Page 42 of The Live-In Temptation (Steele Brothers of Starlight Cove #2)

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

CHLOE

Atlas’s place was huge and gorgeous and…

not at all what I expected for a former professional football player.

Fairy lights decorated the mantel and the bookcases around it, illuminating the space with a soft glow.

Half a dozen blankets were tossed over a sectional that looked like a cloud, and the room had enough lit candles to hold a séance.

Luna tossed me a knowing smirk as soon as she saw me. “You’re late.”

I shrugged and slipped off my jacket. “Wasn’t sure I was even gonna come, so consider yourself lucky.”

“And you consider yourself lucky you decided to show up,” Sutton said, grabbing my coat and hanging it by the door. “You wouldn’t have liked the other option.”

I eyed the three of them warily. “What was the other option?”

Luna handed over a glass of wine filled to the brim and smiled. “We were going to kidnap you and make you watch The Notebook until you cracked.”

Quinn raised her glass. “No one can hold it together through that heartbreak.”

“Better drink up, babe,” Sutton said, sinking back into the couch and propping her feet on the coffee table. “You’ve got secrets that need prying, and we’re not feeling particularly gentle tonight.”

“What, this wine is supposed to be my lube?”

“Or we have actual lube.” Sutton tipped her head toward a package by the front door. “A whole box of it that Mabel dropped off because the packaging was wrong, but she figured I could use it, ‘what with Atlas’s size and all.’”

I snorted and shook my head. “Oh my god, that woman is a menace . Didn’t anyone tell her what you should and shouldn’t say out loud?”

“Oh, please.” Luna rolled her eyes before pinning me with a look I was very familiar with coming from her. “You love it. And her.”

I pressed my lips together, my attention focused on my wineglass because I was afraid if I met any of their eyes, I’d just burst into tears.

Because, yeah, I loved that ridiculous old woman, and I loved this town and these people and my friends who felt like missing pieces of my heart and the little girl who looked at me like I was her whole world and the man who was the other half of my soul.

But I couldn’t say any of that.

I’d learned a long time ago, it didn’t matter how much I loved something or someone or how badly I wanted to be a part of it. That didn’t mean it would be mine to keep.

“What’s that face all about?” Quinn asked, eyes narrowed on me, doctor mode fully engaged.

Smiling brightly—falsely—I shook my head. “Nothing. Just been a long week.”

“Uh-huh.” Sutton pinned me with a look that said not to test her bullshit meter because I’d fail every time. “And would that long week have anything to do with the fact that we’re watching your heart break in real time?”

I blew out a forced laugh. “I’m fine .”

“You’re not fine,” Luna said, her voice soft but firm. “You’re unraveling. And we’re not going to let you do it alone.”

“She’s right.” Sutton grabbed a cube of cheese and popped it into her mouth before pointing a finger at me. “Time to spill, babe. Tell us what’s going on in that pretty, chaotic head of yours.”

I glanced around at the three of them, all of their attention focused on me. Nowhere for me to run. Nowhere for me to hide. And I realized…I didn’t even want to. Not from this. Not from them.

These women saw me. Not the bright and breezy surface-level Chloe that the world got, but the mess underneath it all. The aching contradiction of a girl who’d never stayed anywhere long enough to need anyone or be needed back, while yearning for that kind of belonging.

I swallowed down half my glass of wine because I’d definitely need the liquid courage. “Emma made me pinkie promise to say goodbye when I leave. Not if— when .”

Without even glancing up, I could feel their gazes on me. Could feel their hearts breaking along with mine even in the silence.

“Are you?” Quinn asked, her voice gentle.

“Am I what?”

“Leaving?”

There was that pit in my stomach again, gnawing and relentless and widening with every second that passed.

“Sedona’s next week.”

“What’s in Sedona?” Sutton asked.

“It’s her reset.” Luna lifted her wineglass to her lips and took a sip, her gaze locked on me. “The only place she’s ever allowed herself to return to.”

I lifted a single shoulder in a shrug, searching for the normal weightless feeling I usually got when thinking about that place.

Instead, I came up empty. “It was where I landed after I left home. I drove until I couldn’t anymore and ended up there.

Found a part of myself I’d been missing my whole life.

” I smiled like I hadn’t ripped open my chest and flashed them all my trauma.

“So now I go back every year on my birthday. My personal little reset button.”

“Sounds nice,” Sutton said.

“It sounds lonely,” Luna cut in, not pulling her punches.

Quinn tipped her head in agreement. “She’s not wrong.”

I didn’t say anything in reply. Because…yeah. That was exactly what it was. My entire life had only ever been lonely.

But I’d found if I ran far enough and fast enough, that loneliness couldn’t catch up to me. Couldn’t suffocate me if I didn’t let it.

And if I chose to be alone on my birthday, it wouldn’t hurt when no one else remembered the day.

“It’s just safer this way.”

“Safer for whom?” Quinn asked.

“Me.” I gave her a forced smile and shrugged. “I’ve always been the girl who leaves before anyone can ask her to.”

Quinn stared at me with something that looked an awful lot like kinship, and Luna gave me that soft, sad smile she’d been sending my way for years.

“But what if no one’s asking you to leave?” Sutton leaned forward, her brows raised. “What if we’re asking you to stay?”

My breath caught in my throat, my eyes burning and my nose stinging for some stupid reason. As if I’d been waiting my whole life to hear those words.

“Not just us,” Luna added, pressing her foot into my thigh. “But everyone in this whole messy, quirky, amazing town. It’s been making room for you since you showed up with glitter trailing behind you.”

I pressed a hand to my chest, attempting to rub away the ache that had settled beneath my breastbone and shook my head. “I don’t know how to stay.”

“I’m pretty sure you can learn.” Sutton tipped her glass of wine toward me. “You’re smart and stubborn and resourceful. Aren’t you the girl who coached a group of middle schoolers through their first roller derby tournament?”

Among other ridiculous things, yes.

“You’ve built something real here, Chloe,” Sutton said. “People are clamoring to get on the wait list for you to host their pleasure parties.”

“You talked the town council into approving a winter dog fashion show and turned it into a coat drive for the shelter,” Quinn added.

“And you got the library to replace small overdue fees with acts of kindness.” Luna raised her brows. “Not to mention the four-year-old who thinks you hung the moon and her daddy who’d give his left nut—and probably his right too—just to call you his. And don’t even try to deny it.”

A lump the size of Arizona lodged itself in my throat, and I attempted to swallow it down. Attempted to shove back those tears threatening to spill over too, but neither was budging.

“And you’ve got us,” Luna said, bumping her shoulder into mine.

For the first time in my life, I felt like maybe I actually did have something.

“I’m just gonna say one more thing, and then I’ll drop it.

” Sutton set her glass on the table and leveled me with her no-bullshit stare.

“Sometimes the thing you think will trap you ends up being exactly what you need to hold you steady. And I’m saying that as someone who also spent her entire life running.

At least until I found a reason to stay. ”