Page 20 of Whispered Promises

Winking, I let a cheeky smile spread across my lips. She blinks quickly before she looks back down and closes the container she filled.

“Just ignore him. We all do,” Noah says with exasperation as he leans in, brushing against her shoulder. At his touch, she looks up and smiles at him sweetly.

“Which one did you want on yours, Rosy?” Bry asks.

Glancing up, she catches my eyes and chews on her lip for a moment. “Both.”

Laughter bubbles out of me, and her soft chuckle joins in. The sound has all of us locking onto her; it’s both heady and mesmerising at the same time.

“So do you all have dinner together like this every night?” she asks as we’re all tucking into our bowls for apple-y cinnamon goodness.

I hope there’s enough for seconds.

“Usually. We’re lucky our work schedules mean most of the time we’re all home for dinner. Sometimes one of us will have plans, or has to work late, but the rest of us will still have dinner together and catch up,” Noah responds.

There’s never really been a discussion about it. I guess it’s just been a sort of unspoken rule. But it’s been like this from the first day I moved in, and it just felt pretty natural.

“Do you usually eat with—is it Stephanie?” Bry asks curiously, and I feel the same burning desire to know everything about her.

Her shoulders drop slightly. “Yes, Steph. Sometimes, but often not. She works shifts around her studies, and I work some evenings, or I’m at the gym. So it’s usually just me, which has taken some getting used to.” She shrugs, brushing off her loneliness like it’s nothing.

I slide my hand over the one she has in her lap, keeping our hands under the table, and I give it a reassuring squeeze.

She shouldn’t ever have to feel lonely.

“I used to eat alone a lot too before I was adopted by Noah’s family,” Bry murmurs. “It might not be a big deal to some, but coming together to share a meal gives a sense of belonging, doesn’t it?”

Rosy stares at him, blinking rapidly; a part of me wants to cup her face in my palms and promise that she has a place to belong with us.

“I didn’t realise how much it meant until it was gone,” she says, her voice faltering slightly at the end. “My nanna had been my only family for so long. It was just the two of us, and when she passed it…it has taken a while to get used to it just being me.”

Nate glares angrily at the side of her face. I can tell that meaty bastard wants to muscle his way in and hoard her like the dragon he is.

Tough shit. He needs to share because it looks like we all want to be there for her.

Without realising it, she’s managed to gain a family to belong to, even if it’s going to take some persuading for her to accept it.

NINE

ROSY

“Bitch, don’t tell me you were going to sneak past and not tell me how it went?”

I jump out of my skin and spin to find Steph leaning against her bedroom doorframe.

“No?” The lie sounds feeble.

A single dark blonde brow rises sharply above her narrowed eyes. She definitely clocked the lie.

“Okay, maybe,” I confess easily.

I’d barely had time to tell her my plans when I came home earlier to get changed, so I’d given her the update of bumping into Max and Nate over the last couple of days, then told her about dinner tonight. To say she was excited was an understatement. The lack of love interests in my life since I’d moved in had shocked and appalled my serial-dating flatmate.

“Tough shit, Ro. I want to know everything,” she demands, skipping over to the sofa and bouncing onto it. “What were they all like? What did you talk about? How did you feel?”

I desperately wanted to decompress in my room, but there’s a part of me that also wants to offload and talk about it all. Walking over, I drop onto the opposite side of the seat, letting my body relax into the cushions as I stare up at the ceiling, trying to shift through my thoughts.

“Nerve-wracking, overwhelming, anxiety-inducing…but I had fun,” I whisper the last part, biting down on my lip to calm all the feelings inside as I turn my head towards her. It feels almost daring to say that, but I can’t deny how good it felt just hanging out with them all.