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“Shut up,” I said.

In reality, she wasn’t too young. I was too old. I turned forty in less than two months, and I wished I could go back in time and redo the last ten. And completely erase Ella.

My phone buzzed, and I swiped it from the side table and saw I had an update about my delivery. “Fuck.” They were almost here. “Excuse me, I gotta engage in brat labor.” I wiped pizza grease off my fingers and then stood up on the lounger.

“Huh?” Ash was confused.

“PSA to all brats!” I called out over the pool area. I immediately had about fifteen heads snapping my way. “I have a furniture delivery in about twenty minutes! Everyone who helps me carry the stuff into my cabin will be bribed with a ton of sugar and free drinks at the bar tonight!”

Kit gasped and stood up. “It’s true! I saw one of the bags she brought earlier, and it was full of donuts and candy!”

“I’m in!” Noa yelled. “I’m super strong—punch me as hard as you can in the abs. You’ll see!”

I laughed and blew him a kiss. “Maybe I’ll punch you later, sweetheart.”

He grinned like a dope.

In the end, I had seven volunteers. Kit, Noa, Shay, Lane, Cam, Tate, and…Nora.

CHAPTER TWO

Nora Lilja

Of course Lane had to make a comment to the Tops who helped Penelope.

“Sirs, do you identify as brats?” he teased.

Colt, Kingsley, Ash, and Ty gave him appropriate looks of “Watch it, brat.”

“Or, our mamas raised us up right,” Colt retorted.

“Also, don’t cut off the hand that carries the couch, wild fry,” Ty told his boy.

I snickered under my breath and picked up another box. Judging by the illustration on the cardboard, this was going to be a floor lamp once assembled.

The delivery guys had just left everything by the carport out front, so it was a long trek with each box. On grass. The Mclean property was huge, a stark contrast to what I was used to in my previous community. We’d had a loft space in Alexandria, and thirty people had filled the room.

I kept my head down and trailed along the side of the house, another thing that was huge. Three stories of club area, bar, guest rooms, playrooms, changing room, kitchen… They had their own rope dojo too. Their own freaking forest—at the bottom of the lawn in the back.

I’d been a member of their online forum for about a year, and one thing hadn’t changed. My confusion regarding Penelope’s role here. Because it focused so heavily on gay men, and yet she was one of the Founders. In fact, she was the only woman in a position of power out here. The lesbian community was tiny; I’d stumbled across maybe fifteen members who were active in the online group Lesbians of Mclean. The other forty or so members hadn’t been online in at least six months.

Was she bi? She seemed to surround herself with these men, and I already knew she’d had a playtime dynamic with a dude, though it’d been stated on Penelope’s ex’s profile that it was nonsexual.

On the other hand, I’d discovered for myself early on that this setup was kind of comforting. The number of messages with unsolicited dick pics and propositions was near zero. Same couldn’t be said in communities with more straight men.

We’d see how long I lasted here. Lane and his friends had been very welcoming, but I’d gotten the feeling Penelope wasn’t interested. She’d declined my friend request online, and the one time I’d spoken to her at an event, she’d been pretty aloof. I hadn’t made any progress with the other women either, except a Little named Ivy, but she was straight.

I passed the first A-frame cabins, and Noa strode past me with a stack of what looked like packaged drapes, bed linen, and vacuum-sealed pillows.

The fifth cabin was Penelope’s, and as instructed, we left the stuff close to the western wall. She wanted the rest of the space for assembling everything later.

The cabin was beautiful but completely empty. A kitchen nook near the front, by the window, a presumably tiny bathroom under the stairs that led to a loft. Everything was made of wood, so it felt like being transported to a snowcapped mountain.

Just as I turned around to head out, Penelope herself walked in with two kitchen chairs.

“Sorry, Ma’am.” I hurriedly got out of the way and felt my heart beat a little faster.

I blamed her.