Page 106 of Live for Me

“I tried to tell you it was getting late after the first two times, sugar,” I chuckled.

“I regret nothing.”

“You can stay here. If you’re still up here after I’ve fed your friends, trust me, I’ll come right back up here, too.”

“Myfriends,” she repeated. “They’re yours, too. And you know it. No matter what you say.”

“I think New Jersey would disagree with you.”

She wrapped both arms around my neck to hold me there when I tried to get out of the bed.

“Will you try with him?” she asked. “Please?”

“I think you’re asking the wrong person.”

“Utah,” she tried again. “Please?”

I groaned and dropped my head down on her chest. “That’s hardly fair when you already know I’ll do anything you ask.”

She let me escape that time when I tried to move, and she squirmed out of bed right behind me to get dressed, too. She hesitated for a second in the hallway just outside the kitchen. The voices of all her friends were in that room, and we were the last ones up. She knew they would know why, and I very much expected her to turn right back around to run up the stairs. Instead, she laced her fingers in between mine and pulled me into the kitchen behind her. Then I was the one left unsure of how I felt at the sight of New Jersey already cooking breakfast for everyone. Everyone including Kyle, who’d apparently decided to join us now that Jersey was back.

“Morning, lovebirds,” Indy said, like starting the day this way was the most normal thing to ever happen around here. Memphis’ hand slipped out of mine, and she went to sit in her usual place next to Indy. I stood there and just stared around that room, very much confused by what was happening in this house.

“Pancakes, boss lady?” Jersey asked.

The fuck?

But this washishouse.

Couldn’t just stand here and tell him that breakfast wasmyjob.

“Over here, hoss,” Indy said and moved down a chair to pat the one between Memphis and him when he noticed that I was apparently fucking lost. “Weird not seeing you down here first, but it’s still not a bad view,” he added and nodded toward New Jersey.

Whatever Trista was whispering directly into Memphis’ ear while I sat beside her turned Memphis bright red in a matter of seconds. She cleared her throat and tried to shift away from Triss just a little.

“We need to respond to Salem today,” she said, looking toward Indy instead.

“Whatever you say, sweets.”

“Salem,” New Jersey hissed and turned around to look at me. “She told me about that. You let another woman attack her?”

That shit was somehow both an accusationanda question.

“Says the man who let his girl get stabbed.Mygirl didn’t even bleed.”

“That definitely happened,” Triss chimed in immediately and looked at Jersey. “You did do that. He’s got a point.”

“One time. It wasonemotherfucking time,” Jersey huffed.

“I had a knife in my leg for like two hours, J. The scar is hideous.Andyou made me siton the groundwhile you covered the seat of your car before you put me in it to take me to a doctor.”

“I should’ve given you to the sharks,” he said with a sigh, pointing at her with the spatula that he was holding.

“This is the best relationship argument I think I’ve ever witnessed,” Indy added.

“I think dating got really fucking weird since the last time I did it,” Kyle groaned, just for all of us to bust out laughing at the reminder that he was also present.

The tense silence returned to the room the moment that New Jersey slid a plateful of food across the island in my direction. I stared at him in pure fucking confusion when he nodded at me. Until Memphis squeezed my thigh under the counter and I did the douchebag nod right back at him to apparently accept this truce, even if only temporary.

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