Page 80 of Burn Bright (Cobalt Empire #1)

BEN COBALT

I ’d never call having sex with Harriet a mistake. Not for a single second. But it’s impossible not to feel the repercussions of it.

We’re in the shower together, and I can’t believe I’m going to leave this. Her. It throttles me how I might be wrong. Could leaving be worse than staying? It’s a question I don’t have the answer to, which makes me agonize over it even more.

The blue glow from the LED lights basks a calm hue on Harriet. Water drips down her eyelashes, and I rub shampoo into her hair. She lets me—which is a shock in itself. I thought after she stopped crying on the pull-out, she might want to push me away forever.

I can’t discern exactly what has her so upset, but I can make some educated guesses. Still, I’d rather calm her down to where she’s ready to share than badger her for answers when she’s too torn up to. But yeah, Harriet sobbing after I slept with her—not a great feeling.

Is it because I won’t be sticking around? Maybe. Part of me wants to tell her, “I’m on the fence about the future.” But I’m scared to be wishy-washy, even if my head is like a fucking pirate ship on rocky seas.

Fuck, I wish I could figure how to tell her where I might be without compromising the plan. I can’t risk my family finding me if I go through with it. I’m just trying to protect them. If I cause anything else terrible to happen to them…I can’t. I can’t even allow myself to think it.

My panic will escalate, so I breathe out and focus on her.

Harriet.

She’s right in front of me.

Here. Now.

Her back to me, I skate my fingers through her hair, rinsing out some of the shampoo for her. I asked if she wanted to take a shower with me. She could’ve rejected me, curled up in the sheets, cursed me out forever.

Instead, I get the chance to comfort her. To make this better.

Her silence is eating at me just as much as her tears did. “I’m sorry,” I breathe out. “If I made you feel this way…”

She whirls around, her glare still cute but it splinters in places. “No, you’ve been upfront with me.” She brushes water out of her eyes. “I shouldn’t have cried?—”

“You can cry,” I say. “I want to know how you feel, and if that’s how you feel, you can let it out.”

Harriet holds my waist. She’s not crossing her arms. That’s good. I see her thinking before she says, “It was the sex.”

I wrack my brain. “The sex brought you to distraught tears?” That’s… not good. “Did I hurt you?” My chest tightens. I thought I went slow enough.

“No, the sex was the best , Ben.” Her reddened eyes carry so much emotion. I clasp her cheek, then cradle her head as she strains her neck. Not wanting her to look away from me. “I’ve never felt anything like it, and then knowing you’re leaving soon…it just got to me. But I’ll get over it.”

A knot is in my ribs. Do I want her to get over it? Get over me? I know I’ll never get over her. I pull Harriet against me in a hug, my hand cupping the back of her skull. She rests her cheek against my chest and hangs on to my build.

“It was the best for me too,” I whisper to her. We take some breaths together, and I sense her body relaxing against mine. When we pull back, I peel a wet tendril of hair off her jaw.

She bites at the corner of her lip, her eyes drifting down to my cock. She’s been doing that since we got in the shower, which I’ve learned is one of my biggest turn-ons with Harriet, but I’m hesitant to start another round right now. Not when she’s been so fractured.

“Can we start over, Cobalt boy?” Harriet asks with a stiff shrug.

“Depends on how far over.” I push my wet hair back and angle the showerhead away from her. She’s being pelted with water.

“How far are you willing to rewind?”

I suck in a breath, feigning contemplation. “Two minutes.”

Her cheeks pinch in a grimaced smile. “Oh, only two minutes.” She pumps a lackluster fist in the air.

“Now we can’t rewind at all because that was too cute.

We can push pause though. Let me just do this first.” I lift her up, and her legs naturally wrap around me.

We’re eye-level while I cup her soft, bare ass.

Her arms drape over my shoulders, and her grumpy, sullen face takes a much lighter turn. “You want to pause, Fisher?”

She nods slowly while she says, “I don’t want to fuck this up. We have such a short amount of time left, and I might ruin it.”

“You won’t ruin anything. You are the least ruinous person I’ve met. I’m the one?—”

“You warned me,” she interjects. “You told me. There was nothing more you could do, except not have sex with me, and I wouldn’t want that either. I loved tonight. So I’m not rewinding a single second, I’ve decided.”

“Good—”

She kisses me abruptly, which makes me smile. I kiss back, slowing the tempo, which draws an aching sound out of her.

When our lips part, she pants out, “Did we press play?”

“I think so.”

“Cool, because I wanted to ask what shampoo we’re using.”

I laugh. “Hate it?”

“I could marry it.”

“Now you’re making me jealous. I might have to trash it.” I reach for the bottle, holding her up against me with one arm.

She tears my hand away from the ledge of products. “Absolutely fucking not .”

A deeper laugh rumbles out of me.

“My hair has never felt this silky, and it’s not even dry yet. Feel. ” She tips her head forward to me.

I gladly run my fingers through the blonde strands. “That’s the work of a high-end vegan shampoo.”

“High-end, huh.” Her brows spring at me. “Splurging, Friend?”

“Thankfully I already had it before my bank account plummeted to zero . I don’t use a lot at one time.”

“Conserving,” she nods. “I do the same thing with toothpaste. You have to roll that sucker to the very tip.” Her puckered smile is making me grin. My heart feels so fucking full again.

I lean in and kiss her—then I hear the slam of a door.

Our mouths break apart like we’ve been electrocuted. I shift my hands to her hips, and she slides down my body, her feet splashing into the wet tile.

“What was that?” Harriet’s eyes widen.

I’m already jumping out of the shower, not willing to take any chances. “Stay here.” I wrench a towel off the hook. “Use the conditioner. Just don’t marry it while I’m gone.”

Her hesitation ends the banter, a hand frozen on the hot-and-cold lever. “I thought your brothers usually spend the night at your parents’ house on Wednesdays?”

“Usually they do.” No one loves the two-hour drive back to New York after dinner (shorter for those who push the speed limit, longer if there’s traffic), but there are times they’ll do it.

Especially if they have a morning obligation the next day.

I checked the group calendar. No one has shit to do tomorrow morning.

I’m already walking out the door, tying the towel around my waist. Water drips down my legs and creates footprint puddles as I head down the short hall.

“Hello?” I call out. “Anyone here?”

Then I skid to a halt in the living room.

It’s Charlie.

His yellow-green eyes flit from the soy wax candles on the bookshelves, windowsill, and coffee table.

I can’t read his blank expression, so I say quickly, “I’ll blow them out.

They won’t catch anything on fire.” Except the image of flames spreading across the couch, of me starting an inferno in my brothers’ apartment and burning them alive, is now scoring my brain.

I rapidly begin blowing out candles—my stride lengthy, slightly frantic.

“It’s not kerosine,” Charlie snaps. “This isn’t even the hundredth idiotic idea involving fire that’s been in this apartment. So rest assured, the two pyromaniacs will burn down the whole building before you even light a match.”

Makes sense, still I side-eye a few candles on the bookshelves. I need to blow those out. I’m waiting for him to leave so he doesn’t give me a hard time. “Is that it?” I ask.

He looks me over, unpocketing his cigarettes. Then he eyes the rumpled sheets on the pull-out. “Here’s a tip. Worry more about the girl you left in the bathroom, less about us.” He sticks his cigarette between his lips. “Revelatory for you, I know.”

I clench my jaw. My concern for Harriet isn’t something I feel like I need to defend, but I do tell him, “She’s not just any girl.”

“Didn’t ask. Don’t care.” He lights his cigarette, showing me the flame of his lighter as it eats the paper. He takes a drag, then blows smoke up at the ceiling. “And look, I’m still alive.” He clicks the lighter closed.

I’m not afraid of him causing an uncontrollable blaze.

Me, on the other hand… I shouldn’t be living here.

The thought has flared up less and less frequently since I kissed Harriet at the Halloween party.

I haven’t forgotten the necessity of completing the Kappa bet and securing new housing—but it’s been shelved behind Harriet.

I like that she’s crowding the front of my brain. I like that I’ve stopped picturing Beckett scrubbing his arms at the sink.

The past week, I haven’t felt a half second away from packing my duffel and exiting. I’ve been contemplating delaying for longer. Sometimes, I even wonder if there is a way to stay in New York. With her. With my brothers.

We hear the door open, and I turn as Eliot and Tom slip inside the apartment. When I glance back at Charlie, he’s gone.

Eliot and Tom pass the kitchen with monstrously big smiles while I extinguish the last waxy candles. They might as well be arm-in-arm, skipping in glee, as they put all the pieces together. The candles. Me, naked in a towel. The shower still running in the bathroom.

“What are you doing here?” I ask before they can launch questions.

Eliot chokes on a laugh. “We live here.”

Tom arches his brows. “Dude, we thought you were alone. We were coming back to keep you company.”

“Unless you are alone,” Eliot grins wider. “Is this a side of you we don’t know about, brother? You light candles and set the mood before you jerk one out.” He mimes the motion with his hand because of course he does.

I skate a palm across the back of my neck, still wet from the shower.

“Harriet is here. She’s spending the night on the couch with me, and I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t make a big deal out of this, for her sake.

She grew up as an only child. She’s not used to having you two as brothers.

” Last thing I want is for Harriet to be uncomfortable.

Eliot can’t suppress his elation. “Next time you want to fuck your girlfriend, just tell us. We’ll go somewhere else for the night, or I can even give you my room.”

Fucking on Eliot’s bed—not on my Bingo card.

But really, I’m still hung up on the other word. “She’s not my…” I can’t even say it. She’s not my girlfriend.

Eliot’s smile fades.

A grimace contorts Tom’s face.

They know me too well. I’ve been hanging out with Harriet so much that there’s no universe in which she wouldn’t be my girlfriend now that we’re hooking up.

I’m the relationship guy out of all my brothers.

I have the most experience truly dating—and that’s a terrifying fact considering I’m the youngest.

“You’re not calling her your girlfriend?” Tom just comes out and asks. “Is it because I don’t like her? Because I have no problem going from disliking your friend to disliking your girlfriend.”

I’m not getting into Tom and Harriet’s feud. It’s about as heated as a shishito pepper.

“It’s new,” I say, which isn’t a lie. I know that I’ll be dumping a truckload of suspicion on myself if I continue not calling Harriet my girlfriend.

It is weird. I understand that. Because if I knew with absolute certainty that I’d be in New York by the end of the year, I’d be screaming it off every rooftop in the city.

Harriet Fisher is my girlfriend.

I want it so fucking badly. I just can’t figure out if this is a cruel temptation—like I should want to keep my family safe more than I want to be with her. I don’t know…I don’t know, but I’m not going to stress about it right now.

They both pat my shoulders, congratulating me like I won an award, and I’m grateful when Eliot says they’ll stay in their rooms for the rest of the night.

When they leave, all I want to do is return to Harriet.

So I do.