Four Of A Kind - Chapter 172: [3.74] 3:27 AM

Chapter 172: [3.74] 3:27 AM

The ceiling was doing that thing again where it became more interesting than sleep.

I blinked at the plaster, my brain firing on maybe two cylinders. The guest suite at Valentine Manor was too quiet. No traffic noise. No Mrs. Delgado yelling at someone through the walls. Just silence that felt wrong.

My eyes drifted closed.

Then opened.

The door was cracked. Just slightly. A sliver of hallway light cutting across the carpet.

I didn’t remember leaving it open.

I turned my head on the pillow, groggy as hell, my thoughts moving like honey in winter.

Someone was in my bed.

Purple eyes stared at me from inches away. Wine-red hair spilled across white sheets. Soft curves pressed against my side under the blankets.

“Finally,” she breathed. “You woke up, baby.”

My brain stuttered. “Who—”

Her finger pressed against my lips. Warm. Soft.

“Shh.” She shifted closer. “Don’t ruin it.”

Her other hand slid into my hair. Gentle strokes that made my eyes want to close again. Made my body go liquid under her touch.

Then she leaned in.

Her lips caught mine. Slow. Sweet. The kind of kiss that melted through your chest and pooled somewhere dangerous.

I didn’t think. Didn’t question. Just kissed her back.

She tasted like strawberries and something floral. Her mouth moved against mine like she’d been waiting weeks to do this. Months maybe.

“Mm,” she hummed against my lips.

Heat bloomed through my entire body. That fuzzy, drunk feeling that had nothing to do with alcohol. I cupped her face. Angled deeper. She sighed into my mouth, pleased.

When she pulled back an inch, she was smiling.

“So cute,” she whispered.

“I’m not cute.”

“You are. When you’re half-asleep.” Her thumb traced my jawline. “When your guard’s down.”

She kissed me again. Harder this time. Her weight shifted, and suddenly she was on top of me, straddling my hips. The blanket fell away.

She wore silk. Something thin and burgundy. I could feel everything.

My hands went to her waist automatically. Slid up her sides. She arched into the touch, her breath hitching. When her tongue slipped between my lips, my brain shorted out completely.

I kissed her deeper. Pulled her closer. My hands drifted lower, tracing the curve of her spine, then lower still.

I squeezed.

She moaned into my mouth. “Naughty.”

Her hips rolled. Slow. Grinding down against me. Against the very obvious reaction my body was having to all of this.

“Oh.” Her face flushed. “That’s.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be.” She bit her lip. Moved again. “That’s. Wow.”

Her hands braced on my chest. She kissed my neck, her breath hot against my skin. “You’re hiding a monster down there, aren’t you?”

Blood rushed south so fast I got dizzy.

“Cassidy,” I tried.

She pulled back. Looked at me with those purple eyes. “Cassidy?”

Her wine-red hair rippled. Shifted. The color lightened to rose-gold. The length stayed the same but the style changed. Twin tails appeared. Pink ribbons.

Harlow’s bright smile replaced Cassidy’s smirk.

“Harlow?” I breathed.

“Maybe.” She tilted her head. “Or maybe.”

The hair darkened again. Pulled back into a severe ponytail. Her expression cooled. Sharpened.

Vivienne stared down at me with calculating purple eyes.

“Vivienne?”

“Wrong again.” Her voice shifted. Became softer. Dreamier.

The ponytail loosened. Fell in waves around her shoulders. Her expression went neutral. Unreadable.

Sabrina’s half-lidded gaze studied me like I was a book she was deciding whether to finish.

“Sabrina?”

She leaned down. Her lips brushed my ear.

“Tell me, darling.” Her voice dropped to something dark and sweet. “Which one do you want to put a baby in?”

My eyes went wide.

She smiled against my neck. “Which sister gets to keep you?”

I sat up so fast I nearly headbutted her.

Except there was no one there.

My guest room was silent. Empty. Cool air from the vent brushed against my damp skin. Outside, moonlight cast long, distorted shadows across the expensive rug.

My door was closed. Locked. Exactly how I’d left it before crashing.

The digital clock on the nightstand glowed.

3:27 AM.

I sat there. Breathing hard. Staring at absolutely nothing.

What a weird fucking dream.

My heart was trying to escape through my ribcage. My body was still catching up to reality. Still convinced for several very awkward seconds that yes, one of the Valentine sisters had been on my lap asking which one I wanted to impregnate.

I dragged my hands down my face.

“Jesus Christ.”

My phone sat on the nightstand. Silent. No emergency texts from Iris. No middle-of-the-night summons from any of the sisters.

Just me. Alone. Having the world’s most inappropriate sex dream about my employers.

Plural.

Because my subconscious apparently couldn’t pick just one.

I flopped back onto the mattress. Stared at the ceiling again. It offered no guidance. Just expensive plaster and recessed lighting that probably cost more than my car.

The dream replayed itself. Frame by frame. Her lips on mine. Her weight on my hips. The way she’d said baby like it was my actual name.

Which one had it been at the start?

I tried to reconstruct the details. The wine-red hair catching moonlight. Those purple eyes. The way she’d positioned herself—confident? Nervous? Testing boundaries?

But dream logic was liquid mercury. Every time I reached for specifics, they slipped through my mental fingers and scattered into four different reflections. The hair darkened to Sabrina’s depth, then lightened to Vivienne’s rose-gold. The boldness was pure Cassidy until it softened into Harlow’s warmth. The voice that whispered in my ear changed pitch and cadence like a radio scanning frequencies.

One girl. Four girls. A shifting composite that refused to settle into a single shape.

I scrubbed my face again. Harder this time, like I could physically erase the memory through friction alone.

“Get it together, Angelo.”

My body had other ideas. Biology was a stubborn opponent with very vocal opinions about silk pajamas and thighs straddling hips and hands that knew exactly where to slide along ribs and lower back. My brain could rationalize all it wanted. The rest of me had felt that weight and wanted it back.

I threw off the covers. The cool air hit sweat-dampened skin but did nothing for the fever running underneath.

Too hot. Way too hot for a February night in a mansion with climate control that probably cost more per month than my rent.

Cold shower. That was the obvious solution. Stand under freezing water until every hormone retreated in self-defense and my brain regained enough blood flow to think clearly.

Except.

I sat on the edge of the bed instead. Elbows on my knees. Head in my hands. Staring at hardwood floors that probably came from trees older than me.

The question echoed in the dark.

Which one do you want?

The question followed me even awake.

Did I have an answer?

Cassidy. Who fought everything but trusted me with her textbooks and her failures. Who’d grabbed my shirt tonight and thanked me for existing.

Harlow. Who made blanket forts with Iris and laughed without holding anything back. Who texted heart emojis like they meant something.

Vivienne. Who’d washed dishes badly in her kitchen and turned off her tablet mid-email to have an actual conversation. Who’d asked me to tomorrow’s party as something other than staff.

Sabrina. Who fell asleep on my shoulder in libraries and told me stories about her father. Who counted cards and played games with rules only she understood.

All four. Completely different. Exactly the same.

I wanted to punch something.

Instead I stood. Walked to the window. The Japanese garden stretched below, all shadows and moonlight on stone. The koi pond reflected the sky.

This was Sabrina’s garden. Her father’s garden. The place they came to fall.

I pressed my forehead against the cool glass.

Tomorrow I’d attend Vivienne’s launch party. Wear the suit Mr. Bellamy tailored. Stand next to her while fashion executives asked questions and made assumptions.

She’d said I mattered.

One of these girls had kissed me on those front steps. One of them had decided I was worth the risk.

I still didn’t know which.

But standing here at 3:32 in the morning with the taste of strawberries still ghosting across my lips from a dream, I realized something terrible.

I didn’t care which one it was.

I wanted all of them.

Cassidy’s fire. Harlow’s warmth. Vivienne’s walls cracking. Sabrina’s quiet trust.

Four sisters. Four completely different disasters.

And I was the idiot standing in the middle getting burned from every direction.

My phone lit up on the nightstand.

A single message. From an unknown number that wasn’t blocked yet.

I’m coming home next week. We need to talk. Please.

Diana Angelo. My mother. Asking for things she didn’t earn.

I picked up the phone. Read it twice. Considered throwing the device out the window.

Instead I blocked the number. Deleted the message. Watched it disappear like it had never existed.

I climbed back into bed. The sheets still smelled faintly of that perfume from the dream. Strawberries and something underneath.

Except it was just my imagination. Had to be.

Nobody had been here.

When I finally drifted off around four, the dream started again.

This time she was already smiling when I opened my eyes.

“Baby,” she whispered. “Let’s try this again.”