I want to say yes, but I’m already seeing double. “I think I’m good. I’m going to get going.”

“Okay, I’ll drive you.”

“No, I’ll call an Uber. You’re the party host, Mandy.”

She’s about to argue, but Cora is suddenly beside me, her shoulder brushing up against my arm. “I can drive him. Lily’s hitching a ride with Todd, and I’m getting tired anyway.”

Mandy puts on her gossip face. “Ooh, scandalous. I’ll need details.” Then, as if remembering our encounter in the bedroom earlier, her face falls and her eyes dart between us. “Are you sure, Cor? I don’t mind.”

“Don’t be silly. You can’t leave your apartment unattended.”

Mandy nibbles her lip, looking conflicted, until one of her friends starts calling her over for jello-shots. “Yeah, okay. That works.” She glances over to me. “Call me in the morning?”

I nod.

Cora fishes through her purse for her car keys, then tips her head to the door, encouraging me to follow.

It’s a silent ride to my townhouse, five miles on the other side of town, and I almost fall asleep. But I’m too preoccupied with thinking about the last time we were in a car together, and every time we hit a stoplight, I half expect the window to be smashed open and for a new nightmare to begin.

She helps me into the house a few minutes later because things are starting to spin at this point, and I make my way to the bedroom on stumbling legs, unbuttoning my shirt as I walk. “Come on,” I say to Cora, who is lingering in the doorway, quiet and unsure.

“I should get going. It’s late.”

I pause to face her. She looks nervous, but not the uncomfortable nervous—not the Jason nervous. It’s something else. “Lie down with me.”

A bold request. Goddamn alcohol controlling my tongue.

“Dean…”

“It’s not like we haven’t before.”

She blinks. “That was a mistake.”

I take a step towards her, my shirt hanging open. “I guess if you want to call the best sleep we’ve had in almost two months a mistake, then sure. Okay.”

Cora ducks her head, lowering her eyes to the gray rug in my entryway. “You know what I’m talking about. It’s not appropriate. Especially because we’ve been…” She clears her throat. “Intimate.”

“Those were fucked up circumstances. We didn’t have a choice.”

“I know, but we have a choice now. We have our free will back, and it’s telling me it’s not a good idea to get in bed with my sister’s fiancé. It’s wrong, Dean.” She lifts her eyes back to me. “I’m sorry.”

I can’t argue with her. I can’t argue with any of that. I’m being torn in two directions, my mind telling me it’s not right and that Mandy would never be okay with it, and my fucking soul wanting nothing more than to feel Cora pressed up against my chest, the sound of her beating heart singing me to sleep like a goddamn lullaby.