Page 81 of Sold to the Silver Foxes

He nods once, like he completely understands. Maybe he does. Even if he doesn’t, that reassurance feels like the granite I can build a life on. Nico reaches over, presses a packet of tissues into my hand. Dante munches a fruit cup and casually drapes an arm across my shoulders. The gesture feels so natural, I forget we were ever strangers.

Erin wakes again for respiratory exercises, supervised by a nurse who wields a spirometer like a traffic cop. Grandma returns with blueberry muffins, and Dante declares them perfection. When Erin dozes once more, the brothers leave in search of teriyaki for Grandma, per her request.

I stay, stroking Erin’s hair. The room is quiet but for machines. Beep-pause, hiss-pause. I open my phone, scroll to the digital copy of the contract—just to torture myself, evidently.

What happens when it ends? I picture the carriage turning into a pumpkin, and my fine clothes becoming thrift-store duds again. But then I remember none of that matters. Not really.

Erin is better. That’s what I wanted out of this, and that’s what I got. If their promises of a brighter future are real, that’s amazing. But I have Erin, and that’s what really matters.

No matter what my heart says.

34

DANTE

Snow fell all night,and the morning sun bounces off a white lawn so bright it feels like studio lights outside the kitchen’s picture windows. Carla set the hearth-style table with old majolica bowls and maple-handled spoons, and the oatmeal inside each bowl steams like Vesuvius’ vents. It should look homey, cozy even.

Instead, the scene buzzes with the same low-grade static that’s been humming in my skull. White noise calledThe Contract Ends Soon.

Tabitha pads in last, Sal’s enormous flannel shirt reaching mid-thigh, bare feet quiet on the limestone. Her braid is fuzzy, but her face is scrubbed clean. She looks like the softer, sleepier sister of the woman who wrangled nurses yesterday, and I feel the first throb of panic that I might lose mornings exactly like this.

I can’t let that happen.

She sits, murmurs good morning, and immediately launches into rehab stats she pulled from the patient portal at six-something. “Erin’s protocol calls for daily weight-bearing practice starting soon, then three PT blocks a week. Hydrotherapy in week three if her incisions seal, occupational therapy for grip strength, follow-up MRI at six weeks, which sounds far too far away for my liking. I’d have her in the MRI every day if I could. She’ll still be in a brace potentially until February?—”

Sal nods and writes bullet points in a leather notebook he’s repurposed from board-meeting doodles. Nico slides his phone across the table, calendar app open, and drags colored blocks into new positions with surgical precision. The two of them form an instant committee.

And I’m just here.

I’m across from Tabitha, but the words coming out of her mouth dissolve into hash. Instead, I watch her forehead crease. I watch her swirl oatmeal without eating it. The contract’s sub-paragraph aboutexclusive companionship for thirty daysscrolls like neon in my peripheral vision. Thirty days is coming to a close. Every detail about Erin’s therapy glows bright on Nico’s screen, but nothing’s penciled in for Tabitha after the contract.

Sal asks, “Will she need adaptive utensils past phase two?”

Tabitha shakes her head. “The therapist thinks she’ll ditch the brace within eight weeks, if we keep her honest on the homework.”

Nico asks, “Transportation frequency? We can set a standing driver on Tuesdays and Thursdays, or whatever else you need.”

She nods, but a line forms between her brows. “That’s generous, but I can drive?—”

“Driver,” Nico repeats, tone gentle and unyielding. He moves a blue block—THERAPY VAN—to recurring status on the screen. “Those vans are large and unwieldy and you have enough on your plate.”

She smiles, gratitude plain in her olive-green eyes. “Thank you.”

And me? I push blueberries around in my bowl like lost planets, pretending the steam fogging my face is the only reason my eyes sting.

It’s not just the helplessness. It’s that no one even asks me for help. And I don’t know where to jump in like Sal and Nico have. They’ve handled it all. Without me.

Times like this, I remember it’s good that I’m pretty, because sometimes, they treat me like decoration.

Tabitha takes a sip of coffee, then sets the mug down like it’s suddenly too heavy. “I’ll stay at Grandma’s for the first two weeks,” she says, voice low. “She’ll need help transferring Erin from bed to chair. After that, I can commute back if you…need me to resume regular duties.”

Nobody corrects her. My chest convulses. I’m sure oatmeal is going to reappear.Regular duties—code for the contract. Yet none of us has invoked that thing since the first night. No required companion dates, no mandatory scenes. That’s not how we enjoy someone, so it never occurred to us to invoke it.

Have we been idiots? We gave her freedom but forgot to tear up the leash.

I tell her, “Erin comes first, Tabitha.”

Nico adds, “Period.”

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