Page 149 of Silver Sweet

I ignore the rush of nerves. “Yeah. It’s not like this is my first time. Okay, I know exactly what’s about to happen.” I take a tight breath. “I want it to happen.”

I want to be closer to him.Deeper.And I hate the feeling of stalling out.

I hate the idea that we might backslide.

Beckett takes a seat beside Charlie and stares at the floor in thought. “Maybe you should call Moffy.” He’s our oldest male cousin.

Maximoff Hale might not be a Cobalt, but he’s like the big invinciblebrother to all of us, and for me, he’s more. When he came out as bi to the whole family…I still remember that Christmas at the lake house. Still remember being ten years old and feeling so overwhelmed knowing this cousin, the one I had stars in my eyes around, wasn’t so different from me.

I wasn’t so alone, and I knew, right then, that I’d always have Moffy to run to for advice. For things I didn’t want to go to mydad for. Moffy never makes anything clinical or embarrassing—he’s just fucking cool.

And I have gone to him. Especially when I was younger.

“I’m older and more experienced,” I tell Beckett. “I don’t need to call Moffy for sex advice like I’m sixteen. Even this conversation is more than I really need.” I extend my arms. “Most people do not openly tell their brothers they’re about to fuck their drummer. Okay, I amsharingmore than I frankly should.”

Charlie is staring at the same spot on the floor as Beckett.

I frown at the dead silence. Ben looks around at all of us, and Eliot shrugs at me when I slip him my confusion. He has no answers to the weird quiet. Maybe we’re just too used to vicious back-and-forths.

It feels more normal when Charlie looks up at me and says, “Then go get fucked.”

I flip him off. “I will.”

“Be careful,” Beckett says. “Make sure he uses lube.” That off-handed comment actually roasts my neck.

I put a confident palm to my chest. “I have more experience in this than all of you, thank you. I will be more than fine. Appreciate the concern, but I have to call him now.” I wave my phone and make a quick exit.

Beckett leaves the room seconds after I do. When I check over my shoulder, our eyes meet in the hall for a brief moment, and there is a struggle in his expression I can’t make sense of. He’s the most stoic of my brothers, at times too hard to read. If his emotions were strings, he’d clip all the frayed ends and retighten them until he can’t even breathe.

I don’t know why he’s like that. It seems like an awful way to live.

“I’ll be okay, Beckett Joyce,” I assure. “I know you might not trust Phoenix, but I trust him more than I’ve ever trusted a drummer, a friend, a hookup. He won’t hurt me, dude.”

He nods and says a quiet, “You need any of us, just call. We’ll be here.”

35

TOM COBALT

“You’re serious?” Phoenix asks when I call him in my bathroom. I have him on speaker while I wash my face.

“Yeah, I think having sex will help us finish out the album.”

His next long pause has me circling exfoliator more aggressively on my jawline.

It feels like a solid millennium passes before he speaks. “And what if it doesn’t help?”

“I’ve thought about thatwhat if, and I am willing to be wrong.” I bend over the sink basin and splash water on my face. “Don’t you think it’s worth trying anyway?”

“I don’t need a reason to fuck you other than I want to,” Phoenix says. “I’ve been willing to take the gamble, man. I just don’t want you to regret it.”

“I won’t,” I promise as water droplets track down my face. I stare at the phone, waiting for his response. “Phoenix?” My pulse spikes. “I want to, but I’m not going to beg?—”

“I’m not asking you to beg,” he cuts in fast. “Come over to my apartment. We can work on the last song here. Okay?”

It’s the first time I’ve been invited there. Nothing Personal is on tour, which means all of his roommates are gone. He has the whole apartment to himself.We’llhave it to ourselves.

“Sounds like a plan.”