Rachel Ellis had decided that the most ergonomically sound seat in Noah's apartment was not, in fact, any of the furniture.

  Noah sat cross-legged on the couch, sunk deep into the cushions, and Rachel had discovered that the space between his legs—back pressed to his chest, his chin resting on top of her head—was the optimal configuration for existing on a Sunday evening.

  His hands were wrapped loosely around her stomach, holding her in place with warm, comfortable weight. Like he was anchoring her there. Like she might drift away if he let go.

  Rachel leaned back against him, her brain trying to determine if the possessive quality of his grip was deliberate or just gravity doing her a favour. It felt intentional. Purposeful. The kind of touch that said mine without requiring words.

  And if anyone was guilty of developing territorial instincts, it was—alarmingly—probably Rachel herself. More than once recently, she'd had to suppress a deeply primal impulse to leave faint teeth marks on his shoulder. Just to see if they'd stay. To prove he was real and solid and hers in ways that couldn't be argued with.

  Noah had been infuriatingly gracious about her new tactile tendencies, which was rich considering he was the one who'd rewired her brain to make such thoughts possible in the first place.

  The TV played something soft and forgettable—one of those nature documentaries that was more ambient sound than actual content. Every so often, Noah fed her a piece of popcorn without looking away from the screen. A maintenance protocol. Like she was a small creature requiring regular sustenance.

  Rachel accepted each offering with the dignity of a woman being systematically bribed into domestication.

  "You're turning me into a house cat," she murmured around a mouthful of popcorn.

  Noah's chest rumbled against her back—quiet laughter she could feel more than hear. "Good."

  Rachel tilted her head back, looking up at him upside down. Her hair caught on his shirt. "Good?"

  "Cats usually get whatever they want," Noah said, looking entirely too pleased with this logic. "And they sleep eighteen hours a day. You need the practice."

  Rachel scoffed with as much indignation as she could muster while being actively cuddled. "I sleep."

  Noah's hands tightened around her middle—just a squeeze, brief and deliberate, enough to make her breath catch—then relaxed back into their previous position. "Mm."

  Rachel opened her mouth to formulate a reply that would have been wholly inappropriate for a nature documentary about migratory birds, but Noah's phone buzzed on the side table.

  The vibration cut through the comfortable haze instantly.

  She felt Noah's reaction travel through her spine: his arms went rigid, his breathing hitched fractionally. His gaze snapped toward the phone like it had personally threatened him.

  Rachel reached for the remote and paused the documentary. The sudden silence felt too loud.

  Noah picked up the phone with careful fingers. Stared at the screen. The easy warmth of the last hour evaporated like water on hot metal.

  "Question from Mark," Noah said quietly, angling the screen so she could see.

  Mark: Should we prepare one room or two?

  Rachel blinked at the message. It was so normal. Practical. The kind of logistical question a thoughtful host would ask when trying to be accommodating.

  Noah's thumb hovered over the keyboard. She could feel his hesitation in the way his body had gone still against hers—not pulling away, just braced. Waiting for her to make the decision so he didn't have to.

  He started typing.

  Rachel caught the first word forming: Two...

  Something in her chest kicked before her anxiety could weigh in.

  "Give me that," she murmured.

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

  Noah hesitated. "Rae—"

  Rachel reached back and extracted the phone from his hand with efficient shamelessness, bringing it around in front of her like she'd just confiscated contraband. She backspaced over his partial answer and typed quickly.

  One room is fine.

  She didn't hit send.

  The words sat there on the screen, stark and definitive. Rachel stared at them, suddenly hyperaware of the weight she was trying to carry in a single sentence. Her heart was doing something complicated and fast in her chest.

  She lowered the phone but didn't hand it back yet. "Two is fine," she said, voice softer now. More careful. "If you feel strongly about it. I don't want to make this harder for you."

  Behind her, Noah exhaled slowly. His hands slid higher on her stomach—still flat, still warm, anchoring her while he processed.

  "I don't feel strongly," Noah said.

  Rachel narrowed her eyes at the frozen documentary birds on screen. "That answer feels suspicious."

  Noah huffed a soft laugh against her hair. "I'm being serious. I just..." He paused, searching for accurate words. "It's going to be a lot. Being there. The whole dynamic is heavy. I didn't want you to feel trapped in a small room with me and all that tension if you needed space to breathe. I don't want it to be more awkward for you than it's probably going to be."

  Rachel sat with that for a second, her analytical brain parsing the subtext.

  He wasn't worried she would leave. He was worried the sheer atmospheric pressure of the weekend would suffocate her, and he was trying to give her a designated escape route. An emotional airlock.

  She tilted her head back again, finding his eyes. "Noah."

  He looked down, expression guarded but open. Waiting.

  "The truth," she said. "Do you want me in the room with you or not?"

  Noah didn't hesitate this time. "I want you there."

  Rachel looked back at the unsent message. One room is fine.

  It wasn't just fine. The alternative—sleeping down some unfamiliar hallway, separated by walls and the weight of his unspoken history—sounded actively miserable. Space in that house wouldn't be a kindness. It would be an exile.

  "I sleep better when you're there," she murmured, the admission feeling dangerously like handing him a weapon he could use against her if he wanted. "Space isn't going to help me."

  She tapped send before her anxiety could construct a seventeen-point argument for why this was a terrible idea.

  Then she handed the phone back over her shoulder like it might burn her if she held it too long.

  Noah took it. Glanced down. Waited.

  The reply came almost immediately.

  Mark: ??

  Noah stared at it for a beat too long, like he wasn't sure whether to be relieved or mildly insulted by the sheer efficiency of a thumbs-up emoji as a response to something that had felt significant.

  Rachel felt the breath leave him—slow, real. The last of the tension melted out of his arms and he slumped slightly, the rigid line of his shoulders softening back into the couch.

  His hands tightened around her then—firm, warm, possessive in a way that made her stomach flip—pulling her more securely against him.

  Rachel let herself sink into the contact, eyes closing, breathing in the familiar smell of his laundry detergent and whatever it was that made him smell like Noah underneath it.

  Normal. It had all become normal so quickly it was almost frightening.

  "You know," Rachel said softly, "I'm starting to think I'm the dangerous one in this relationship."

  Noah's laugh rumbled underneath her ear. "Starting to think?"

  Rachel huffed. "Don't encourage me."

  "I'm not encouraging," Noah murmured, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. "I'm collecting data."

  Rachel shifted without warning. The movement wasn't subtle or accidental. She turned in his lap—knees sliding to bracket his hips—and in one smooth motion she was facing him, straddling him, the position shifting from cozy to something decidedly more urgent.

  Noah's hands went to her waist automatically, steadying her. His eyes lifted to meet hers, dark and attentive and absolutely aware of what she was doing.

  Rachel's face was warm but she didn't look away.

  "You're too calm about this," she whispered.

  Noah's mouth quirked. "Am I?"

  Rachel leaned in and kissed him, and the conversation ended there.

  Noah kissed her back like he'd been waiting for permission, his hands tightening at her waist, pulling her flush against him with the kind of certainty that made her brain short-circuit slightly. Rachel's fingers threaded into the hair at the nape of his neck, and the world narrowed down to heat and contact and the deeply unhelpful realization that she fit here too.

  When she pulled back just enough to breathe, her gaze didn't stay on his eyes. It dropped, lingering on the line where his shirt collar ended and his shoulder began.

  Exposed skin. Accessible. Tempting in ways that would have embarrassed her a month ago.

  Noah saw the look. Recognized it immediately.

  "Don't you dare," he murmured, his voice dropping into a low, teasing warning.

  Rachel dragged her eyes back up to his, blinking with theatrical innocence. "Don't I dare what?"

  Noah's grip slid down to her hips and tightened fractionally, grounding her against him in a way that made her pulse spike. "You know exactly what."

  Rachel smiled—all sweetness, zero sincerity. She didn't retreat. Instead, she leaned in close, her breath ghosting over the skin she'd been examining with such obvious intent.

  She pressed a kiss there first—soft, deceptive, a promise of good behavior.

  Then she opened her mouth.

  Later—significantly later, when the documentary had been abandoned entirely and they'd relocated to more appropriate furniture for the direction things had taken—Rachel would claim, with grave seriousness, that the faint teeth marks on his shoulder had been a purely practical measure.

  To keep her voice down, obviously.

  Noah, for his part, had the courtesy to laugh about it.

  And the grace not to point out that his apartment had excellent soundproofing and her justification was transparently fictitious.

  He just kissed her temple and pulled her closer, and Rachel decided that maybe being dangerous wasn't such a terrible thing after all.