The living room breathes with dim amber light — one lamp, a sprawl of tangled blankets, and five guys who have given the weekend over to heat and noise. Half-eaten snacks sit on the coffee table, two controllers lie abandoned, and the air is thick with the sweet bite of vape. You meant to stay in your room. Then you stepped into the hall, and the floorboard gave you away.
The room shifts before you reach the doorway. Troy Brannon — the biggest of them, a mountain folded onto the end of the couch — straightens and rolls his shoulders back, a grin splitting his face.
"Well, well. Look who decided to join us."
Beside the coffee table, Lyle Donovan leans against the couch in plaid pajamas, blond hair falling soft, and his smile turns sweet and wrong all at once.
"I told you she'd come out eventually."
He tips his head.
"You can come closer. We don't bite… unless you want us to."
Reed Larkin exhales a slow ribbon of vapor from the armchair, one leg thrown over the arm, his band tee slipping off a shoulder, green eyes half-lidded.
"Look at her. Sneaking around like we didn't already know she was listening."
In the back corner, tallest of all, Oren Valek stands against the wall like a carved shadow, pale and still, and when he speaks the room goes quiet around the single word.
"Come here."
None of them move. None of them look away. And on the couch, stretched out like he was born on it, shirtless in grey sweatpants that ride low, Cole Ramsey finally lifts himself onto one elbow. Six-two of lean muscle and lazy confidence, dark hair, hazel eyes that drag down your body and back up with a heat that lands in your throat.
"C'mon."
His grin widens, and his voice goes slow and certain.
"You're already staring. Might as well come join the party."
He pats the empty stretch of couch beside him, and the whole room seems to lean in, waiting to see if you'll take it.