Page 54 of Break Away
“This house smells like hospital, lemons, and boy.”
Briggs appeared at the end of the hall, visibly trying to arrange his face into a non-overwhelming expression. It was like watching a marching band remember it was inside a library.
Skylar stopped and stared at him. “You’re the goalie.”
Briggs placed one hand over his heart and bowed with disturbing dignity. “Briggs Lawson, emotional backbone of the Fury and victim of your brother’s cleaning regime.”
Skylar looked at me. “He talks like that on purpose?”
“Unfortunately.”
“I like him.”
Briggs’s face lit up. “I have been perceived and accepted.”
“Bring it down,” Ryan called from the kitchen.
Briggs lowered his voice to a theatrical whisper. “I have been perceived and accepted.”
Vivi’s gaze shifted toward him, her hands still tucked inside her sleeves. “Goalies are statistically different.”
Briggs went completely still. The effort it took him not to explode with joy should have earned him community-service credit.
“That is the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.”
Vivi looked at me. “Is he loud?”
“Yes,” I said. “But he’s trying not to be.”
Briggs nodded solemnly. “My volume is under construction.”
“Okay,” Vivi said, and stepped inside.
That one word changed the room. The guys softened without making a show of it, quietly adjusting around her instead. Cade stepped away from the banister to leave a clear path, Rider moved the coffee table farther from the couch, and Ryan collected the empty cups from the island. Briggs remained exactly where he was, vibrating with friendliness without moving closer.
Mom watched all of it.
Nothing got past her. Exhausted or not, she saw the world for what it was and smiled anyway, which was a survival skill and a warning. Her gaze moved from Cade to Rider to Ryan to Briggs before returning to me with one brow raised.
“Well,” she said. “Look at you, training feral athletes into housebroken pets.”
Cade’s mouth twitched. “We prefer domesticated predators.”
Mom’s eyes landed on him, and her whole expression changed with recognition. “Cade Mercer in the flesh.”
He straightened without meaning to, but people did that around her. “Yes, ma’am.”
“So handsome and polite. Unnerving, but in a good way.” She stepped directly into his space like she had decided months ago that he belonged to her in whatever distant, FaceTime-adopted way my friends did. “Come here, honey.”
Before Cade could decide whether old-money emotional repression had a formal response to being called honey by my mother, she wrapped him in a hug.
For half a second, Cade looked like every wealthy defense mechanism in his body had filed a formal complaint. Then his arms came around her carefully, one hand hovering before settling against her back like he wasn’t sure what the rules were but knew refusing would be rude.
Mom patted him once, firm and warm, then pulled back and looked him over the way she had been waiting to do since the first time I lied through FaceTime and told her he was fine.
“I’m glad to finally see you standing in front of me after everything. My son tried to act calm for months, but he worried so hard I started worrying secondhand.”
Cade blinked, something quieter moving through his face. “I’m okay now.”
