“I have cracked ribs. I wince when I breathe, when I laugh, when Briggs talks too loudly, and when somebody mentions stairs, and I just want you to fuck me on them!” My voice rose on every word until I was fully shouting.
He stared at me with equal amounts of shock and need.
At least we were getting somewhere.
Briggs huffed a sigh and rolled his eyes, not even attempting to read the room. “My volume is a public health issue?”
“Out!” Cade barked.
The word cracked through the kitchen so hard even I froze as everyone else moved instantly.
Briggs abandoned his cereal like the house was on fire. Rider grabbed him by the back of his hoodie and dragged him toward the hall. Ryan pushed away from the fridge without arguing, but he gave Cade one long look on the way past. Easton stepped into the living room, holding out one hand toward Aura like he was asking, not ordering, and the fact that she actually took it said more about the tension in the room than anything else.
Charm hesitated, eyes on me.
“I’m fine,” I said, glaring at him.
Cade didn’t look away from me. “She’s fine.”
The rough edge in his voice sent heat straight through me.
Holy shit.
Aura paused near the living room entry. “Door stays open.”
“No,” Cade said, eyes locked on mine. “She wants my attention, she gets it.”
I looked at Aura and softened my voice, my eyes telling her to leave. “Aura.”
She held my stare for a second, reading everything I wasn’t saying because that was what she did. Then she nodded once and let Easton guide her out with Charm behind them.
A few seconds later, the kitchen belonged to us.
Just Cade standing across from me with his shoulders tense and his eyes dark, and me gripping the edge of the counter like I hadn’t spent four days imagining exactly what it would take to make him stop being so careful.
He stared at me. “What the hell was that?”
I laughed once. “Which part?”
“The part where you pick a fight with an entire kitchen because you’re too stubborn to admit you’re hurting.”
“I am hurting.” My voice cracked around the words, and I hated that. Hated that the anger was already letting otherthings bleed through. “I know I’m hurting. Everybody knows I’m hurting. We have all established I’m injured. There are professionals outside this house with earpieces because I’m injured and Luke is psycho and apparently my life is now a true crime documentary with better lighting.”
His jaw flexed.
“But that’s not all I am,” I said, the words coming faster now. “And everybody keeps looking at me like it is.”
Cade’s expression shifted. “Bliss.”
“No, don’t you dare use your reserved voice and call me Bliss with it.” I shook my head, and the movement pulled at my neck enough to make me wince. His body reacted, just a small step forward, but I threw a hand up. “See? That. Exactly that. I make one wrong movement and you look like you’re about to wrap me in bubble wrap and install me in a climate-controlled room.”
“You were beaten unconscious.”
“And I’m still me.”
The words flew out of me harder than I meant them to.
They hit him. I saw it.
