Now I understood it had only been the first one.
Chapter 33
Chapter 33
DECLAN
Jace stole my hoodie before coffee.
He did it badly, standing in the hallway with his hair damp from the shower, one arm already through the sleeve, his expression caught between guilt and defiance when I came out of the bedroom.
“That’s mine,” I said.
He looked down at the dark gray fabric like this was new information. “Is it?”
“It has my name on the tag.”
“Lots of people are named Reid.”
“It’s team-issued.”
“Then technically it belongs to the organization, and we’re about to have a lot of conversations about organizational boundaries, so maybe don’t start.”
Tiny sat beside him, tail thumping against the wall, fully prepared to defend the theft.
I leaned a shoulder against the doorframe and looked at them both. “You two working together now?”
Jace shoved his other arm through and pulled the hoodie down. It hung loose on him, but not by much. “He supports my healing.”
“He supports anyone holding toast.”
Tiny huffed.
Jace’s face softened when I crossed the hall toward him. The humor stayed, but it made room for the thing under it, the fatigue from yesterday, the knowledge sitting between us like a third cup of coffee neither of us had ordered.
I caught the front of the hoodie and tugged him closer.
He came without making me ask.
The kiss was brief because it had to be. Soft because the morning couldn’t handle anything sharper yet. His hands found my waist under my T-shirt, cold fingers pressing against warm skin, and he exhaled against my mouth like he’d been bracing for impact since he opened his eyes.
“You slept?” I asked.
“Some.”
“Nightmares?”
“No. Just woke up four times and checked the time even though I didn’t need to be anywhere yet. Then I had a ten-minute argument with myself about whether brushing my teeth before feeding Tiny made me a bad guest.”
Tiny’s tail thumped harder at the word feeding.
“You fed him?”
“I gave him a piece of toast.”
“Jace.”
“It was a corner. A responsible corner.”
