"You're all terrible," I inform them.
"Terrible but charming?" River suggests.
"Terrible but memorable?" Seth tries.
"Terrible but skilled with his tongue," Grayson says, and I kick him under the table.
He catches my ankle before I can pull back, his hand wrapping around it and holding it against his leg. The position forces me to shift closer, and suddenly I'm pressed even tighter against his side.
"Careful, sweetheart," he says, low enough that only I can hear. "Keep squirming like that and I'll have you in my lap before dessert."
The image that puts in my head doesn't help anything.
"Okay, okay," Seth says, clearly trying to rescue me again, though his neck is flushed. "Real question. Worst job you've ever had?"
I latch onto the change of subject gratefully. "Call center. Selling timeshares. Lasted two weeks before I rage-quit."
"I worked at a haunted house when I was sixteen," Seth offers. "They fired me because I kept apologizing to people I scared."
The image of sweet, anxious Seth trying to be intimidating while wielding a chainsaw is so absurd I actually snort wine.
"That's adorable," I say.
"It was pathetic," he corrects, but he's smiling. "River, tell her about the hammers."
"No."
"Tell me about the hammers," I demand.
River sighs. "When my parents retired to Arizona last year and left me the store, I was trying to learn everything at once while keeping the business running. I was exhausted, barely sleeping, and one day I accidentally ordered fifteen hundred hammers instead of fifty."
I choke. "Fifteenhundred?"
"Every person in Honeyridge Falls owns at least three hammers because of me," he admits. "Mrs. Patterson still brings it up at town meetings."
"That's actually kind of amazing," I say. "In a disaster-success kind of way."
"Julian called it 'failing upward.'" River's watching me with warmth now, the teasing intensity banked but not gone. "You would've figured out something better, though. Marketing genius that you are."
Something flutters in my chest at the casual confidence in his voice.
Our food arrives, and we eat and talk, the conversation flowing between teasing and genuine. Grayson tells us about tattooing a full back piece of someone's cat—Sir Fluffington the Third, complete with crown and throne. River explains his dream of teaching woodworking classes. Seth describes breaking up a fifteen-year feud between neighbors over a stolen pie recipe.
But underneath the normalcy, the tension never quite disappears. Grayson's hand stays on my thigh, occasionally squeezing. River's knee finds mine again under the table. Seth's arm drapes along the back of the booth behind me, his fingers occasionally brushing my shoulder in a way that feels deliberate.
They're not competing. That's what strikes me. They're coordinating.
Taking turns keeping me aware of them, building the anticipation higher with every casual touch, every heated look, every double-meaning comment.
By the time dessert arrives—tiramisu they ordered without asking—I'm wound so tight I might shatter.
"Here." River holds out a forkful. "Try this."
I lean forward, and the movement presses me back against Grayson. His breath hitches, and I feel exactly how affected he is by this—by me—pressed against his side.
The tiramisu is rich and sweet on my tongue, but I'm not really tasting it. I'm too aware of River's eyes on my mouth, of the way Seth's fingers have stilled on my shoulder, of Grayson's hand tightening on my thigh.
"Good?" River asks, his voice rough.
