Page 91 of Burn Bright (Cobalt Empire #1)

Harriet watches us, chewing her candy more slowly. Her glare is presenting as angry , but I know she’s just contemplative.

“You’re ditching the frat?” That’s Beckett coming into the communal space. Already finished dancing in dress rehearsal for The Nutcracker , he’s recently showered and wears black joggers and a tight-fitted tee. “Did they do something?” His protective stance is welcomed but unnecessary.

“No, they’ve been cool. I just don’t want to be in one.

It’s a lot of time commitments. Too many parties they want me to attend.

” Off his smile, I nod and smile back, “And I’m staying here.

” Before they celebrate, I add fast, “I’m leaving now.

” I swipe my granola bar and water bottle off the counter, about to head to the door.

“We’ll all go with you,” Beckett offers, which stops me dead in my tracks. Especially as Charlie and Beckett exchange a silent, unreadable look. Then Charlie blinks hard in palpable irritation and drops his travel duffel to the floor, like his plans are now cancelled. That easily?

For me?

No way.

“I’m literally just going to the frat,” I say. “If you’re concerned about me?—”

“None of us are doing anything for the rest of the night,” Beckett interjects. “We’re free.”

“Clearly Charlie has somewhere he needs to go.” I motion a hand to the duffel on the floor.

“It can wait.” Charlie stares me down like I’m making this more excruciating for him. “Can we hurry this up?”

“Charlie Keating finally finding his priorities,” Tom says while sticking his arms through his jean jacket, wearing it over a black hoodie.

“The night is practically over,” I tell them.

“The night is always young,” Eliot counters, squeezing my shoulder while he rounds the island and closes in on the door.

Harriet shrugs at me. “Why not bring them along?”

Because you won’t be with me. I need to figure out how to quiet my panic when she’s not around. A catastrophe isn’t going to strike. I won’t hurt them. Think of Maeve’s birthday . Yeah, that went fine.

Eliot’s grin widens in my direction. “Even your girlfriend wants us present, brother.”

Her ocean blue eyes search mine, but I just take a big breath. I want to say my brothers complicate everything, but they also uncomplicate terrible situations too. “No security,” I tell them.

“What a shock,” Charlie says dryly.

“You didn’t call Novak?” Beckett asks.

It hasn’t been such a secret that I’ve routinely stopped informing Novak when I leave the apartment. I’m a legal adult. Not a kid. I can decide when I want a bodyguard trailing my every move, even if my mom has blown up my phone reminding me to attach myself to our private security.

My parents can’t force their desires. They can get creative, yeah, and place me among the family who have bodyguards flanking their every move. Being protected by proxy.

So I assume my brothers are about to lead me down that type of path.

“No, I didn’t call him. This isn’t supposed to be a big ordeal. If you all want to go with me, then no bodyguards. I don’t want to make a scene. In and out. I’ll be five minutes. You stay in the car and wait for me after we drop Harriet off at her apartment.”

I’m floored when they instantly agree.

Minutes later, I’m in Beckett’s luxury car with his personal driver, Hans, behind the wheel. My four brothers with me. I’ve already said bye to Harriet at her apartment, and now we’re en route to the frat house.

My stomach grumbles because I burned way too many calories today working out and having sex.

I want to eat the granola while not dirtying the sleek black interior of Beckett’s SUV.

The risk of spreading crumbs is astronomical.

It’s not a soft, chewy granola bar. It will break into too many tiny pieces with one bite.

Should’ve grabbed a banana. Fuck.

“So you’ve screwed us all over, brother,” Eliot says as we hit a red light.

My brows pinch together in confusion. “What’d I do?”

“Chose a girlfriend that Mom literally adores.” Eliot flashes a wry grin. “Thank you for setting the bar unimaginably high for the rest of our future significant others.”

“You don’t need to worry about that, Eliot,” Charlie says from the front seat. “We’ll all be dead before you stop fucking around.”

“Touché,” Eliot smiles. “But even while you are nestled in your graves, I don’t think my future girlfriend will be living up to the Harriet Fisher standard. I heard Mom asked her to Le Petit Rêve.”

“ Beeeeen .” Tom lengthens my name in a groan. “Seriously, couldn’t you have told her to belch or something?”

I’m near laughter. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard her belch.”

“So she’s Mom’s favorite and she doesn’t burp?” Tom throws up his hands. “I’m calling it, she’s a demon.”

“What about Dad?” Eliot wonders. “He could be our opening. Maybe he hasn’t been bedazzled by Harriet’s demonic charm.”

I stare at the granola in my hand. Our dad didn’t have as much time to converse with Harriet, but he told me he can tell she means everything to me. He used that exact word. Everything . That’s all I care about—that he knows she’s not a tiny part of my world, that she is my world.

“Dad already likes her, I’m sure,” Beckett says, immediately grabbing my gaze. He has a soft smile on me, and I can practically read his eyes that calmly whisper, no need to be afraid.

That’s not what I’ve been afraid of, Beck. A lump wedges in my throat. How do I tell them? How do I explain the mess inside my mind? It’s been years , and I never really could unravel it all in perfect coherence. I barely understand myself at times.

In the silence, my growling stomach sounds like a broken dishwasher.

“Dude, did you skip dinner?” Tom side-eyes me.

“Our growing baby boy,” Eliot teases.

Beckett smiles into a laugh, which is making me smile, but I’m still not unwrapping the granola.

It causes Beckett to frown a little more.

Then his face just completely plummets, and that hurts.

We stare at each other for a long moment, unspoken things passing between us, and I don’t know what to do until Charlie says, “Eat it.”

I waver. “I’m fine.”

“ I’m fine,” Beckett says so deeply, so soothingly. “My little brother being hungry in my car, I don’t like. Especially if you’re not eating because of me.”

I can just wait until we reach the frat, but since he’s asking me not to, I say, “You sure?”

“Positive.” So I end up carefully eating the granola, but yeah, shit goes everywhere.

Tom is laughing so much, he’s rolling into Eliot.

Guilt overwhelms me. Sears the skin on my face, my arms, my chest. I seldom find humor in the same exact things Tom does, which is partly why I’m sure I’m more sensitive than my brothers.

But as soon as he laughs out, “All this time, all we had to do was feed Ben granola—follow the crumbs and we’ll never lose him,” I find some ironic levity in the joke.

I laugh from my chest. Hard.

It actually startles Tom. To where Beckett busts out laughing, and Charlie has a rare smile.

Eliot ruffles Tom’s shaggy golden-brown hair in brotherly affection, then touches the back of my head with the same sentiment, and I hang on to this effervescence filling my lungs.

I don’t want to lose this. I don’t want to lose any of them. Not even Charlie.

Maybe I never have to.