Page 50 of Jax (The Kansas City Reapers #3)

The guilt hit fast. It always did. Sharp and unrelenting, a betrayal that carved beneath my ribs. I hadn’t cried in days, but in that moment, I came close, not because I didn’t deserve this, but because she didn’t. Because deep down, I still believed that if I’d been faster, smarter, stronger…

Bellamy nudged me, her face streaked with glittery face mask goo. “You good, newbie?”

I blinked, then nodded. “Yeah. Just thinking.”

“Dangerous hobby.”

“You don’t know the half of it.”

She grinned and bumped my shoulder again. Maddy leaned over and pressed a tiny glitter sticker to my cheek like a badge of honor.

“Welcome to the war paint brigade,” she murmured. “We don’t cry here. We sparkle aggressively.”

It was ridiculous and sweet, and exactly what Violet would’ve wanted for me. So I let myself have it. I laughed. I reached for more popcorn. And for the first time in too long, I let myself exist without calculating the emotional fallout. Not forever, just for now. And that, somehow, was enough.

Maddy pulled a small tin box from the blanket nest like it held ancient power, her eyes lit with the kind of mischievous glee usually reserved for teenagers summoning spirits behind a locked door.

“Ladies,” she said, popping the lid with theatrical flair, “I present to you... the Safe Word Edition.”

Bellamy perked up instantly, practically crawling over Maddy’s legs to get a better look. “You finished it?” she asked with the reverence of someone witnessing the unveiling of the Mona Lisa. “You really finished it?”

“I did.” Maddy grinned. “Forty cards. All hand-drawn. All wildly inappropriate. And possibly illegal in seven states.”

I blinked, equal parts intrigued and horrified. “Wait. You made these?”

“With Sharpies and spite,” Maddy said proudly. “Each one is a Would You Rather question specifically designed to make you deeply question your morals, taste in men, and ability to maintain eye contact after answering.”

Bellamy was already shuffling the deck like a Vegas pro. “We’re starting immediately.”

I smirked “Does this game have rules? Or are we just playing until someone combusts from shame?”

“Same rules as Fight Club,” Maddy replied. “But with more glitter.”

Bellamy pulled the first card with dramatic flair. “Would you rather get spanked by Sully while reciting Shakespeare, or be tied to a St. Andrew’s Cross by Niko while he reads IRS tax code at you in Russian?”

I choked on my wine. “What the hell kind of choices are those?”

“The kind that tell us who you really are,” Bellamy said, wagging the card like it held the secrets of the universe. “Now, answer.”

I opened my mouth. Closed it. Took another sip of Prosecco and narrowed my eyes. “Sully. But only if I get to pick the monologue.”

Bellamy whooped. Maddy nearly fell backward off the couch from laughing. “You’re a slut for sonnets,” she gasped. “I knew it.”

Bellamy flipped another card. “Would you rather let Carrick edge you for three hours with a violet wand, or go one round with Deacon using nothing but a feather and a blindfold?”

My jaw dropped. “These are not ‘Would You Rathers.’ These are criminally specific character assassinations.”

“And yet,” Bellamy said, eyes gleaming, “you’re considering it.”

“Three hours?” I muttered, calculating. “I’m not even sure what a violet wand is, but I get the feeling Carrick would weaponize it like it’s a damn scalpel. But Deacon’s got that scary-silent thing going on...”

“Exactly.” Maddy raised her glass. “No right answers. Only chaos.”

“Fine.” I sighed. “Carrick. But I want a safe word, and a hydration clause.”

Bellamy high-fived Maddy like they’d won a bet. “She’s one of us.”

I groaned and buried my face in a pillow. “You all are menaces.”

Bellamy winked. “You’re among perverts. Embrace it.”

“And you made a whole deck of these?” I asked, muffled by the pillow. “How do you have this much free time?”

“I’m unemployed and emotionally unstable,” Maddy chirped. “It’s a hobby.”

Bellamy leaned closer, brandishing another card like a dare. “Would you rather watch Jax lecture you on the psychological roots of obedience while slowly unbuttoning his shirt, or have him interrogate you in a dimly lit room about why your thighs clenched just thinking about it?”

“Jesus Christ,” I said, half-laughing, half-dying. “This is entrapment.”

“Answer the question,” Bellamy said, smirking like the devil dipped in glitter.

I took a long drink, met her gaze, and said, “Both. Back to back. I want the full thesis presentation, and the follow-up interrogation.”

Maddy fell off the couch. Bellamy clutched her chest like she’d been blessed by Dionysus.

“Oh, we’re talking dirty now?”

“Keep testing me, glitter goblin. I will smother you with this face mask.”

From the floor, Maddy groaned. “If this isn’t friendship, I don’t want it.”

Bellamy threw the cards like confetti. “Girls’ night supremacy!”

We collapsed into pillows and fleece, punchy with sugar and wine, laughter echoing like war cries. My cheeks ached. My stomach hurt. And for the first time in too long, I felt soft. Not buzzed, or numbed. Just seen. Teased. Included. Not once asked to shrink or explain.

The credits rolled in a slow wash of ‘90s nostalgia. Maddy had passed out mid-sentence about Heath Ledger’s cheekbones, one arm flung over her face like a fainting Victorian heroine.

A smear of brownie clung to her mouth like a battle scar.

Bellamy had claimed the couch like a monarch, swaddled in two throw blankets with one foot sticking out as a warning.

Her glitter-covered cheek was mashed into a pillow that would never be the same.

I lay flat on the rug, pajama pants brushing my ankles, hand grazing the carpet. The warmth in the room had settled deep, the kind that made you realize you weren’t braced anymore. That you could breathe without it costing something.

A spoon clinked in a forgotten bowl. The playlist had ended, but the silence didn’t feel empty. It felt earned. The house itself seemed to exhale. Vanilla lotion, overcooked popcorn, and something more subtle, something sacred, lingered in the air like proof that softness could survive.

I exhaled. Not dramatically. Just full. Of sugar, air, and this strange new safety I hadn’t known I needed.

I never thought this kind of softness could exist in captivity.

The kind that shrieked at rom-com tropes, and painted glitter masks on each other.

That passed wine like communion and debated kink dynamics mid-popcorn fight.

But here it was, real and alive, built of elbow nudges and shared blankets and dramatic sighs when the popcorn missed its target.

It would’ve overwhelmed me once, this much presence. This much emotion. Now, it just felt good. Like heat beneath skin. Like a silence that didn’t echo with regret.

They were chaos. Glitter-drenched, unapologetic, beautiful chaos. And somehow, I belonged here.

And I wanted that. Not just tonight. Not just the sugar crash and sarcasm. I wanted it to stay. To become part of me. To grow into something steady. Something that could live through the aftermath of survival.

I wanted Jax to see me like this. Not brittle. Not bound. Not pretending I had it all handled. Just me. Breathing. Present. Unscripted.

Maybe what Jax and I had wouldn’t last. Maybe it wasn’t love. But it was something. And I wasn’t ready to let it go.

I stretched one leg from the blanket cocoon, toes brushing the rug, eyes drifting to the ceiling. The sugar high had faded. The silliness, too. But something remained. Something quiet. Something good. Like maybe it was okay to want more of this, whatever this was.

Then came the knock.

Soft. Intentional. Not loud enough to wake anyone. Just enough to stir me. The kind of knock that wasn’t meant for the house. It was meant for me.

I sat up gingerly, careful not to jostle the blankets or disturb the two sleeping glitter goblins beside me. Maddy snored into her arm, face buried. Bellamy had vanished into her pillow fort, one sparkly foot poking out like a warning to would-be trespassers.

They didn’t stir. The room held its breath.

I pushed off the couch and padded to the door. When I cracked it open, the hallway light spilled in soft and golden around the man waiting there.

Jax. Hoodie unzipped over a black T-shirt, barefoot, hair tousled like he’d been pacing until the moment he felt me stir. He didn’t look surprised to see me. Like he’d already calculated the outcome and landed here on purpose.

“Glitter levels have reached a tactical hazard,” he murmured, voice dry and low.

I leaned against the frame. “And you knocked anyway? Bold move, Colonel.”

His smile curved, subtle and slow. “Risk analysis suggested the threat level was acceptable.”

“You’re not wrong. Though Maddy does own a glitter cannon, and Bellamy has no fear of God or consequences.”

He nodded solemnly, like he was filing it away for future consideration. “Noted.”

We stood in a shared quiet, the air between us humming with something that didn’t need to be named. He didn’t step forward. Didn’t push. Just watched me with that calculating gaze, like he was taking inventory, running diagnostics on every twitch of my mouth and angle of my stance.

“Security sweep?” I asked finally.

“All clear,” he confirmed, voice gentle. “Tree line’s quiet. Cameras are stable. Everyone’s accounted for, except the brownie thief, who may have initiated a secondary snack mission.”

“That checks out.” I let out a breath, soft and grateful. “Thanks.”

He hesitated, eyes scanning my face, his tone dropping lower. “You good?”

It wasn’t a casual question. It was the kind of ask that came with subtext and weight. A question that measured my stability, not just my safety. It felt like an offering. Like he was trying to shoulder some of what I couldn’t say.

I didn’t deflect. Didn’t throw up a wall of sarcasm. Just nodded. “Yeah. I think so.”

His gaze softened, but sharpened too. Like he was committing this version of me to memory. “You looked good in there.”

“Sticky and sleep-deprived?” I arched a brow. “That’s your thing now?”

“No,” he said quietly, and there was something heavier behind it. “Happy.”

That word shouldn’t have made my chest tighten. But it did. I bit the inside of my cheek and looked down, unsure what to do with the ache curling warm and strange in my gut.

“I didn’t expect it either,” I said, because it was the truth.

“I’m glad it found you.”

The honesty in his voice made my breath catch. I looked up, caught in the weight of his stare, the quiet gravity of how he watched me, like I wasn’t some variable to be solved. Like I was the answer.

“So, showing up right after the glitter and vulnerability,” I teased lightly, needing to move the weight before it crushed me. “Is that a kink I should know about?”

His grin spread slow and feral. “Not unless you want it to be.”

“God, you’re insufferable.”

“Statistically,” he murmured, “that’s only a 47% match.”

And there it was. That Spencer Reid-adjacent nerdery that always landed like a punch and a hug at the same time. I tried to hide my smirk. Failed.

“Next time, I pick the movie, and you and I watch it ourselves.”

He leaned just a little closer, enough that his voice skimmed against the shell of my ear. “Only if it has explosions, and significantly less glitter.”

“Deal.”

He didn’t touch me. Didn’t linger. Just gave me one last glance like he was imprinting me onto something unseen, then turned and walked back down the hallway, barefoot and golden and completely unfair.

I stood there for a moment, hand still on the doorframe, soaking in the hush he left behind. And for once, the quiet didn’t feel like an absence.

It felt like a promise.