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Because, of course, I would be Velma in this situation. My brows pinched with annoyance.
Aurora: No.
Connor: I’ve got it. We can be Goldilocks and the three bears.
Aurora: I’m muting this chat. Goodbye.
But it was Noah’s private message that made my heart flutter.
Noah: You’re coming, shortcake. I won’t take no for an answer.
When I finally got back to the house, my costume party nightmare had come true because hanging on the door were four garment bags with suspicious furry contents.
“You’re here.” Connor grinned. “Did you have a good day, little Hart?”
“You know, you can stop calling me that.” I leveled him with a stern look.
“And why would I do that?”
My expression melted. Connor was like a big goofy puppy I just couldn’t resist.
“Aus, Holden, get in here. Rory’s home.”
Home.
The word clanged through me.
This wasn’t my home, but by God, it felt good to hear him say those words. To know that he’d accepted my presence without question.
I’d needed that.
More than I ever could have imagined.
“Thank you,” I whispered, and Connor stared at me with confusion.
“Umm, okay.”
I chuckled. “You’re a good guy, Con.”
“I like to think so.” He winked and bellowed for Austin and Noah again. They came bounding into the kitchen, grinning when they saw me.
“We got lucky. Fantasy and Sparkles had what we needed.”
“There had better not be four costumes in there,” I said.
“Rory, baby,” Connor came over to me and slung his arm around my shoulder. It was oddly comforting.
Austin frowned, his eyes lingering on where Connor touched me, and a sad, wistful moment passed between us.
We still had a lot to talk about. But we’d tried that the other morning, and it had ended with Austin walking out on me. So I wasn’t in any hurry to do it again anytime soon.
I knew he harbored a lot of guilt at what went down. But guilt didn’t change anything, and it didn’t fix things. Eventually, we’d need to air all the tension between us.
“Here,” Noah said, thrusting a bag at me. “We got you something.”
“Do I even want to know?” My brow lifted, and a faint smirk traced his mouth.
God, his smile was dangerous, luring me in and making my insides turn to mush.
