23. Reva
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
REVA
By morning, I have made several bad decisions.
The first is going downstairs in nothing but a T-shirt and underwear.
In my defense, the T-shirt is long enough to qualify as clothing if everyone agrees to be mature about it. Also, it is one of the new ones from the closet, soft and black and mine, which still feels strange enough that I keep tugging at the hem like it might disappear if I stop checking.
The second bad decision technically goes along with the first one—coffee before pants—but who bothers with pants before coffee?
The third is letting Shiloh catch me in the kitchen.
He finds me standing on my toes, reaching for a mug on the top shelf because apparently Blackwood House was not designed for short people. I hear him behind me a second before his hands settle at my waist.
“You know,” he says near my ear, “we do have step stools.”
“I don’t trust furniture with names like step and stool. If it was called something worthy like Bill, I might’ve used it.”
“I’ll keep that in mind next time I name the…micro ladder.”
His hands slide around to my stomach, pulling me back against him. He is already dressed, much the same as when I first met him on the highway, in a pair of worn jeans and a T-shirt, his hair slightly damp. His mouth is far too close to my neck.
“You’re very…dressed.”
“You’re also wearing very little. Not that I’m complaining.”
“It’s a kitchen. In the morning. I’m getting coffee, not applying for citizenship.” I try and fail to clear the huskiness from my voice.
His lips touch the side of my throat. “I support your efforts, Yank. Every one of them.”
I roll my eyes and fail to step away.
That’s how I end up sitting on the counter five minutes later with Shiloh between my thighs and my coffee forgotten beside the sink.
His hands are warm on my legs. His mouth is patient in a way the rest of him never is.
Shiloh kisses like he is talking me into something, except the terrible truth is that I usually want whatever he’s selling.
He starts light, teasing, smiling against my lips when I make irritated sounds, then deepens it just enough to make my fingers curl in the front of his shirt.
“You are very annoying,” I say against his mouth.
“Yes, darling. You’ve mentioned.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
He kisses me again, and I lose the thread of my half-hearted argument.
My legs tighten around his hips. His hand slides higher on my thigh, thumb moving under the hem of the shirt, not quite indecent but not innocent either.
My pulse trips. The kitchen is bright and quiet, all marble counters and morning sun, and somehow that makes this feel worse than if he had pulled me into a dark corner.
Worse, and better.
My life has become deeply confusing. I want my revenge, but I also want quiet, sexy mornings wrapped up in sunshine and Shiloh. I want afternoons with Ever and nights with Nash.
I might even want something with Deacon; I haven’t decided that yet.
The back hallway floor creaks.
Shiloh hears it when I do, but instead of moving, he smiles into the kiss.
“Don’t you dare,” I whisper.
“Don’t what?” His smirk somehow manages innocence and wickedness all at once.
“Use me to traumatize someone before breakfast.”
Over his shoulder, Cal stops dead in the doorway.
For one terrible second, nobody moves.
I am on the counter in a T-shirt and panties, my legs splayed around Shiloh—no other word for it—hair a mess, mouth probably swollen.
Shiloh is standing between my knees like he pays rent there.
Cal’s hand is still on the doorframe, his eyes taking in the scene before his brain decides to save him by looking somewhere else.
He turns his head toward the cabinet to his left so fast I am surprised nothing cracks.
“Morning,” he mutters.
Shiloh steps back. A little. Not enough to be helpful.
“Good morning, Cal,” he says, pleasant as sin. “Sleep well?”
I slide off the counter and tug the hem of my shirt down. It covers everything important, which does not improve the situation nearly as much as one might hope.
“Hi,” I mumble.
Cal keeps his eyes on the coffee maker with the determination of a man defusing a bomb. “Didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“You didn’t,” Shiloh says.
“Stop kissing ass,” I say.
Cal opens a cabinet, takes out a mug, and fills it. His movements are careful. I have watched him move like that around frightened animals, grieving parents, and me at thirteen when I slammed a bedroom door hard enough to knock a picture off the wall.
He is trying not to make me feel small.
He leans against the far counter, coffee mug in hand, eyes now fixed on the floor somewhere near Shiloh’s shoes. “I’ll just pretend I saw nothing.”
“Generous of you, Dad,” Shiloh says.
“Jeezum Pete,” I exclaim.
He lifts both hands.
Then Nash walks in.
He is on the phone, already frowning, dressed in a dark suit with no tie. He looks at Cal, then Shiloh, then me standing barefoot in my underwear beside the counter. His eyes pause on the shirt. Recognition flickers there. One of the new ones.
Something in my chest pinches as he ends the call without saying goodbye.
“Nash,” Cal says, wary now.
Nash ignores the warning completely, crosses the kitchen, takes my face in one hand, and kisses me.
Not a peck. Not a polite good morning. A full, possessive, hand-at-my-jaw, breath-stealing kiss that makes my toes curl against the tile and every intelligent thought in my head take a brief leave of absence.
Behind him, Cal chokes. Coffee sprays across the counter.
I break the kiss and look over Nash’s shoulder.
Cal stands frozen with his mug halfway to his mouth, eyes wide, coffee on the counter, coffee on his shirt, coffee possibly in his soul.
Shiloh closes his eyes and presses two fingers to his mouth. He is laughing. Silently, which is better for his survival but not by much.
Nash looks back at Cal, forehead wrinkling. “Problem?”
Cal sets the mug down slowly. “I’m going to need a minute.”
My face heats. “Nash.”
“What?”
“You cannot just walk in and do that.”
His gaze comes back to mine. “Why can’t I?”
“Because I don’t think he knew…”
“I think he knew.”
Cal grabs a dish towel and starts wiping coffee off the counter with the haunted expression of a man who has seen the inside of war zones and was still not prepared for this kitchen.
I pull at the hem of my shirt again. “Maybe everyone could just stop kissing me in front of my father.”
The room goes very still. The word hits me after I say it.
Father.
Cal’s hand pauses on the counter.
My throat tightens. I almost correct myself. Foster father. Guardian. Cal. The man who raised me and lied to me and flew to New Orleans because I stopped answering my phone. The man who used to check under my bed when I was little even though he knew monsters had never bothered hiding there.
In the end, I don’t correct it. He needs a little mercy.
Cal starts wiping again, slower this time.
Shiloh catches the shift and moves first because Shiloh is many things, but oblivious is not one of them. “Breakfast,” he says. “We should discuss this over breakfast. Preferably before Cal decides to shoot one of us on principle.”
“I didn’t bring a gun to breakfast,” Cal says. “But don’t call me Dad again.”
Nash lifts a brow.
Shiloh points at me. “You. Pants.”
I look down. “Fair.”
“No,” Nash says.
Every eye goes to him.
He looks back at us and shrugs without shame. “She can wear what she wants.”
Cal’s expression says he may die right there, standing over spilled coffee.
I sigh and head for the stairs. “I am putting on pants because I am suddenly super cold and because I refuse to be the reason Cal has a medical event.”
“I am not having a medical event,” Cal says.
“You spat coffee like a lawn sprinkler.”
“That was situational.”
Shiloh’s laugh escapes this time.
I go upstairs, put on shorts because full pants feel like capitulation, and come back down to find Cal at the stove.
The sight stops me in my tracks.
He has a mixing bowl out. Flour. Eggs. Milk.
Butter warming in a pan. He found a whisk and a griddle because Cal can locate breakfast equipment in any kitchen on earth.
It was one of his superpowers when I was little, right after finding lost shoes and knowing when I had a fever by touching my cheek with the back of his hand.
I know without asking: he’s making pancakes.
My favorite, once upon a time.
He used to make them after bad nights. After nightmares. After school dances I pretended not to care about, then cried in the bathroom because everyone else had mothers taking pictures.
Blueberry pancakes, if he could get them.
Chocolate chip if it was an emergency.
I stand in the doorway, suddenly unsure where to put my hands.
Cal glances over. “I found some good-looking blueberries.”
I come fully into the kitchen and lean against the island. “This house has everything.”
His mouth moves like he almost smiles. “It’s pancakes, kid.”
The nickname slips out. Everyone hears it. His hands pause on the whisk, then keep going.
I let it pass.
Nash sits at the island with his phone face-down beside him. Shiloh pours fresh coffee, still looking entirely too pleased with the morning. I take a stool because standing feels dramatic and I have used up my quota.
Cal cooks like he has done this a thousand times, because he has. Batter hits the griddle. Butter pops. Blueberries sink into butter-grease circles. The kitchen fills with the soft sounds of breakfast instead of whatever explosion we narrowly avoided.
Then Ever walks in.
He takes in the scene in one sweep: Cal at the stove, Nash seated, Shiloh pouring coffee, me in a new shirt and shorts, a faint coffee crime scene still visible near the sink.
His gaze settles on me, intent and focused.
I know before he moves.
“Oh, Christ on a crutch, don’t—” I say.
He walks straight to me.
“Ever.”
He bends, one hand on the back of my stool, and tongue kisses me.