His tone is neutral, but the corner of his mouth lifts.
I hate that I notice.
I love that I notice.
“Figured moving would wake you,” he adds quietly. “And you… looked peaceful.”
Peaceful. Me. That’s almost funny.
Before I can make a joke out of it, something cold and bright flickers across his face — the protective part of him slipping back into place. His gaze slides toward the house, scanning, assessing something invisible. He’s always half in the real world and half in the threat map his mind refuses to retire.
I open my mouth to say you can relax, there’s no danger here, but the words die.
Because right then, my phone starts ringing.
From inside the house.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
Rapid-fire, insistent, like someone’s trying to drill a hole into my skull with sound alone.
My body goes rigid before I can help it. Ethan feels it instantly. His arm tightens around me—not desire this time, but protection—before he lets go and pushes himself upright.
The blanket falls off his torso. He’s gloriously naked. Gloriously unbothered by it. Sunlight hits him like it’s flirting.
“You should answer that,” he says, voice settling back into calm command even though his eyes flick toward the patio door like he’s assessing potential threats. “Might be important.”
My heart drops. Nothing good ever calls like that.
I sit up, pulling the blanket with me, trying to cover myself in something resembling dignity. Ethan leans close—too close—and brushes a kiss along my temple, casual and intimate like he has the right.
It nearly knocks the air out of me.
“I’ll make coffee,” he murmurs. “Go on.”
“I—okay.”
He stands, grabs the other blanket around his waist, and heads toward the house, all broad shoulders and morning wood and quiet certainty, while my phone starts ringing again—impatient, relentless, promising trouble.
And I go inside to face it.
The second I step inside, the house feels wrong.
Too big. Too quiet. Too echoing with the ring of my phone, shrill and frantic, bouncing off the walls like an alarm I can’t shut off. Ethan is at the counter in the kitchen, barefoot, shirtless, blanket low on his hips, already reaching for the moka pot like nothing is on fire.
He glances at me as I pass—quick scan, assessing my face, filing something away—but he doesn’t stop me. Doesn’t ask. Just lets me go.
The phone is still screaming.
My pulse matches it.
“Where the hell—”
I shove aside sheet music, notebooks, scribbled lyrics, receipts, Lily’s drawings—my whole chaotic life spread over the coffee table like a crime scene.
