I tilt my chin up, and I swear I feel the air crackle around us. “Then what’s it about?”
His nose brushes against the tip of mine in the barest touch. My breath catches.
“I think you know?—”
“Got a room,” Gage calls as he jogs across the lot, key dangling from his fingers.
Cruz rocks back on his heels and meets Gage at his trunk.
I exhale through my nose. Look at the sky for a second. Look back. The moment folds in on itself before it can go anywhere else, and I don’t know if that’s devastation or anticipatory hunger gnawing at my insides.
Cruz takes the duffel when Gage shoves it into his chest without a word.
“Optimistic, were you?” I ask.
Gage glances over his shoulder. “Nah.” A beat. “Hopeful.” He grabs the cooler, then my hand, lacing our fingers together like it’s nothing.
I let him.
Our room is right in front of the car. I take the key from Gage before we reach the door, unlock it, and step inside first.
The room is exactly what it looks like from the outside.
Old carpet. Faded bedspread. A TV bolted to the dresser. One bed.
I count the chairs without meaning to. Three. At least there’s that.
Behind me, Cruz drops the duffel onto the table with a dull thud. Two more steps, and he lets himself fall back onto the bed, arms spreading wide, ankles crossing like he’s been here a hundred times before.
A slow grin pulls at his mouth. “Looks like we’re gonna be cozy tonight.”
Gage drops the cooler on the end of the dresser. “You hog the bed, I will push you off it.”
“Me?” Cruz tilts his head toward me. “You should be worried about her. I’ve heard she steals the blankets.”
I turn around. “Who told you that? Because my sister is known for her dramatics in at least three different counties.”
Cruz lets out a quiet laugh, one arm still stretched behind his head. “Nah, it wasn’t her.”
I swing my gaze to Gage and plant my hands on my hips.
He grins. Crosses the room. Slides his hands around my waist and pulls me in until there’s nothing between us.
“I would never,” he murmurs against my mouth.
He kisses me again, quick and light, then turns to the cooler. He unloads the contents onto the small, battered table by the window. Bottles of water, a container of fruit, bags of chips and pretzels, three sub sandwiches, and one giant red velvet cupcake in one of those single plastic cupcake holders.
I blink. “You—packed us dinner?”
“‘Course. I know how my brother gets when he doesn’t eat dinner.” He winks, then plops a stack of napkins in the middle of the table.
“Jesus,one timeI was an asshole because I hadn’t eaten in like ten hours, and boom! I’m forever known ashangry,” Cruz huffs, rolling his eyes as he gets off the bed. He drags one of the chairs over to the table, angling it so he can keep eyes on the laundromat without sitting directly in the line of sight.
“It happens to the best of us,” I console, taking the middle chair.
Gage sits on the other side of me, and the three of us start eating.
Cruz steals a chip off my sandwich wrapper. I don’t say anything. Gage refills my water without being asked. Across the street, the laundromat glows steady—fluorescent lights, idle machines, no movement at the front. The occasional car drifts past and keeps going.
