I watch the window. Somewhere behind me, Cruz says something that makes Gage laugh, low and easy, and I find myself almost smiling before I’ve decided to.
I take a bite of my sandwich and watch a woman fold the same shirt twice before setting it down.
At some point the cupcake gets split three ways without anyone suggesting it. Cruz takes the smallest piece without beingtold to. Gage gives me the piece with the most frosting without acknowledging that he’s doing it.
The laundromat doesn’t change. Neither do we.
Hours pass. The caffeine Gage packed is mostly gone. I’m nursing the last of mine, rationing it against the dark hours still ahead.
“Remind me: why four a.m. again?”
“Two-hour gap between shifts. Inside that, there’s a thirty-minute window where it’s dead. No customers, no employees, nothing,” Gage says.
“And cameras?” Cruz asks, his gaze fixed on the building across the street.
Gage’s already shaking his head. “The owner is more analog. No cameras, keypads, or alarms.”
“And how are we hauling home those bill changers?” Cruz asks.
“I borrowed Rafe’s kit,” Gage says with a wide grin. “It’s in the trunk.”
Cruz huffs a laugh. “Man, I hope for your sake that you asked him first.”
“Beg forgiveness and all that. Besides—” he looks directly at me— “I think we’ll be alright.”
A yawn splits my attempt at an eye roll.
“Go lay down,” Gage says. “We’ll post up again in a few hours.”
I don’t argue. I push back from the table, shimmy out of my jean shorts, and pull the blanket from the duffel—the soft one, the one he packed on purpose. I stretch out on top of the covers and pull it over me.
The lamp on the nightstand throws a wedge of yellow light across the ceiling. Behind me, one of them says something too low to catch. The other one laughs.
I watch the light until the edges go soft.
TWENTY-TWO
BELLAMY
It’sthe heat that wakes me, creeping in like a reminder of everything I shouldn’t want. Too warm for the blanket twisted around my waist. Too warm for the uneven hum of the AC unit rattling in the corner, pushing out air that smells faintly like dust and something stale baked into the walls.
My skin feels… aware. Hypersensitive. Like I’ve been lying in the same position too long and every point of contact has sharpened.
My eyes adjust to the dark, and Gage is facing me. Close enough that I can feel the slow, steady rhythm of his breathing against my mouth. His hair is a little messy, falling into his eyes, his face relaxed in a way I don’t usually get to see when he’s awake.
One arm tucked under his head. The other resting between us, fingers loose against the mattress. My knee is bent toward him, pressed lightly against his thigh.
That’s when I feel it—the slow, unmistakable press of a hard cock against the curve of my ass.
Cruz.
I have no idea when they both came to bed, but I know I went to bed alone, and I don’t hate waking up to both of them.
Fingers twitch along my stomach, absently stroking the skin underneath my belly button, and it sends a soft wave of goosebumps over my skin.
He breathes deeply behind me, the warmth of his exhales stirring the loose hair by my ear, igniting something inside me that I can’t quite ignore. The touch is feather-light, just enough to make me wonder if I’m imagining it, if the nerves keyed up along my skin are exaggerating everything in the dark. I breathe slow, feeling his hand pause as if it’s listening.
It moves again—a careful slide beneath the hem of Gage’s hoodie. My body goes alert. Not fight or flight—just a bone-deep electric tension, like the moment before a power line snaps.
