Page 33 of Rule Breakers Fall Hardest

As if to contradict me, the lights flicker.

Rosie lets out a squeak and drops the sheets on the stairs. Hand over her heart, she asks, “Did you see that?”

There’s no sense in lying. “Yeah.”

“I think there are ghosts here. We come in peace. I promise.” She holds her hands together like she’s praying. “Or at least I do. I can’t speak for him.”

I roll my eyes from the bottom of the stairs. “They’re ghosts, not aliens.”

She screams again, pointing an accusing finger at me. “You said it wasn’t haunted!”

I put my hands up and take a step back. “I just meantifthere was something here, it wouldn’t be aliens. You don’t need to say you come in peace.”

“Maybe we made a bad decision with this place.” She scoops up the sheets and continues up the stairs, her head on a swivel.

I reluctantly follow. I need to get my bed ready too, and by bed, I mean a blow-up mattress. Our furniture is being delivered in phases over the coming weeks, thanks to Rosie and her ordering frenzy. She really did a number on my card, but I was an asshole, so I was asking for it.

“You loved it when we toured it.”

She pauses in the hall that stretches in both directions—her room on one end, mine on the other.

“That was before it was dark and empty and creepy.”

I sigh. “I can’t help that. We’re lacking on furniture at the moment.”

“Speaking of furniture.” She holds up a finger, but it gets stuck in the folds of the sheets she’s holding. She flails until her hand is free and wags that finger at me. “I think we should paint before anything else arrives.”

“What’s wrong with the paint?”

She blinks at me, her mouth ajar. Clearly, she thinks my question is ridiculous. “It’s very formal.”

Sure, the colors are pretty dark and rich, but the paint looks fresh, and the colors aren’t hideous. “So?”

“Men,” she mutters with a shake of her head. “I’ll call around and find someone who can do it in the next week or two.”

“I didn’t agree to this,” I remind her.

Adjusting her hold on the sheets, she says, “The sooner you learnhappy wife, happy life, the better.”

With a grunt, I turn toward my room at the end of the hall on my right.

“Go for it, then,” I mutter as I step across the threshold into my room.

I wrestle the sheets onto the blow-up mattress I bought when we stopped at Target on the way over. The furniture in the place I just moved out of belongs to Cree’s parents. His mom did all the decorating, hence the feminine touch, despite it predominately being a bachelor pad.

I’m dropping my pillow onto the mattress when Rosie comes into the room.

“I was thinking pizza for dinner. Are you good with that?”

“Yeah.”

She plants her hands on her hips. “You know, it is possible to reply with more than one word. What toppings do you like?”

“Supreme is fine with me.”

“Perfect.”

She stands in the doorway, watching me expectantly.

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