Voices overlapped. Teasing, arguing over who got the last piece of fish, a story shouted from the far end of the table that had half the room groaning and the other half laughing before the punchline even landed. Chairs scraped. Glasses clinked. Elbows bumped mine without apology.
“Hey, Carson,” Liam called down the table, fork hovering midair. “You siding with Beck or Owen on this one?”
I barely knew what the argument was about, something to do with a fishing trip and a missing cooler, but the table had gone expectant.
“Owen’s lying,” I said, shrugging. “No one forgets a cooler full of beer. That’s a crime.”
The explosion of laughter surprised me almost as much as the fact that it had come out of my mouth at all.
Sienna leaned in to steal a bite off my plate, grinning like she’d been doing it her whole life. No one blinked. No one made room for me. I already had a place, and I was mildly panicking.
The noise didn’t push me out; it pulled me under, warm and relentless, until I stopped bracing for it altogether and just let it carry me.
A family.
The kind I had once belonged to.
The kind I had once hoped to build.
The kind I told myself I would never have again.
At one point, Sienna excused herself. “Shoot. I left my phone in the car.”
Before I could think, I stood. “I’ll go with you.”
She blinked. “You don’t have to do that.”
“I know.”
Something flickered across her face. Maybe, surprise?
She nodded. “Okay.”
We slipped out into the cold night air. Snow fell in delicate flakes again. There weren’t many, just enough to whisper across the windshield of her old Subaru. The air smelled like pine and woodsmoke, comforting, which was unnerving.
She wrapped her arms around herself as we walked. A twinkle appeared in her eyes as she smiled. “So, you needed a break from my siblings?”
“Possibly,” I said, and that earned a laugh that hit me square in the chest.
She unlocked the Subaru and crawled inside to grab her phone from the center console. I stayed outside, trying very hard not to stare at the perfect curve of her back or how her sweater pulled as she stretched.
God help me.
When she spun around to jump out, her boot slipped on a patch of snow near the tire.
I reached for her on instinct, and she fell into me.
Full force.
My arms locked around her waist before I even had a second thought. Her hands landed on my chest. Her breath brushed my jaw. Her hair grazed my cheek.
A jolt went through me with a flash-fire of wanting her.
I sucked in a breath as she froze in my arms.
And in that brief, impossible moment, I realized something with absolute, startling clarity.
I wanted to kiss her.
