80 Chaos, crates and condoms

**Date = 30 July**
*Everyone got here in record time.*
**Place = San Francisco (Black Pit)**
*And we’re all moving here for safety.*

**POV - Aria**

They say moving house is one of the best but most stressful things you can do in life.

They say this like it’s a normal process. Like you box up your books and your throw pillows and your cat, and you carry your curated life across town with the assistance of some overly muscular moving men and a U-Haul.

What they don’t say is that if your life includes your hunky fiancé, three feral children, and the entirety of the Blackburn-Grimm baggage buffet, moving becomes something else entirely.

It becomes hell.

Sweet, sentimental, wildly inappropriate hell.

We’re officially moving into the newly renovated cottage at Black Pit — the one I woke up in after the warehouse incident. An act of madness I apparently consented to while distracted by Enrique’s dimples and the promise of honeymoon sex.

Or maybe because it’s the only option at the moment. We can’t move into his house … unless we want to advertise to every paparazzi and psycho villain out there that we’re together. And the club is also not that private.

So Black Pit cottage it is.

My arms are full of boxed-up toys, my forehead is shiny with sweat, and I can hear the sound of someone arguing about condoms around the corner.

So far, ten out of ten, zero regrets.

I round the bend. Luke and River glare at each other like two rival assassins forced to share a sandbox — narrowed eyes, twitching jaws, and the kind of tense silence that promises bloodshed over the function of a condom. If looks could kill, they’d both be buried in matching glitter coffins by now.

Lili is seated on my faithful green suitcase with her iPad and pink headphones on — completely oblivious to the chaos. Or so it would seem.

Kiara is sitting on the dining room floor, unpacking Leyla’s clothes, a faint smile on her face as if she’s secretly enjoying this.

There’s a suspicious silence. Then River’s voice, flat and deadpan, right in Luke’s face — “You don’t know poop.”

“When are you going home?” Luke sneers. I’m not sure how long River is going to stay here, but I do know Jackson phoned her parents.

“Jackson is adopting me, Goof-boy!” Not sure about that either.

“Aria,” Lili chirps without looking up. “What’s a condom?” Clearly not so oblivious.

I drop the box of hairless Barbies and half-built LEGOs.

River shrugs, completely unbothered, as she opens a box to unpack the pink kitchen utensils Enrique got me. “It’s a balloon.”

“It’s not,” Luke says quickly.

“Is too,” River snaps. “But not the party kind.”

“It’s not any kind of balloon,” Luke sneers, “It’s like a sock a man wears on his —” He gets thwacked at the back of his head by Damion, who stepped in just at the right moment. Luke rubs his head and squints his eyes at his brother.

“My brother didn’t use one, and that’s why Mel is having a baby.” He continues in a snotty voice, arms crossed and glaring.

“WHAT?” Mel’s voice screeches from somewhere behind me. She’s carrying Petunia’s crickets, since she can’t pick up anything heavy. Logan steps in with a box labeled, ‘My Shit’ in his arms.

Luke snorts. “Have you even seen one before?” He doesn’t wait for an answer. “You don’t blow it up … a man rolls it —”

“LUKE!” Damion shrieks in a low voice. The lot of them arrived yesterday. Damion, Mel, Logan, and Kiara.

“What? You said I must always speak the truth.” He eyeballs his brother. Damion looks between me and Mel and just sighs like a man who’s made his bed and knows he’s going to die in it.

“The truth … not nonsense,” River flattens him, “It comes in small square tinfoil packets … like the soy sauce from sushi dinners,” she continues proudly, twirling a pink butter knife. “Jackson has a whole drawer full of different ones,” she announces.

Silence.

I drop a Barbie back in the box. Mel pauses mid-cricket-count. Lili lowers her iPad. Damion blinks twice. Luke makes a gagging noise.

“What?” Mel croaks.

“Yup.” River pops the ‘P’ and keeps stacking utensils like she didn’t just detonate a verbal grenade.

“Why were you in Jackson’s drawer?” I ask, trying not to laugh and cry at the same time.

“I was bored,” River says simply. “And boys have the weirdest, coolest things hidden in their rooms. I HAVE a brother.” As if that explains it all.

“Oh god,” I mutter, burying my sweaty face in a doll.

“Jax has all kinds,” she continues, totally unfazed. “Red ones, silver ones, and glow-in-the-dark ones.” She taps her finger to her lips as if thinking about it. “Ripped, ribbed, dotted, fruity, spicy —” she adds proudly. “I don’t know what spicy means, but it sounds dangerous. One’s camouflaged, another’s got tiger stripes. Not joking.”

“Please stop,” Logan begs. “I can’t un-hear this.”

“Do you know what dotted means?” Mel asks, horrified but somehow unable to look away.

River shrugs. “I blew one up. It had like … tiny bumps,” she says, like she’s giving a product review. “Probably for grip. I haven’t tried them on anything but the wall. It slipped off.”

“I am going to pass away,” Mel says, fanning herself with a pink frying pan.

“Anyway, Jackson caught me,” River adds, not done yet. “He brooded for just a moment. Then he laughed.” She suddenly lowers her voice and locks eyes with Luke with the seething intensity usually reserved for mortal enemies in ancient epics. “Jackson says men wear these balloons on their private parts so they don’t get cooties — or babies. His words.” She takes a deep, needed breath and gets to a point she wants to make. “So if Jackson calls it balloons, it is balloons.”

Luke’s quiet, like the rest of us. So River carries on. “He also said Enrique has special ones because he’s allergic.”

Enrique sputters. “I — I — excuse me?!” I turn just in time to see my fiancé frozen mid-step, holding Petunia’s terrarium. The huge spider is clinging to the front glass as if inspecting her new outside-the-box habitat.

“Yeah,” River says matter-of-factually. “He said you have the Eco-friendly kind. Vegan. Made from recycled goat skin, in baby milk flavor.”

Logan wheezes. Damion bursts into laughter. So does Kiara.

“I’m going to kill him,” Enrique growls, red in the face. “I am actually going to kill my fucking twin.”

River just nods. “You should. He said if you don’t use the special kind, your tiny dingemadong swells up like a baked potato … and that’s why Aria screams.” Doesn’t the man have any boundaries?

Lili stares at me in horror. “You scream at his dingemadong?”

“No!” I sputter. “Not at — ! I don’t —” I inhale a sharp breath, cough, and nearly drop the salad tongs I’ve been holding like a weapon.

“Jackson says you’re a screamer.” I look heavenward, asking some higher power for patience. Now I am going to kill Enrique’s twin.

But then Kiara, without even looking up from the box she’s cutting open, clears her throat and says loudly, “So! Don’t you think the place cleaned up nicely?”

Everyone blinks.

There’s a beat of silence. Then Mel snorts.

“Smooth,” she mutters.

“Thank you,” Kiara replies. “Just trying to salvage what’s left of Enrique’s dignity.”

“Too late. River set it on fire and peed on the ashes,” Logan chuckles. Oh, these boys have so much to learn about talking in front of little ears. Mel jerks her head towards him, but he’s unaware, looking into the distance. She lets it go, but she will get them in line sometime or another.

His eyes flick toward the old mansion with something like nostalgia — though it’s heavy with things unsaid. His face changes as he looks at the main house — this strange hybrid of pain and longing.

“Do you think the pit is still there?” he asks, meditatively, as if not even registering that he actually said something.

The air shifts. Heavy. Like someone sucked the laughter out of the room and replaced it with something dense and dark.

The kids go still.

I glance at Enrique. His face is rigid and hard. The pit means something. And it’s not something good. I put my hand on his arm.

“It’s still there,” he says, “Just full … ”

“Oh.” Logan turns, his face unreadable. Enrique shrugs and pouts.

I exhale slowly, hand still pressed to Enrique’s elbow. I feel the tension in his body — old memories surfacing.

“What pit?” River finally asks, looking suspicious. “Is it like a dungeon? Or a jail?” This is not good. She’ll probably dive in headfirst. Followed closely by Luke.

I step forward before things escalate again. “The pit is not for kids, alright?”

“I want to see the pit,” Lili mutters rebelliously. Both River and Luke nod in agreement.

“You will not see the pit,” Enrique says, voice lower than usual.

“Fine.” She kicks at a chair with one sparkly pink boot. “But if someone throws me in there, just know I will haunt this place.”

“Good to know,” Logan says dryly. “You can join all the other ghosts around here.”

I look over and see the expression on his face, and realize that he’s not joking. He means it.

“If we can’t go to the pit, can we at least borrow your stolen bicycles? We’ll give it back before the honeymoon,” River asks, while Lili still looks slightly insulted.

“Huh?” Damion grunts.

“Bikes … the things with two wheels and pedals,” she snobs. Luke stands next to her like a retired Marine, arms crossed.

“I know what a bike is,” Damion huffs, “But why do you think we have stolen ones?”

“Well, Enrique is supposedly going to ride Aria like a stolen bicycle,” she says, and I choke.

“And your gears slipped,” River tilts her head and grins. “And you also failed to backpedal … combined with the fact that you are too dumb to use a balloon, Mel is now knocked up.”

“Let me guess,” Logan coughs loudly to cover his laughter. “Jackson said that?”

River nods. “His exact words.”

Mel lifts her head, looking like a goddess wrapped in yoga pants and a crop top stretched over her massive belly. She’s glowing and cursing at the same time, which I honestly admire.

“Classic mistake,” Damion snobs.

“Yeah, you’re not the one carrying this mistake around in the July heat,” Mel flares.

“At least you have a reason to walk like a duck,” River says. “Poor Aria’s coming back from honeymoon waddling like a knock-kneed chicken, and we’re all just supposed to pretend it’s because of the bicycle and not sex.”

I nearly drop the dolls again. Enrique audibly chokes. The rest of the room holds their breaths.

“Should it not be ride WITH Aria ON a stolen bicycle?” Lili chirps. Oh, the beauty of virtue. Thank heavens for that.

“Yeah, sometimes that man gets his grammar wrong,” River answers casually. “Would never say he’s a lawyer.”

“Lawyer?” Damion and Logan ask at once, surprised. Mel also lifts her brows.

“Yeah,” Enrique informs them, “Apparently, he passed the bar. Who knew?”

“Who? Jackson?” Kiara gasps. He nods.

“He answered the blind man’s test, drank the shooter, and got his black robe,” River says. “Easy as pie … he said … or was the test about pie … I’m not sure now.”

“Huh?” Mel snubs. I lean over to her.

“You had to be there,” I say softly. She pulls a face.

“Holy shit,” Logan swears. I wonder why Jackson never told his family about it. And how many more secrets are they keeping from each other? It’s strange that they actually keep secrets, since they seem so close-knit.

River bends and picks up a box.

“Don’t drop that!” I yell, lunging toward her as she now balances a crate twice her size labeled FRAGILE – Aria’s breakable stuff.

“It’s fine,” she grunts, knees wobbling as she waddles toward the kitchen. “I have a strong core. My coach said I’m built like a ferret.”

I blink. “You … what?”

“Trim and dynamic,” she adds, like that explains it.

“I’m going to need therapy,” Enrique mutters. “So much therapy.”

He’s wearing cargo pants and a loose tee that’s already damp with sweat, hair messy, jaw set. It should be illegal to look this good while moving furniture.

“Stop drooling,” River calls without even turning around. “You’re gonna slip on your own hormones.”

“I’m not —”

“She so is,” Enrique chimes in innocently. I don’t know who I want to strangle more, the kid or the asshole. Or the asshole’s stupid twin.

River balances a spatula on her head like she’s auditioning for a bizarre Victorian circus act, still humming as if she didn’t just reveal half of Jackson’s private life. But just as I’m about to redirect her toward actual unpacking, she pauses, mid-hum, eyes narrowing.

“This plate,” she says, pulling a blue-and-white ceramic dish out of the crate. It’s one of the few things I have left of my mother. “— looks exactly like the one Lee used to make chocolate-mess cake on. You know the one with the crushed pretzels?”

She places the plate gently on the counter, her hand lingering over it a little longer than usual.

“I miss Lee,” she says suddenly, her voice going soft. “But I know staying at the better place is safest.”

There’s a quiet pause. Luke glances at her, frowning slightly. Lili looks up from her iPad.

“What better place?” Kiara asks gently.

River shrugs, not meeting anyone’s eyes. “Lee went to a better place. Jackson says it’s best for now. But I’ll see Lee soon. He promised.”

A silence falls over the room. Not heavy, but thoughtful. Logan looks down at his hands. Mel presses her lips together and rubs her belly in small circles.

“Okay,” River chirps suddenly, too brightly. “This is as much unpacking as my ADHD can take …”

“Come on, Lils. Let’s go to the stables. One mare is supposed to foal. I want to check that out.”

“I want to explore, not see a messy horse delivery,” Luke argues, following her out anyway. Two guards appear from the shadows. I recognize Marco by now. He’s Rosa’s kid … the Brazilian nanny who helped name the Blackburns.

Yep, she’s still here.

The other is a brute that works for Garcia. An enormous beast named Teddy who keeps his eyes locked on Luke like the kid’s going to detonate at any second. Not that I blame him.

“I picked first,” River calls back.

“I’m OLDER,” Luke barks.

“You’re STUPIDER.”

“That’s not a word.”

“Yes, it is, I heard Enrique use it about Logan.”

“Still not a word!”

“Don’t care. Move!” River pushes him out of the way.

“I’ll fart on your pillow.”

“I’ll call your mom.”

“Kids these days,” Lili sighs, hopping down from her crate, collecting her iPad. “I hope there’s Wi-Fi in the stables.” She runs to catch up.

“What’s sex?” I hear her voice blowing in with the wind. Another guard steps out. A tattooed woman with bigger arms than my brother and smaller boobs than my sister.

River says it’s something adults do when they love each other. Luke smugly says he will one day show River if she behaves and finishes school. She replies that he should learn to back paddle and switch gears first. He moans that he knows how to ride a bike, and then the three of them disappear into the sunlight, squabbling, as always, like a chaotic sitcom that never got canceled. Entourage on heel.

“I think we need to politely suggest to their parents that those kids need to be evaluated,” Mel says, watching them go. She sighs, then slowly lowers herself onto one of the armchairs in the living room.

Enrique and I lock eyes.

“Is this what parenting is?” she asks. “Just suppressing laughter and trying not to call CPS on yourself?”

Damion goes over to wrap his arms around her from behind. “Pretty much.”

“That’s our future now,” she snaps, “Just because you couldn’t use a balloon or ride a frickin bike!”

“Our kid is not gonna be like them. He’s going to be sweet and perfect.”

Mel snorts. “He’s gonna be worse.”

Damion laughs deeply, wiggling his nose into her hair, and groans. “Fuck, we’re gonna be great parents.” Mel doesn’t just roll her eyes, she practically launches them into orbit. But he’s not wrong … they will be good parents. And maybe one day, if fate and my one cloaked ovary allow it, Enrique and I will be too.

“You know,” Mel says, pulling a throw pillow under her arm like a security blanket, “I’ve been trying not to ask. But I need to know. What happened with the boat?”

Enrique and I exchange a look.

“What about it?” he says carefully. He hasn’t told me much. Just the top layer. Nothing deeper.

“The explosion,” Damion adds, folding his arms. “Heard they found bodies. Shot and burned.”

Mel’s hand tightens on the pillow. “And DNA matched one with Lee.”

I feel Enrique tense beside me.

“But that’s not possible,” Logan says, finally speaking. “Jackson wouldn’t lie to River. Not about that.” He looks around the room when no one answers. “Will he?”

Enrique exhales slowly, his hands on his hips. “I don’t know much. You know how tight-lipped the devil and his bestie can be. But I’m sure Jackson … went all out this time. Straight over the edge to hell. Breaking laws and morals as he went.”

“Did he kill those people?” Damion asks.

“No,” I say surely. “They were shot from behind … by a coward.” The boys all sigh deeply, relieved, knowing.

“I figure … that body — whomever he stole — was planted to make everyone believe Lee is dead.”

“Stole? Holy hell,” Mel whispers. “Where is Lee, then?”

“In hiding,” Enrique says. “I’m guessing in a better place.”

“And where’s he?” Damion asks. “And Axel?”

Enrique shakes his head. “He’s with Lee, I guess. Said he’d be back.”

Mel closes her eyes. “He’d better. You two are getting married, and I refuse to waddle down the aisle without knowing everyone is there.”

I give a small laugh and crouch beside her. “You’re going to be the sassiest, roundest bridesmaid ever.”

She snorts. “You mean matron of honor. And yes, I’ll look like a wine barrel in heels. But I’ll still look better than Logan.”

“Offended,” Logan mutters. “Deeply.”

Damion pats Mel’s hand. “Come on. Let’s go see if the air-con works in our villa. I saw a tub. A real one. With jets.”

She perks up. “Air-con? Jets? Oh, you say the sweetest things.”

“It’s foreplay, Angel,” Damion smirks. “And a way to get you out of these clothes.”

Logan and Enrique make the same donkey-like sound through their noses.

Logan walks out of the room, hands in the air. “Nope. I’m out. That’s it. Done.”

“I’m done too,” Kiara follows him.

The four of them head toward the path, laughing, Damion with one arm slung around his best friend’s shoulders, his other hand tightly holding Mel’s, leaving Enrique and me alone in the cottage. The silence settles immediately. Warm. Familiar. Charged.

I sigh thankfully. I love each and every one of them to bits already, but a girl needs her peace and quiet. They can be a little debilitating. They wear me down.

He walks over and leans against the table, watching me.

“Well,” he says, grinning. “It’s just us now.”

I glance around. “And Petunia, the chameleon, crickets, and a few unopened boxes we have to pack before Leyla comes.”

“Mm,” he murmurs, reaching out to pull me close. “We could take a break. You know … test the rooms.”

I arch a brow. “Test them?”

He shrugs, eyes gleaming. “See which one’s best for what position.”

I smack his chest, laughing. “You can’t be serious.”

“I am. It’s important. Scientific, even.”

“Oh? And the results?”

“So far, I’d say the kitchen counter is winning. Very supportive. Lots of surface area.”

“Tempting,” I whisper, wrapping my arms around his neck. “But I have questions first.”

He groans. “Why do I feel like this is going to ruin the mood?”

“It might. The pit. The stables. The stuff no one talks about. What happened, Sport?”

He sobers slightly, pulling me into the crook of his body. His voice softens. “The stables are nothing … it’s what’s underneath … rooms with iron doors. That’s where everything happened.”

“Like torture rooms,” I ask wearily. I don’t want him to shut down. If I’m going to fix his broken parts, I need to know how they broke.

“Exactly.” I can feel by the stiffness of his body, the crack in his voice, that this is as far as he’s willing to go on that subject.

“And the pit?” I ask gently.

He’s quiet for a moment.

“It was punishment,” he says finally. “When we stepped out of line. No light. No food. Just water up to your waist, and spiders … and bugs crawling on your neck because they fall in too and can’t get out.”

“It was … dark. Wet. Cold. Sometimes worse.”

My chest tightens. Do I really want to know this?

“As if something grew in you down there,” Enrique continues quickly. “Something evil.”

“That bad,” I whisper.

“Worse.”

I press my forehead to his chest.

“I hate what he did to you.”

He tilts my chin up. “I don’t. Not anymore. Because it brought me here. To this place. To you.”

I smile against his mouth as he kisses me, slow and deep.

Then I pull back and grin. “Still want to test the rooms?”

“Oh,” he murmurs, eyes darkening, “I intend to test every square inch of this house. But we should probably start with the bed. Then the tub with the jets. You know, for accuracy.”

“You’re a menace.”

“And you peach it, Batnip.”

I do.

God help me, I do.

“Why do you even call me that?” I squint at him, because honestly, it sounds like something you’d buy in a sketchy pet store. Not that I don’t like it.

He grins, lazy and wicked. “First time I saw you, your face was all black … like this tiny, pissed-off bat staring at me.”

The memory hits — that night, the call, my skincare routine, and him smirking like he owned the world. “Oh. Right.”

“And the nip?” I press, even though my pulse already knows where he’s going.

“Catnip.” He leans in, voice dropping like velvet dragged over gravel.

“You’re my drug. I get one whiff of you and —” he snaps his fingers near my ear, sharp, electric — “I’m wrecked.”

I laugh despite myself, because it’s so him — part confession, part flirtation, part performance. All of it true.

And as we head toward the bedroom, I glance once more out the window, toward the path where the kids ran off, and his family disappeared.

Maybe Black Pit is no longer haunted.

Maybe it’s alive again.

And so are we.