I slam the door of my car and rush up the driveway in the rain, trying not to spill my coffee or slip and bust my ass. Panting as I reach the front porch, I flip back the hood of my jacket, dancing in place to shake off some of the rain.
I’ve been up since 5:00 a.m., too wired to sleep—which is crazy because, by all rights, I should be dead to the world. Alcohol and orgasms are a heady combination. Enough to knock me out cold after three rounds last night—twice at the party and once in the shower when we got home.
Apparently, they’re just not enough to keep me asleep. Not when the sky is falling, and I may lose my title as an honorary Ray.
I slipped naked out of Ryan’s bed, threw on some workout clothes, and high-tailed it over here. I need answers. And advice. And to be talked off this ledge…or maybe pushed. No one is better at talking me off ledges than Rachel.
I dig in the pocket of my raincoat, fishing out my keys, and let myself into the house. It’s the work of moments to pop in the code to disable their alarm system. Then I’m rushing up the stairs, determined to do a proper freakout session with my best friend.
The dog barks, meeting me in the hallway with alarm that quickly morphs into delight. I march right past all the closed bedroom doors, heading straight for the master bedroom.
“Rach, girl, I need to talk to you,” I cry, pushing on the half-open door.
Jake and Rachel are curled up together at one end of their double king bed. He’s on the end, facing in towards her, being the big spoon. Ilmari is stretched out across the other king. Caleb is nowhere to be found.
“Rach,” I say again. “I need you.”
Jake bolts up in the bed. “Tess?” he says, his voice scratchy.
“I need to talk to Rachel,” I say, shucking off my wet raincoat and dropping it to the floor.
Ilmari groans something in Finnish, rolling to his side.
“What time is it?” Rachel asks.
“Early,” I reply, kicking off my shoes. “Like, not even 7:00 a.m.”
Rachel grabs Jake’s arm, checking the time on his Apple watch. She whimpers, pressing her face deeper into the pillow. “Tess, no. My alarm was going off in fifteen minutes.”
“Everything okay?” Jake says at me, rubbing a tired hand over his face.
Rachel elbows him. “Don’t ask her that. Now we’ll never get her out of here.”
“Hey, it could be important,” he counters.
“No, it’s about sex,” she replies. “Frantic texts and phone calls are for work emergencies. Late-night whine and cheese sessions are for family stuff. Early morning freak-outs are only ever about Tess thinking with her vagina instead of her head.”
“Rude,” I say at her, one hand on my hip. “Don’t act like you know me.”
She sighs, sitting up in the bed, propped against her pillows. She’s wearing a cute little silk nightie, blue with pink lace. “Tell me I’m wrong,” she says through a yawn, her fingers brushing Jake’s hair back from his brow. “Is this or is this not about your greedy little kitty scratching up the wrong tree last night?”
“Rakas, take her downstairs,” Ilmari mutters, his face still buried under a pillow.
“No, it’s cold down there,” I say, hurrying over to his side of the bed. Grabbing the covers, I flip them back to expose his freaking awesome back tattoo and his pearly white derrière. “Mars, scooch ov—mygod! Why are you naked?”
Mars snatches the blankets as Jake and Rachel laugh. “It’s my bed,” he barks.
“God, I’m not getting under there with you naked,” I huff.
“Good.”
I snatch the little knit throw blanket off the end of the bed and use that to cover my legs as I take up the spot next to Mars on top of the covers. “Where’s Caleb?” I say, glancing around.
“He wanders in and out,” Rachel says with another yawn.
“How did you even get in here?” Mars asks.
“I used my key,” I reply setting my coffee down on the side table.
“And how did you get a key?”
“Because I gave it to her, remember?” Rachel replies, her hand reaching out to pet his hair too.
He scoots closer to her. “How did she disable the alarm—”
“Oh my god, officer, I confess, alright?” I say, throwing up both hands in mock surrender. “I broke in through a window, ducked the net of laser beams, and disabled the alarm by cutting the blue wire.”
“Hey, I’ve seen that movie,” Jake teases.
“What the hell is going on in here?”
We all turn to see a very naked Caleb standing in the doorway.
“God,” I cry, my hand going up to cover my eyes. “Do none of you have clothes?”
He saunters up to the other side of the bed, leaning down to kiss Jake, then across him to kiss Rachel. “What is Tess doing here at 6:30 a.m.?”
“Girl gossip,” Jake replies as Rachel says, “Vagina monologues.”
Jake tosses him a pillow and he casually holds it in front of his naked lower half. “I need to get ready for work,” he says at his partners.
“Mars and I don’t need to be in until nine,” Jake replies.
“I’m going in at eight,” Rachel adds.
“That doesn’t mean I need to suck my own dick in there, does it?” Caleb replies, gesturing to the bathroom.
Rachel just sighs. “Seriously, Cay?” At the same time, I cry, “God, I’m sitting right here.”
“Well, I’m interested,” Jake says, his tone brightening. “But…” He glances dramatically from me back to Caleb.
“I’m sure Tess won’t mind if I fuck my husband in my own shower, in my own house, behind a closed door,” Caleb replies with a roll of his eyes.
“No, I’m interested in her vagina monologue,” Jake admits.
Rachel laughs and it’s my turn to roll my eyes. “You can feel free to leave at any time,” I say at them both. “I really only need Rachel here to witness my humiliation.”
“Well, now I’m definitely not leaving,” Jake replies, tugging Caleb down onto the bed next to him.
“I have to get ready,” Caleb huffs at him.
“Five minutes, and then we’ll do a speed round,” Jake tosses out as a compromise. “Tess, you’ve got five minutes. Go.”
Rachel, Jake, and Cay all look to me.
“I—can’t—Rach, I need to know how well you know Shelby,” I get out at last.
“Pretty well, I guess,” she says with a shrug. Then she flashes me a look of horror. “Wait—ohmygod, what did you do?”
“What?” I cry, feigning indignation.
“You only do morning freak outs when you’re regretting last night. I know you fucked someone inappropriate, and now you’re asking me about Shelby and—oh, holy fuck, was it Sully?”
“No,” Jake gasps dramatically, his hand going over his mouth.
Rachel looks ready to implode. “Tess, I swear to God—”
“Ew, gross,” I shout over her. “No! He’s like obnoxiously happily married and he wears socks with sandals. Are you kidding me?”
“Hey, I wear socks with sandals,” Jake counters.
“We all do,” Caleb adds.
“If you need a reason to hate him, how about because his favorite ice cream flavor is Rocky Road?” Jake offers. “I mean, honestly, it’s criminal.”
But Rachel is looking at me. “If not Sully, then who did you—”
“She fucked Langers,” Caleb says, his eyes on Jake’s phone.
It’s my turn to gasp, peering around the other two at him. “How did you know?”
“Because your mutual attraction is as subtle as a goal horn,” Ilmari says next to me, his face still buried in the pillows by Rachel’s side. He’s shifted a little so now he has a large arm slung over her hips.
“Hooooly shit,” Jake says. “Tess, do you have a thing going with Langley? Isn’t he like ten years younger than you?”
“Age is just a number,” Caleb replies. “He’s hot and she’s horny.”
“And you can go drown in the shower,” I snap at him.
“They’ve had a thing since beach day, way back before you and I were even a thing,” Rachel says at Mars, still petting his hair.
He just makes a grunt sound, curling in closer to her.
“Wait, now I’m confused,” says Jake. “What does Shelbs have to do with any of this?”
I groan, giving Rachel a sheepish look.
Her smile falls, replaced with resignation. “Oh, seriously, what the fuck did you do?”
“Nothing…too terribly bad,” I hedge. “I just need to know if you’ll ask Shelby a favor for me.”
“Tess, just spit it out,” she replies.
“Yeah, I’m losing interest in this fast,” Jake mutters.
“We could already be fucking,” Caleb says at him. “You have no one to blame but yourself.”
“Fine,” Jake huffs. “Tess, tell us what you did last night, or I’m gonna give Cay a handy right here on the bed.”
Taking a deep breath, I look to Rachel and try to get it all out in one go. “I need you to ask Shelby if the camera in the nursery records, or if it’s just live action. And if it is recording, I need you to ask her to just go ahead and erase everything from last night without watching any of it. Okay? Cool. Bye.”
I try to launch off the side of the bed, but Rachel throws herself over Ilmari, snatching at my arm. “Oh, no you don’t,” she cries, jerking me back.
“Ouch—shit—”
Beneath us, Ilmari grunts.
“In the nursery, Tess?” Jake says, his tone laced with disappointment. “Where Baby Josh sleeps?”
“Hey, he wasn’t in there,” I huff. “And it was either that or we do it in the little girl’s room where Drunk Cleopatra was already passed out, or in the guest room where two of your teammates were Eiffel towering your—” My words stop as I realize I was about to give away one of their colleagues.
Jake looks shocked. “How did I miss all this?”
“Because you were too busy outside playing with your hook,” Caleb deadpans from his side.
“Oh, right.”
“Who did you say was Eiffel towering whom?” Caleb asks, moderately curious now.
But Rachel sits forward, saving me from answering. “Wait…Tess,” she says in warning. “Langley? You really went there with him?”
I shrug. “Yeah, I think we were kind of inevitable, you know? Our chemistry is great—”
“Tess,” Rachel says again. “Have you at least told him everything? Does he know about Troy and the pictures and all of it?”
“He knows everything,” I reply with a solemn nod. “I couldn’t lie to him, Rach. I couldn’t hide it. He deserved to know.”
“And he’s…okay with it all?” she asks, one dark brow raised.
“Langers is cool,” Caleb replies for me. “He’s not the kind of guy to let a little psycho ex drama stand in his way.”
“Yeah, he may be a forward, but he’s got the heart of a defenseman,” Jake adds. “In fact, I think he played D for a while in Junior League.”
“If you came here expecting me to play the Tess card, I’m not gonna do it,” Rachel says, crossing her arms in defiance.
“Wait, what’s the Tess card?” Jake asks, glancing between us.
“It’s where Tess makes me channel all her nastiest thoughts and spit them out at her like some kind of mean, painfully poignant truth-teller,” she replies.
“Rach, you’re my mirror,” I beg. “I need you to give me the hard truths. It’s the only way I can keep perspective.”
“No, it’s the only way you keep yourself locked into this delusion that you only deserve shitty things,” she counters. “And I’m not doing it.”
“I feel like I’m missing so much right now,” says Jake, his gaze darting between us.
“Tess’s brain is at war with her heart, which has been hijacked by her vagina,” Caleb summarizes for him. “She wants Rachel to dunk her heart and her vagina in an ice bath so her brain can take charge again.”
Rachel snorts. “Honestly, I think I prefer his way. We’ve got bags of ice and a tub big enough to dunk you. Wanna try that?”
“No thanks,” I mutter, crossing my arms. “Come on, please,” I beg. “Just a taste. I’m free-falling over here.”
“No,” she says more vehemently this time. “I’m not going to hurt your feelings and make you question things with Langley. You two are good together—”
“God, you’re useless,” I cry, slipping off the side of the bed. “The one time I need you to catch me as I fall, and you’re just gonna cross your arms and watch me go splat?”
“Falling for a guy and falling to your death are not the same things,” she counters. “That the sensations are similar for you is what we called trauma, Tess. If you’re not ready to be with Ryan, be a big enough person to tell him that. I really don’t want to see either of you get hurt.”
I stare at her wide-eyed before I slowly shake my head. “Who are you, and what have you done with Rachel Price?”
She just shrugs, a little smile on her face. “I did my own free-falling recently…or hadn’t you noticed,” she adds, gesturing to the pile of men around her.
“Married happy Rachel is a total buzz kill,” I say, snatching my coffee off the side table. “I’m leaving before whatever infection you have spreads to me.”
“Wait—what do you want me to do about Shelby?” she calls.
“Umm, nothing.” I slip on my shoes. “Forget about it. I’ll take care of it.”
“Tess…”
“Really, it’s fine,” I say, ducking down to pick up my rain jacket. “Lots to do today. See you later Price family—”
“Tess,” Ilmari calls softly, stopping me in my tracks as I reach the door.
I turn and glance over my shoulder, one hand braced against the doorway.
He’s sitting up in the bed now, naked to his waist, his blond hair a mess around his shoulders. He holds my gaze, those steely blue eyes boring into me. “You came here looking for advice. Will you hear mine?”
I hold my breath, hand holding tight to the door. His partners all look to him too, waiting for him to speak. Moments tick by as he just looks at me. Finally, I raise a brow at him and nod.
“Life is short.”
I wait for him to say more, but he doesn’t. As per usual, he doesn’t need to. “Right. Thanks, Mars,” I say, tears in my eyes.
I turn away from the vision of all four Prices happy in their marriage bed. Life is short, and they’re choosing to live it to the fullest. But I don’t have Rachel’s strength…and she doesn’t have my baggage.
I know what my advice is, even if Rachel won’t say it for me. My advice is that I should let Ryan go. My advice is that my life is messy and complicated and Ryan deserves better. My advice is good. My advice keeps me safe. I know it’s my advice I should take.
So you tell me why I’m marching out of this house, phone in hand, ready to dial Ryan and tell him to be naked and waiting in the shower by the time I get home. Life is short, and I feel like doing some more free-falling before it ends.
