Page 15 of Well That Happened

They’re loud. They eat an obscene amount of food. And between them, they have more abs than I can count. It’s annoying.

By the time I make it to the kitchen, the chaos is… impressive.

Hunter is at the stove, wielding a spatula over a pan of eggs. His dark hair’s sticking up in all directions, jaw clenched like someone pissed in his Cheerios. Shirtless, of course. Black gym shorts hanging low on his hips, muscles tensed.

He doesn’t glance up as I walk in. Just grunts. Classic.

Caleb’s perched on the counter, legs swinging, eating cereal straight from the box. He’s all golden skin and easy energy, hoodie half-zipped and hair still damp from a shower. There’salways this lazy spark in his eyes—like he’s in on a joke you haven’t heard yet.

And then there’s Grayson.

Leaning against the fridge. Shirtless. Sweats slung low on his narrow hips, hair still tousled like he just rolled out of bed and doesn’t care if the world knows it. He’s ink and muscle and unreadable silence, with a gaze so steady it feels like pressure against my skin.

Black lines curl over one shoulder—sharp geometric patterns that taper into soft script down his bicep, like poetry trapped in steel. Spanning his chest is an intricate design with a wolf, mid-prowl, inked in clean black strokes, like it’s watching everything and saying nothing. And down his forearm? A tangled mess of flowers and bones, beauty and ruin etched in grayscale. It’s the kind of ink you don’t get unless you’re carrying things you don’t say out loud.

And it’s level ten hot.

Forget-how-to-breathe hot.

He doesn’ttryto be distracting. He just is.

I feel my pulse jump and immediately pretend it didn’t.

Three hockey players. One tiny kitchen. Zero personal space.

“Good morning, boys,” I say, sliding onto the stool at the end of the island. “Didn’t know we were reenactingMasterChef: Testosterone Editiontoday.”

Caleb flashes a grin. “We take turns with breakfast. Today was supposed to be Hunter’s day.”

Hunter grunts. “Itismy day.”

“Tell that to the toast you just murdered,” I say, eyeing the blackened graveyard in the toaster.

“I like it crispy.”

“Yeah, well. That bread’s one crunch away from becoming a weapon.”

He narrows his eyes at me but doesn’t argue. Which feels like a win.

Grayson pushes a mug of coffee toward me without a word. No cream. No sugar. Just black, bitter salvation.

I blink up at him. “You been spying on my caffeine preferences?”

He shrugs. “You talk in your sleep.”

My cheeks go warm. “Please tell me I said something interesting.”

“You cursed out a man named Craig for mislabeling a placenta.”

Caleb chokes on a mouthful of cereal.

Hunter freezes. Then—barely—a smirk twitches at the corner of his mouth.

I sip the coffee. “Craig deserved it.”

Grayson nods, like that checks out.

I take another sip, oddly grounded by the moment. Like I belong here. Like this weird, loud, male-occupied war zone isn’t as terrifying as I expected.

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