Page 39 of Crushes and Confections

“Or we could and avoid dishes. My date, my rules,” I said as I crossed my arms and stared him down in challenge. Adrien both loved and hated my stance, but I saw him slowly giving in.

“Okay, what about drinks? Tell me we aren’t just drinking out of cans?” He made it sound like I was asking him to drink from a dog bowl on the floor, and I just knew in that moment that Riley and I would be challenging them as much as they challenged us.

“Now we are,” I sang out. Even as I teased him, I pulled out several cans of soda, bottles of water, and glasses to fill with ice. The relief on his face as he gave me a dry look had me laughing to myself.

“What’s so funny?” Riley asked as he stalked in the door.

“Claire is just torturing me. Apparently, we are eating out of the takeout containers,” he said with a raised eyebrow.

“What else would we do?” Riley asked seriously. Vance chuckled and clapped his husband on the shoulder.

“This is about change, Adrien,” he said gently.

I grabbed a plate out of the cabinet and handed it to him.

“And compromise,” I said. Adrien bent down, brushed a kiss over my forehead, and took it gratefully.

“Thank you, mon chou,” he said before joining Riley in the living room.

“We waited too long. Don’t torture them too much, Ri. Maybe not a Julia Roberts marathon tonight,” I teased. He shot me a glare.

“Don’t act like you don’t love them just as much,” he countered.

“Oh, I didn’t say that,” I promised. “Just that it wouldn’t be the thing for this date.”

“Fair enough,” he sighed. “What do you guys watch?”

Both Vance and Adrien looked at each other for a moment before answering.

“We don’t watch TV often. But we aren’t opposed to watching something with you,” Vance said with a shrug.

“Wait… then what do you do?” Riley asked. “Just eat in silence?”

“No, of course not,” Adrien laughed. “We have music playing usually. And we talk.”

“There’s so much we have to learn about each other still,” I said. “But just wait, the moment you meet the moms, you’ll have our entire life stories, complete with embarrassing stories, our worst moments, and our best. It will be well rounded at least.” There was silence as I took my spot next to Riley on the couch.

“If you’d said this and I hadn’t seen the reaction tonight, I might have thought you were joking,” Vance said as he settled on the floor, Adrien taking the last spot on the couch behind him.

Riley turned on a new action movie as we started diving into our usual orders. Vance dished out Adrien a plate before joining us in eating out of the containers. It was a strange mix of our styles and strangely comforting.

This was the first moment that we’d all been together that I could see the shift. We were no longer just friends or acquaintances, Riley and I had evolved to lovers, and now we were shifting towards being a pack.

“I keep telling her she has to stop looking at us this way,” Adrien noted with amusement. At this point they’d finished too and set the food aside. Vance slowly took the empty box from my hand, and I swallowed hard as tension rose even further between us all.

“Oh, I think Claire here is about to be dessert,” Riley said with an evil laugh. My eyes shot to his in shock and he looked completely here for that plan. In fact, he stood up, went to the kitchen, and returned with a bottle of champagne. “In fact, I think this calls for a bit of bubbly. A little help, alphas?”

Adrien stood and took the champagne, stepping away from us and opening the bottle. My mind was strangely blank as I watched, my attention on them so intense that I could barely think. Even as the glass was pushed in my hand and I took a sip, I was in my own fantasy world of being spread out on the table and devoured.

“Oh, we can make that happen,” Riley said. I gaped in horror at the realization I’d said that out loud. But the others didn’t look upset, in fact, Vance dove in to help as Riley cleared the table, even going as far as wiping it down so it was clean for me.

The three of them kept their eyes on me as they quickly finished the table, and I couldn’t help but shift where I was standing, rubbing my thighs together as I tried to ease the growing need I felt.

“You smell so damn good, Claire,” Vance said with a groan.

He moved to stand in front of me, his hands settling on the soft curves of my hips as he looked down at me with hunger. It was a different side to him than I usually saw, his glasses and sweet inquisitive demeanor replaced with a dominance and need that was solely focused on me in the moment.

“What are you going to do about it, alpha?” I said tauntingly, raising the glass of champagne to my lips and taking a drink.

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