Page 129 of Scavenger's Oath

Is that jealousy? Holy shit. My Ivy’s jealous.

“Greedy girl,” Phoenix drawls behind me. “You get three boyfriends, and we just stay grateful? Is that it?”

“Exactly.” She grins smugly. But her eyes stay locked on me, her head still resting in my hand as my heart beats like a war drum.

Then her stomach growls loud enough to make Zane laugh. Phoenix drops the hammer with a clatter and claps Zane on theback.

“The stomach has spoken. Lunch,” Phoenix chuckles

Ivy flushes pink, fumbling to tuck her paint-streaked hair behind her ear. “It’s fine. We can—”

“None of that,” I cut in, pulling her to her feet with a grin. “You’re eating before you waste away. We’ll finish this shit later.”

The hallway’s too narrow for three huge guys and one little queen we’re all orbiting. Shoulders bump, curses are muttered under breaths, but somehow we make it to the kitchen without bloodshed.

Zane starts raiding the cupboards as Phoenix lifts Ivy onto the counter like it’s the most natural thing in the world. She giggles when he whispers something in her ear and my fists clench on instinct.

“Pancakes?” Zane calls out, holding up a dusty mix box.

“It’s lunch,” Phoenix scoffs, rolling his eyes.

“Oooh, please!” Ivy pleads, turning those baby blues on him. “I haven’t had pancakes since my sixteenth birthday!”

Phoenix chuckles, hand sliding to the back of her neck. “How can I say no when you beg so sweetly?”

Yeah. I know that tone. That’s hisyou’ve-got-five-seconds-before-I-bend-you-overtone.

We move around her like it’s choreography. Zane mixing batter, Phoenix setting plates, me making coffee strong enough to wake the dead.

Ivy brushes past me to grab something, her hip grazing mine. My blood spikes like I’ve mainlined adrenaline.

“Sorry,” she murmurs, smiling like she knows exactly what that did to me.

I catch her hip, pulling her back into my chest and letting her warmth seep into me. Her scent floods my senses as I lower my face to her ear. “No, you’re not,” I growl, rollingmy hips into her, enough for her to feel me.

Her breath hitches and I don’t miss the way she leans into me. For a second, I almost forget we’re not alone.

“Come eat,” Zane calls, saving us all from me doing something reckless.

The table looks like a postcard from a world that doesn’t exist anymore. A tower of pancakes, maple syrup, chocolate sauce, even whipped cream Zane conjured out of powdered milk.

For one long moment, it feels like Sunday morning in a house full of love instead of guns.

Ivy gasps. “This is insane! Where did you get all this?”

Phoenix smirks. “We’ve been guarding this town a long time. Never got picked clean like the cities. Zane hunts, but we’ve still got stores.”

“Expired stores,” she mutters, eyeing the chocolate syrup.

Zane grins. “Half this stuff is so processed it could survive a nuke. Expiry dates don’t mean shit. But the berries are fresh. There’s a blackberry bramble in the forest over the ridge.”

She digs in, humming when the syrup hits her tongue. That sound nearly drags me to my knees.

The clink of cutlery and plates fills the quiet. Then after a while, Phoenix leans back in his chair, sipping on his black coffee as he watches all of us finish the feast.

Ivy licks a smudge of cream off her finger and says softly, “We should play a game.”

“A game?” I raise a brow, shoving more syrup-soaked pancake in my mouth.