I dropped into the booth, leaning back with a sigh. “You’re both exhausting.”
“Love you too, sunshine,” Derek said, sliding a drink toward me. “Whiskey. Neat. Like the angry little traditionalist you are.”
I gave him a look, but took the glass anyway. “You rehearsed that line, didn’t you?”
“Every morning in the mirror,” he said without missing a beat.
Logan shook his head, faint smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “You two should take this routine on tour.”
Adam grinned, tossing an olive from his martini at him. “We’re more of a local act.”
The banter hit easy, familiar grooves — jokes that didn’t need setup, insults that came with affection baked in. For the first time all week, the tension in my chest loosened a little.
Derek leaned back, arm slung over the booth. “So, Mason. Heard you’ve been doing community service with the foundation princess. That true?”
I groaned. “You make it sound like I’m on parole.”
Adam lifted his glass. “Technically, you kinda are.”
“Shut up,” I muttered, but there was no bite to it.
Logan glanced up, studying me the way he always did — quiet, sharp, seeing more than I wanted him to. “You don’t hate it, though. Do you?”
I hesitated a beat too long. “It’s fine.”
Derek’s grin widened. “Translation: he likes it.”
“I didn’t say that.”
Adam kicked my boot under the table. “You didn’t not say it.”
“Remind me why I hang out with you idiots again?”
“Because deep down,” Derek said, raising his glass, “you love us.”
“Sure,” I said dryly. “Right next to my love for post-match interviews and losing streaks.”
They laughed — that real kind of laugh that rolled through the table, echoing off glasses and music and memories.
For a few minutes, the world outside didn’t exist. Not the press. Not the team politics. Not the noise in my own head.
Just this.
The rhythm of brotherhood built from years of shared bruises and late-night wins.
Logan said something about the new rookie’s haircut, Adam nearly spit out his drink laughing, and Derek waved down another round, insisting we toast “to surviving our own bad decisions.”
I didn’t argue.
The whiskey burned, the laughter drowned out everything else, and for the first time in a long time, I actually let myself breathe.
Yeah. This — the noise, the teasing, the loyalty — this was oxygen.
And God, I’d missed it.
Adam leaned back in the booth, swirling his drink like he was about to drop something I’d regret hearing. “I almost texted Kieren to join, but ever since he fell in love, he’s been shacked up with Daphne like some reformed monk.”
Derek barked a laugh, tipping his glass toward him. “Good for him. Daphne’s terrifying. In a hot, stab-you-if-you-lie kind of way.”
