Snuggling closer, she savored the feeling of being in his arms. For a man who lived in chaos half the time, he felt like the safest place she’d ever been.
“You hungry?”
She smiled. “Starving.”
“Good.” His arm tightened briefly around her. “We’ve got take-out sitting in the kitchen getting cold.”
She lifted her head. “Right. I forgot about that.”
A soft laugh brushed her ear. “Hard to focus on food when you’re in my bed.”
“Fair point.”
He pressed a quick kiss to her temple. “Stay here. I’ll grab it. We can eat in here.”
She nodded, already reaching for the sheet as he rolled away, taking his warmth with him. By the time he stood, she’d pulled the covers up over her suddenly chilled body. He glanced at her, then retrieved a T-shirt from his dresser drawer and tossed it to her. “To keep you warm until I get back.”
Loving his thoughtfulness, she pulled the shirt on before settling back onto the pillows while he slipped on his boxer briefs and walked out the door. She listened to him moving around in the kitchen, cabinets opening, bags rustling.
When he came back, he climbed onto the bed beside her and handed her a fork, the container with her grilled chicken Caesar salad, and a bottle of water. “Dinner is served.”
Ravenous, she took a bite and closed her eyes briefly. “God, this is perfect.”
Beside her, he unwrapped his burger and shoved two french fries in his mouth—apparently just as hungry. They settled side by side beneath the sheet, containers balanced in their laps, shoulders brushing whenever one of them shifted.
He reached over and speared a piece of her chicken without asking.
“Hey,” she protested lightly.
“You weren’t eating it fast enough.”
She rolled her eyes and retaliated by stealing one of his fries. “Fair warning—I will absolutely judge you if you drip ketchup on your sheets.”
A smirk tugged at his mouth. “I live dangerously.”
She glanced at him as he took a bite of his burger, a little sauce at the corner of his mouth. Without thinking, she reached over and wiped it away with her thumb.
The look he gave her afterward wasn’t about food.
Dinner turned into shared bites and quiet laughter, her crisp romaine and tangy dressing mixing with his salty fries and smoky burger, the ordinary act of eating in bed feeling unexpectedly intimate.
Eventually, he set their empty containers on the nightstand, and she curled back against him.
His arm tightened around her waist, and his mouth found her shoulder—he seemed to like kissing her there, and she didn’t mind at all.
“Can you stay a while?” The huskiness in his voice told her exactly what he had in mind, and she was completely on board with it.
Reaching up, she cupped his stubbled jaw. “I wasn't planning on going anywhere.”
His answer was a low, satisfied chuckle as he pulled her closer.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Andy didn’t answer the phone when it lit up with a local number he recognized, even though it said “Unknown Caller” and wasn’t in his contacts.
He’d been hunched at his desk for nearly an hour, staring at the new Ghost Thread: Echo devlog without processing a single frame of it. The video played on—graphics demos, commentary, ambient music—but his mind kept looping back to the moment he’d done Diego’s job. The sick rush of adrenaline. The guilt that crawled under his skin afterward. And what he hated most—a flicker of pride he couldn’t smother, the part that craved being good at something, even for the wrong person.
The phone rang again—same unknown number.
