Cypress stretched before shaking out his head and looking around. “Better, lighter, as if everything’s flowing right inside now or whatever.”
“So we answered the riddle then!” Teak exclaimed, hugging him.
“No,
we
didn’t,” Cypress whispered, coming around the counter and plucking me off Aspen’s lap. “
She
did.”
I talked with Aspen and Teak on the side, and given Cypress’s issues and condition, we agreed it best that he crash with me until we got him back to normal. Plus, maybe it was what we needed? But it was
really
weird sleeping with a boy in my bed.
Especially one who liked to have his head buried between my legs any time we were horizontal.
Not that I complained about waking up that way. Or going to sleep that way, to be honest.
It was just a
slight
change from normal.
After the first time, I gestured him to move up the bed by me again and rolled us over. Once I’d heard what he’d been through trying to help me, talking with Aspen, and Teak—I’d decided to forgiven them after having a bit to think about it.
“Do you accept my offer now?” I whispered as I straddled his body. “I forgive all of you. Will it just be us and no one else ever? I get you guys are a package deal, but I don’t share with other women, so I need to make that clear and know now if that’s okay and I’m enough.”
“I accept and you’re
more
than enough,” he growled, pulling my head down to his. I rode him as a
good morning,
and then we played some more in the shower. By the time Teak and Aspen came over to start plotting the next step in plan
clean up Cara’s life,
the two of us were all smiles, and we told them what we’d discussed.
The two of them were
thrilled
they both agreed just the four of us, no other women ever. And that thrilled
me
.
The next day Teak and I worked on getting a book done while Aspen and Cypress handled other
shit
. Yeah, it was best to leave it at that because in my opinion they were handling a steaming pile of crap so why not call it what it was. But I had the best part, which was calling my parents any
lying
through my goddamn teeth to them. Fortunately I’d decided to take the easier upfront and more painful later approach and pretend to call them as I was driving to the airport.
It was the only way I could figure out how to do this without them getting on a plane to meet me for my fake brain surgery. Needless to say they freaked, but at least I got them to calm down enough that they let me get on my pretend plane when I got to the airport I wasn’t going to and promised the hospital had their numbers and the moment I was up I’d call them and let them know when I’d be home and they could meet me here.
When I hung up the phone, I stared at it a moment before setting it down. “Aspen?”
“Yeah, hon?”
“You can fix walls easily, right?”
“Yeaaaah—why?”
“No reason,” I lied, thinking what was one more after telling that many. I walked out to the garage, picked up my old softball bat, and started swinging. They let me go for about five minutes before Cypress came up behind me and wrapped his arms over mine and made me drop the bat.
“I know, I know,” he cooed as I sank against him, falling to my knees.
“No, no, you don’t
know
. I can’t ever take back what I’ve just done,” I sobbed, curling up against him. “They’re so scared, and I gave them
nothing
. No doctor to check up on, they don’t even know the hospital. They’re in the dark. We have to give them something to verify or research that’s real for when I pretend wake up. This is going to be torture for them. My whole family. We didn’t think enough of this through. We have to do better.”
“Okay, we will. I’ll call the attorney and get more,” Aspen agreed, squatting down in front of me. “Maybe we’ve got an elf who’s out here like us that can vouch for the whole thing.”
And that turned out to be exactly what saved our asses. Some bigwig at a fancy New York private hospital was an elf. He rigged the whole thing with their attorney guy and made it look like he got wind of the malpractice mistake and added it to the hospital’s teaching budget so poor, poor me didn’t have to wait for insurances and bullshit red tape to get a tiny tumor removed and wait for it to turn into a big tumor that could end my life. It also helped explain all the last minute rushing.
So when my parents showed up a few days after I supposedly got home, we were ready.
Except they wanted to tell them I was dating all of them.
“
Abso-fucking-lutely not
!” I exclaimed, my eyes going wide. “We are not giving my
conservative
parents heart attacks that I’m dating the
three
men next door. There’s enough we’re dropping on them. I’d prefer not tell them anything.”
“No, you’re in a relationship now, you have to admit to that,” Aspen argued, crossing his arms over his chest. “At least pick one of us to introduce. It’s the only way to explain all of our involvement in this.”
He did have a point there. But then that brought up another problem.
“Fine,” I ground out, waiting for them to ask.
“Which one of us will you pick?” Teak asked, practically batting his eyelashes at me.
Yup, there it was.
“You’re not going to like my answer,” I chuckled as I shook my head, knowing it without even thinking.
“Just tell us already,” Cypress mumbled, looking away. He was already doing much better, but still, at times, he tended to overreact and seemed to be hurt like that kid who was always left out at gym class picking teams, which I would understand if we ever
not
picked him.
Which we did.
I glanced at Aspen. “My dad will hate me dating you. You’re too intense. He will take that as you hiding something. You’re also argumentative, and he’s boss. It’s too volatile of a combo.” Then I looked at Teak. “And he will chew you up and spit you out. While I love your free spirit and playful nature, he will not see you as the type of man’s man who should take care of his daughter.”
“But you don’t need to be taken care of,” Teak argued, glancing at his friends.
“Not the point. Welcome to the ways of the old school mind. I’m a female. I must be
someone’s
responsibility.” I smiled at Cypress. “So, wanna be my boyfriend and meet my parents? We have to give you a last name though.”
Yeah, I’d learned that one too. They didn’t have them in elf society. They were like
ancient
in that way, he was Cypress son of… Someone.
“We use Greene in our documentation,” he chuckled, sliding his arm around my waist. “I’ve never met anyone’s parents before. What do I do?”
“Keep it cool. I’m just going to slid it in there later when the time’s right after the whole
brain
tumor
thing shock has calmed down and they see we’re fine.” I glanced at Teak and Aspen all the blood leaving my face. “Oh fuck. You guys, shit, you can’t, you know, when they’re here.”
“This is rich,” Aspen drawled, catching on while Teak blinked at me, completely clueless. “They’re homophobic.”
“No, my mom isn’t,” I sighed, covering my hands over my face, mortified. “
She
doesn’t care in the slightest. She’s just not a fan of PDA from anyone. My
dad
is and he
hates
PDA. I think it’s more that he doesn’t care about who’s with who, and he’s tired of everyone talking about it and it being a
thing
than he’s homophobic, but no, I don’t think he’s ever had a gay friend ever. If you said in conversation you were gay, he wouldn’t freak out and tell you that you were going to hell.
“He’d probably change the topic. We’re Chicagoans. We don’t really care. But if he walks in on some of the things
I
walked in on when we met, he will have a heart attack.”
“Chill, Cara,” Aspen chuckled, understanding better now as he held his hands out in front of him. “We don’t normally behave like that. I mean, we know how to keep our hands to ourselves. We had to for years at the castle. We did that because we wanted you in our bed.”
“Plus we’d never had the chance to be free and open with each other before until we moved here so we went a little overboard.” Teak smiled widely at that as if he’d been a dirty, dirty boy or something.
Hey, whatever made them happy and didn’t end up with my parents walking in on him giving someone head was
great
. And we had a plan, which was
really
great. My parents came later that day, we had dinner—all of us—even though I could see they were confused as to why the guys next door were there, until we realized we’d forgotten one
huge
part of our story.
“It’s just weird,” my dad muttered as he stared at the guys while they cleaned up the dishes. “They all look alike but not really.”
“Oh, come on, Dad,” I snickered, setting down my fork. “How many photos do I have with girls I went to school with that we’re about the same height, build, blonde hair, and blue eyes? They grew up together. It’s no big deal. You’re making it a thing.”
“True,” he hedged.
“You just notice it so much more because they’re
gorgeous
,” my mom hissed, and I couldn’t help but notice Aspen’s lips twitch.
“Where did you guys say you were from again?” my dad asked as all the blood drained from my face. They hadn’t said and even worse, we hadn’t planned on answer that.
“Washington,” I answered, but so did they.
“California,” Aspen tried.
“Texas,” Teak blurted.
Him
I shot a nasty look. He
had
to pick fucking Texas. In a room full of Chicagoans.
Really?
Cypress’s eyes went wide from behind my parents’ backs, and I realized he was the only smart one who’d kept his mouth shut. Thank fuck because explaining three answers was going to be hard enough.
“So which is it?” my father asked darkly, scooting back his chair so he could see all of us.
“We were talking schools so you got both answers,” I chuckled as my heart raced, thinking quick on my feet. “Washington, California, but then they went to Texas State, though you went to high school in Washington and your guys’ town was just outside of it, right?” I focused on Cypress since he didn’t answer at all. My parents glanced at him and then back to me as if wondering why I would look at him.
Yes, it was a horrible time to bring
that
up, but if anyone knew of a better distraction, I was all ears.
“Oh—
oh
,” my mom breathed. “Well, that explains a lot.”
“He couldn’t have dinner with us by himself?” my father drawled, shooting me a disapproving glance. “He had to bring his friends for backup to meet us?”
“Wait, what did I just miss?” Cypress hedged, his gaze darting around the room.
“I just told them we were dating, hon,” I chuckled and then focused on my dad. “There’s a lot going on, and it’s Aspen’s cousin who’s the lawyer who helped saved your daughter, so I thought you’d like to get most of this from him firsthand after I get too tired and go to bed. This isn’t normal meet the boyfriend time. I just had brain surgery and he lives next door. So tension is high, cut him some slack. He’s also not been the normal boyfriend on this.”
Dad glanced between us. “How so?” Then he hissed as the table moved.
“We read online what type of effect besides weight loss this type of tumor could have on her. Take the damn hint and shut up.” He nodded and I had a feeling my mom meant throwing up and stuff, but I hadn’t, but okay. If they wanted to think Cypress was a great boyfriend because he’d been cleaning up my puke and holding my hand while I’d been sick, well, yeah, I’d told enough lies, why not let that one slide.
But needing the subject change backfired.
“I’m surprised you’re friends with Texans,” my mom chuckled.
Yeah, kinda like that.
“They just went to Texas State,” I reminded her, standing to get dessert out of the fridge. I glanced at Teak as I did, and mouthed,
I’m going to kill you
.
“Everyone has to unfortunately pass through there now and again,” my father commented, setting his napkin on his plate. “I went to boot camp there when I was in the Army. Hotter than Hell and they say Chicago is Hell on Earth. I swear those people read their Bibles upside down or something as they pretend to know so much.”
And that was why I was going to beat Teak. I didn’t get to explain it to him until after my parents were gone and the visit was over and they were happy I was fine, going to live, and happy I was with Cypress.
Yeah, that one shocked me too.
“Okay, so what was so wrong with what I said?” Teak asked about five minutes after they were gone. “So your dad doesn’t like Texas? I picked a bad place.”