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Then back at me.

“For who?”

“You,” Charm says. “We’re getting it for you.”

Briggs stares at her as if she just started speaking another language.

His eyes slowly move to mine. “Is she fucking serious?”

I sigh. “Unfortunately.”

“We’re buying a house with a guesthouse,” Charm explains, “and you’ll live there so you have your own space, but you’ll still be with us.”

Briggs sets the champagne down.

He looks at me again. The humor has disappeared from his face, exposing something younger and far more vulnerable beneath it.

“You want me to come?”

I cross my arms. “There will be rules.”

“You want me to come.”

“That is what I just said.”

“No, you said there will be rules.”

“Because there will.”

His throat moves. “But I can come.”

I look at my friend, my teammate, and the closest thing Charm and I will ever have to an adopted adult child.

“Yeah,” I tell him. “You’re coming with us.”

Briggs launches himself at me.

I barely get my arms up before he hits me, wrapping himself around my body hard enough to drive me into the counter.

“Get the fuck off me.”

“We’re getting a house!”

“I heard.”

“With a guesthouse!”

“I was part of the planning.”

He releases me, grabs Charm again, and starts jumping with her. “We’re getting houses!”

“We’re getting houses!” she screams back.

They turn another circle in her tiny kitchen while I stand beside the stove holding a spatula and questioning every decision that brought me here.

Briggs reaches for my arm. “Come jump with us.”

“Get the fuck away from me.”