carefully, like he was handing me something fragile instead of detonating my entire nervous system before ten in the morning.
“Well,” he said quietly.
Aura made the most violent choking sound I had ever heard in my life as Charm slapped both hands over her mouth and I stared at him while my heartbeat tried to physically escape my body.
Briggs’s toast slipped out of his hand and landed on the counter with a sad little scrape.
Ryan whispered, “Holy fuck.”
“Easton and Rider picked one hell of a morning to run,” Briggs said.
Cade didn’t look away from me.
Not once.
Like nothing else in the room mattered now that the words were finally sitting between us.
My chest felt tight and warm and terrifyingly full all at once.
Because somehow the scariest thing Cade Mercer had ever given me wasn’t his possessiveness or his intensity or the way he touched me like he wanted to crawl beneath my skin.
It was this.