Chapter Thirty-Six Third Wheel with Paws
Chapter Thirty-Six
Third Wheel with Paws
Chase
I don’t want the night to end. That’s all I can think about as I watch Scarlett across the table.
She’s smiling, debating another slice of pizza, and I’m dangerously close to convincing myself I haven’t completely wrecked things between us.
We’ve been bickering for over an hour—about pizza toppings, about which Ninja Turtle has the best energy (it’s obviously Raphael), about how I fold my pizza like a tourist—and somehow, it’s perfect. Easy. Familiar.
She wipes her hands on a napkin and leans back, stretching. “Alright. That hit the spot. My heart’s still broken, but at least I’m full.”
I grin. “That’s all I’ve ever wanted to hear from a woman.”
She rolls her eyes, but she’s not pushing away anymore. Not like before.
I take a breath. “You wanna come over?”
Her brows lift slightly. “Subtle.”
I fight off a laugh because of course she calls me on my terrible line. But instead of backing down, I lean into it. “It’s late. We’re both riding the high of surviving pineapple pizza trauma.”
She doesn’t say anything, so I go for the real hook.
“Plus, Rip misses you.”
That gets her.
“Oh, Rip misses me?”
I nod solemnly. “Hasn’t stopped whining since you left. Practically watched The Notebook without me last night.”
She smirks, but there’s something warm in her eyes now. “Yeah, I wouldn’t want to deprive your emotionally needy dog.”
“So that’s a yes?”
She shrugs, but it’s playful. “Let’s go before I remember I’m supposed to be mad at you.”
I try not to smile as we slide out of the booth.
My place is dark when we enter, and I immediately hear the soft jingle of Rip’s collar as he trots out to greet her like she’s been gone for a year.
I flip on the kitchen light.
“Wow,” she says, crouching to scratch behind his ears. “There’s my best guy.”
“Honestly, I’m the third wheel in this relationship,” I mutter, locking the door behind us.
She toes off her shoes and pads into the living room like she’s done it a dozen times—which she hasn’t, but it feels like she has.
“You want anything to drink?”
She shakes her head. “I’m good.”
“I feel like it’s a movie-in-bed kind of night. You in?”
She gives me a look. “Are you trying to get me into your bed, Remington?”
“Is it working?”
Rip—my man—leads the way, tail wagging, and Scarlett follows.
She’s never seen my bedroom, and she pauses in the doorway.
She doesn’t say much at first; she just looks around.
The walls are painted a soft gray, and there’s a worn leather chair in the corner.
The king-sized bed is halfway made—the dark gray duvet flung haphazardly over the mattress.
If she notices I sleep like a human tornado, she doesn’t call me on it.
One pillow’s near the foot, another is sideways by the headboard.
Her eyes linger on the photo by the window, the one of me and my brother on the frozen pond back home. Then they land on the book by the nightstand. Her book.
Finally, she sits on the side of the bed. “I expected more trophies. Or at least one life-sized cutout of yourself.”
I grin. “That’s in storage.”
Scarlett laughs, and it’s the best sound in the world.
I queue up some random comfort movie—something we’ll pretend to watch and absolutely won’t. We end up propped against pillows, the flatscreen streaming some chaotic rom-com neither of us is paying attention to. Rip is at our feet like he’s supervising.
I look at her then—really look—and she’s close, warm, soft around the edges in a way that makes my chest ache. Her lips are right there. Her sarcasm is right there. And I want all of it.
So I lean in slowly, giving her time to pull away.
She doesn’t.
Our mouths meet in that soft, tentative way that says this is new again, but it’s still us.
She shifts closer, hand sliding up my chest, and suddenly it’s not tentative anymore.
It’s heat and memory and want. It’s her fingers in my hair and my hands on her waist and the soft sound she makes when I deepen the kiss like I’ve been dying to.
Rip sighs at our feet like he’s unimpressed. We ignore him.
We kiss until we forget there was ever a reason not to.
We eventually pull apart, breathless and dazed, her forehead resting against mine.
Neither of us speaks right away.
She’s still close—so close—and all I can think is don’t screw this up again.
She blinks at me, lips pink and kiss-bruised. “So… are we still watching this movie, or are we just lying to Rip now?”
I glance at the screen where two characters are having an aggressively slow-motion food fight. “I think even Rip has checked out.”
Scarlett turns her head, and sure enough, he’s passed out at the foot of the bed, paws twitching in some epic dog dream.
She shifts again, curling on her side to face me. “Okay, full honesty.”
“Hit me.”
“I’m terrified.”
That knocks something loose in my chest. I meet her eyes. “Of what?”
“Of how easy this feels,” she says softly. “Like I should still be mad at you. Like I shouldn’t… trust this again. But I do. And that makes me feel like a walking red flag.”
I reach for her hand, thread my fingers through hers.
“I’m scared too,” I admit. “I don’t know what this is supposed to look like. But I know I want to find out. With you.”
She lets out a shaky breath, then mutters, “You’re really hot when you’re sincere.”
I grin. “Don’t tell anyone. I’ve got a reputation to protect.”
She settles in closer, head on my chest, like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
We lie there in the quiet, her fingers tracing lazy lines across my ribs, my hand wrapped around her waist.
And for the first time in a long time, my brain shuts up.
No noise. No second-guessing. Just this.
Her.
Us.
I press a kiss to the top of her head.
She murmurs something I almost don’t catch. “If I fall asleep here, you’re not allowed to say ‘I told you so.’”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
But I do smile to myself in the dark and hold her a little tighter.
Because she’s here.
Because she stayed.