Theo hopped up and jogged down the hall.
I strode over to read the sign.
Girls only. No Griffins allowed. None. For any reason.
PS: Not even if I’m having a bad dream. I made it the past three months without you here to comfort me. I don’t need you to start now.
PPS: Unless the house is on fire. You can save me then. But that’s the only exception.
I read it twice. “Well, dang.”
“Told you.” Theo appeared beside me, holding out the air mattress. “Sorry, I don’t have a pump.”
“It’s fine. Thanks,” I mumbled, face hot, lungs hotter.
I spent the next twenty minutes hyperventilating into a mattress—an appropriate punishment for a fool who singlehandedly fumbled a marriage to the most stunning woman on the planet, inside and out.
Theo didn’t go to bed for another hour, but it didn’t matter. Not with Juliette on the other side of that door, making noises so terrible, I couldn’t stop wondering what she’d lived through to sound like that.
I couldn’t have slept through that if I wanted to.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
JULIETTE
The next morning, I awoke to the smell of bacon and the clatter of dishes.
“What the…?”
Theo didn’t even eat breakfast, except for the occasional bowl of Cookie Crisp, and he never washed anything by hand. If the dishwasher couldn’t get it clean the first time, he just ran that plate through on repeat.
My growling belly wanted that bacon. Desperately. So I stumbled out of bed, opened the door, and… screamed as I tripped, face-first. It died when I landed with a gentle thud onto… a plastic cloud?
“Th-Theo,” I sputtered, pushing up onto my hands. “Why is there an air mattress—” The words evaporated when I came face-to-face with Griffin.
Kneeling at the end of the mattress, hair still wet from the shower. He wore a green Zion National Park T-shirt he’d gotten on our trip and a pair of dark jeans that fit him a little too well.
My heart waggedhappily.
“Good morning,” he said and popped the seal. The mattress deflated under me, air whooshing out.
“Did you sleep here?” I scrambled onto the floor.
“Yes.” He didn’t look up, working out the rest of the air.
“Right outside my door?”
“Yes.”
My insides went a little mushy. “Did you cook breakfast too?”
“Yes.”
“For me?”
“Yes.”
I stood and crossed my arms. “Why?”
