Felicity

I wake up Sunday morning in an unfamiliar bedroom with a familiar bulge pressing into my butt cheek and an even more familiar monkey staring into my face.

“Go find some mango,” I tell Loki.

Ares stirs behind me.

After we got caught in the conference room—almost dressed, but obviously behaving in a manner in which hockey players and their teammates’ sisters shouldn’t behave while anywhere inside the arena—Ares got the rest of the day off.

You could say I talked our way out of trouble.

Loki helped.

Sort of.

I still don’t know if I’ll be able to find a job as a physical therapy assistant, but for the first time since I went back to school for the third time, I’m not terrified that I’ll never figure out what I’m supposed to do with my life.

I make people laugh once a week or so at The Laugh Track.

And I make Ares happy.

Amazing how something so simple can make everything okay.

A hand cups my bare breast, and a rough thumb flicks over my nipple. Lips press into that sweet spot where my neck and shoulder meet.

“Morning,” I murmur.

“Mmm,” he answers.

For once, we’re in a king-size bed.

Ares’s bed, to be specific.

In his apartment.

The one he rented just before Nick asked him to keep an eye on me, because he could see where Manning and Gracie’s relationship was going, and he didn’t want to be a third wheel.

Again.

Like he was when his best friend started dating his sister, and then when his twin fell in love a few months later.

Nick didn’t ask if Ares had somewhere else to live.

He just assumed he didn’t.

Everyone underestimates Ares.

We’re six floors beneath Gracie and Manning, in the same building, because even if he didn’t want to be a third wheel, he likes being close to his friends.

He brought me back here yesterday afternoon, and we’ve officially christened every single room.

I roll over in his arms to face him, and kiss along the ridge of his collarbone, because my morning breath is terrible, but I still need to kiss him. “I love you.”

Both our phones are vibrating on the nightstand. Probably half of Ares’s team sending him gifs—that what they do—and probably my friends and my brother and Gammy’s ghost wanting to know why I didn’t stay at the house last night.

He reaches past me—an easy feat with his long arms—and pulls out a drawer in the simple nightstand instead of silencing either of our phones.

He shifts again, this time pressing something into my hand.

Something metal.

Small.

Rigid.

A key.

I pull back so I can see his face, and get a lopsided grin. “Don’t want to forget,” he says.

He’s adorable when he says more than three words at a time. Slow, but sure with each word distinct.

Not that he needs to use lots of words.

He communicates plenty with his actions.

“You want me to move in?” I whisper.

He shakes his head and brushes his thumb over my knuckles. “Use it however you want.”

Every other guy I’ve dated has issued orders.

Move in with me.

Kiss me.

You’re mine.

But Ares?

Ares offers himself first.

I’m yours.

You come first.

You’re welcome in my home anytime you want to be here, for as long or as short as you want to stay.

And he doesn’t make me feel any less wanted.

If anything, he makes me feel treasured and valued.

I’m tearing up again. “Remind me to thank my brother for being an asshole who underestimated your charms.”

He quirks a grin, and a sudden smell hits my nose.

You know the smell.

That smell.

I do my best not to react—god knows Nick singed my nose hairs enough growing up, and I realize this comes with living with a man—but when Ares’s nose twitches and his grin fades, I frown.

He peers at me.

Concerned.

Like maybe I need to reconsider my diet.

“That…wasn’t you?” I ask.

He shakes his head.

Loki shrieks happily out in the living room.

And sheer dread slithers into my belly.

I shoot out of the bed, grab Ares’s T-shirt from last night, and yank it over my head as I’m stalking to the door. I point at him without looking. “Stay off your ankle.”

I stride through the bedroom door, down the short hallway, turn into the light, airy living room, and groan.

Loudly.

Loki chirps again. He claps.

From his perch atop a donkey.

A real, live donkey.

Wearing a unicorn horn.

Standing on the simple brown rug between the sturdy leather couches, which are both angled so everyone can have a great view of the widescreen TV on the exposed brick wall.

The uni-donkey swishes its tail and plods toward me, giving a clear view of the present it left on Ares’s rug.

I groan again.

Louder.

More frustrated.

Ares stops behind me. I feel him there, and a quick glance assures me he’s on his crutches.

“I’m going to kill him,” I declare. “I’m going to fucking kill him.”

“I’m going to help,” Lucy adds.

“Buying the cyanide right now,” Tim agrees.

“Can’t wait to watch,” Harold says.

Ares snickers.

The donkey nudges my hand, and I realize it has something around its neck.

A ribbon.

With a tag.

Like you’d put on a dog.

I pat the donkey’s soft snout and reach for the tag. It’s small. Shaped like a heart.

And it’s inscribed.

To Loki. Love, Uncle Nick.

Ares snickers again.

I look up at him.

He can’t stop grinning.

“This is funny?” I ask.

He nods. “Bergers don’t get mad. We get even.”

I watch him another beat.

His grin’s growing. The wheels are turning.

“Have I mentioned I love you?” I say.

And there goes that smile even wider. “Just wait,” he says.

Like I could love him more.

He eyes my shirt.

The donkey nuzzles my butt.

The monkey tosses donkey poop.

And this is just the start of our happily ever after.