Chase stayed rooted in front of Chloe. “Pick someone to give you a ride back, cause you’re not staying here,” he told her.
Her face paled. “You—you want me to leave?”
“Yes.” No hesitation.
Avery crossed the room slowly, stopping beside Mila. Quiet solidarity. Tori lingered near the doorway, shaken but steady.
Mila’s gaze lifted to mine, a small crack in her composure. This was Blackwood bleeding into the one place we’d tried to keep clean.
I stepped toward the front door just as someone knocked. Hard. I opened it only a few inches. Three guys I recognized from school stood on the porch, grinning too wide.
“Didn’t know this was invite-only,” one of them joked.
“It is,” I answered flatly.
Behind them, headlights continued to spill into the driveway. I closed the door in their faces. Turned the lock. And exhaled slowly. This wasn’t a full escalation. Not yet. But it was proof that we weren’t as removed as we thought.
I pulled my phone from my pocket. The signal was strong now. Another call incoming from Drew. I stepped away from the group and out onto the front porch alone to answer.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
MILA
Luke had already gone downstairs to make coffee, the smell drifting up the staircase before I’d even finished brushing my hair. I took my time in the shower, letting the hot water loosen the last of the tension in my shoulders. The last of the adrenaline. The night could have exploded. But it hadn’t.
Mom and Edwardo hadn’t loved the story when I called them in the morning. He had gone silent in that focused way that meant action was already happening somewhere behind the scenes. Once Luke got on the phone and walked Edwardo through how it had been handled, they’d relaxed enough to let it go.
After breakfast, we would head back to Blackwood. I wanted to stretch the last few hours of this bubble as far as they would go.
When I stepped downstairs, sunlight cut through the tall windows in long pale stripes, stretching across the hardwood floors and the empty bottles that hadn’t made it to recycling yet.
Outside the sliding glass doors, damp towels hung over the deck railing, heavy and twisted from the night before. The faint scent of chlorine drifted in through the cracked door.
It felt almost… ordinary.
Theo stood at the stove shirtless, flipping something in a pan with exaggerated concentration. Jax sat at the island with Avery perched sideways on his lap. He had one arm wrapped loosely around her waist while he scrolled on his phone with the other.
Tori leaned against the counter beside Theo, hip brushing his, stealing pieces of whatever he was cooking when he wasn’t looking. He didn’t protest.
Chase stood near the sink, arms folded, staring into space like he was replaying something he didn’t like.
Luke crossed the kitchen and wrapped his arms around me from behind before I even reached the counter. His chin rested against my temple.
“You sleep?” he murmured against my hair.
“Enough.” He’d kept me up most of the night, and he knew it. Not that I was complaining.
His arms tightened for a second.
Theo glanced over his shoulder at Chase’s broody expression. “For the record, it was contained quickly. No harm done. I’ll have a cleaning service come in before I leave. Alarm will be set. Don’t think about it anymore.”
Chase’s jaw flexed. “She knew what she was doing.”
Theo shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. She got a ride from a couple of girls. She’s gone.”
Avery reached back and squeezed Chase’s hand. “It didn’t spiral out of control. That’s what matters.”
Chase nodded once. Agreement without commentary.