Page 197 of Burn Bright

You can say no if you want to.

I send that one way too quickly, and I groan at myself. “Of course they know that. Ugh,Harriet. Why?” I don’t have to second-guess for long. My phone is already pinging.

Eliot

Always welcome, never a bother. It’d take a force beyond human capabilities to make a Cobalt uncomfortable.

Charlie

I don’t care what you do.

Tom

Just don’t blast shitty music in the living room, Harry.

Relief begins to wash over me, then my phonerings.“Oh fuck.” I spring back off the chair, holding my phone out like it’s contracted a staph infection. Beckett is calling me?! Why? Oh no, is he going to grill me over the phone? Ask me what my intentions are with his baby brother?

I intend for him to rail me tonight, if you must know.I have a love-hate relationship with my brain right now.

“Okay, you can do this,” I pump myself up, then answer the phone. It connects to my earbuds. “Hey?” I’m praying that didn’t sound hostile.

“I don’t mind if you spend the night again.”

I wait for more, but he says nothing after. “Did…did you just call to tell me that?”

“Yeah, sorry, I don’t text.”

I pause for the joke. “Wait, you’re being serious? Is this like a seventeenth century Cobalt Empire role playing thing?”

Beckett lets out a light laugh. “No. I wish.” His breathing sounds shortened. I wonder if he’s on a treadmill. Or moving very quickly somewhere. “It’s sadly afriend leaked my messages to a tabloidtype of thing. Don’t take it personally. I don’t even text family.”

“Good to know.” I stare out into the pitch-black darkness of the lab. “Sooo you’re really okay if I just crash with Ben in the middle of the living room? Even if we…I mean, I’m not saying wewill…but maybe…”Stop talking, Harriet.

Whyyyy does Beckett Cobalt intimidate me?

“You’ve already spent the night twice,” he says smoothly. “Third, fourth, fifth time—if that’s what Ben wants, it’s what I want. I have to run, but if you ever need a ride to the apartment, you can call my driver. Put this number in your contacts.”

I store the number Beckett reads out over the phone. My pulse beating a mile a minute.

Then he says, “One more thing.”

“Yeah?”

“Stick around. I haven’t seen my little brother this happy in a long time, and it’s definitely because of you.”

My eyes spring a tiny leak.What the fuck?I wipe my cheek quickly. I’ve just never been a source of someone’s happiness before. I can see how Ben feels around me, but to hear it from a witness makes this fact durable, solid, like it’s etched in stone.

Stick around.How do I even tell Beckett I’m not the one in threat of bolting?

In this moment, all I manage to reply is, “I plan on it.”

46

HARRIET FISHER

Later that night, Ben and I devour frozen pizzas in his kitchen. Vegan margherita, which Ben let get extra crispy in the oven for me. I like a crunchy charred crust. None of his brothers are home early enough to swipe a slice. Seeing as how their professions have late hours, I’m not surprised we have most of the apartment to ourselves again.

We’re cuddled on the couch (not the pull-out mattress), and I lie longways against Ben’s firm chest, his arms weave around me while I untangle a knot in the stuffed lion’s mane.