Chapter 2: Ruby gets mad
The morning light through the east-facing windows of the breakfast nook was painfully bright, a sharp contrast to the shadowy, perfume-soaked darkness of Sera’s bedroom hours before. She sat at the head of the wrought-iron and glass table, already dressed in a silk kimono, picking at a perfect dish of berries and yogurt she had no appetite for. The scent of coffee from the Italian machine was usually a comfort. Today it just smelled acidic.
Ruby entered, barefoot, wearing only one of Sera’s old t-shirts. It drowned her frame but did nothing to hide the curves beneath. She poured herself a cup, the steam curling around her platinum hair, and slid into the chair opposite Sera with a soft scrape.
“You look like you didn’t sleep,” Ruby said, her voice morning-rough.
“I didn’t.” Sera pushed a berry around the bowl. “Not really.”
“Leo and Chloe?”
“Still asleep. I checked.” Sera finally looked up, meeting Ruby’s clear blue eyes. There was no judgment there, just open curiosity. It was why she’d fallen for her. Ruby was the calm to her storm, the anchor point in her chaotic world. “It… happened.”
Ruby took a slow sip. “The seduction plan? In your bedroom?”
“Yes. And… Chloe joined us. Later.”
A beat of silence. Ruby’s eyebrow arched, just a fraction. “Well. You work fast. How was it?”
Sera let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. The telling came out in a rush, the words tumbling over each other—the transparent negligee, Leo’s stunned, boyish embarrassment, the way his gentleness had disarmed her even as she’d orchestrated every second. She described the heat of his skin, the surprising strength in his huge hands, the naive wonder with which he’d touched her. She told Ruby about Chloe’s entrance, the redhead’s fierce, possessive kiss on Leo’s mouth before she turned a challenging gaze on Sera, a silent negotiation in the dim light. She detailed the threesome that followed, a clumsy, breathless, profoundly intense tangle of limbs and whispered assurances.
“It was… successful,” Sera finished, her clinical tone belying the flush on her chest.
“Successful,” Ruby repeated, the word neutral.
“Then I spoke with Chloe. After. Just the two of us.”
She relayed that conversation too, sticking to the broad strokes: Chloe’s pragmatic acceptance, her clear-eyed view of their financial desperation, her stipulation that whatever happened, Leo was never to be hurt. Sera carefully, meticulously, excised the specific threat—the cold, utterly serious promise of dismemberment delivered with a sweet smile. She just said Chloe was protective. Fiercely so.
Ruby listened through it all, her expression shifting from curiosity to contemplation to something harder to read. She set her coffee cup down with a definitive click.
“Okay,” she said, drawing the word out. “So, opinions?”
“Please.”
Ruby leaned forward, her arms on the table. “First, the approving part. I get it. I do. The baby fever thing, the specific… fixation. It’s a little out there, babe, but it’s yours. And honestly?” A small, wicked smile touched her lips. “The idea of you, all haughty and in control, deliberately getting yourself knocked up by that big, sweet giant? You waddling around with a giant belly on you? It’s kind of hot. And him being with Chloe, with us in the mix… it’s a scenario. I’m onboard. More than onboard. I’m intrigued.”
Sera felt a spike of relief. “Good. That’s—”
“But,” Ruby interrupted, her voice dropping, losing all its lightheartedness. “What the actual fuck, Sera?”
The question hung in the sunlit air.
“What?”
“The utilitarian indifference,” Ruby said, her words now precise and sharp as glass. “You described him like a… a specialized tool. A means to an end. ‘Successful.’ You manipulated him. You set a trap with rent money as the bait, and he walked right into it because he’s a good kid trying to keep his head above water. And you sat there in your million-dollar negligee and pulled the strings. Fuck's sake, you called him a stud not because it was sexy but because that's what you think of him as.”
“He wanted to!” Sera protested, heat rising in her cheeks. “Chloe wanted to! They both agreed—”
“After you engineered the situation! After you dangled their security in front of them! They're broke as fuck, Sera, and Chloe is so pragmatic that....” Ruby shook her head, her blond hair catching the light. “I know you, Seraphina Bellweather. I know how you see the world. People are assets, experiences are transactions. But Leo isn’t a stock portfolio. Chloe sure as hell isn’t. And you forgetting that is going to get you burned.”
Ruby took a breath, her gaze unwavering. “And you’re glossing over Chloe. I’ve known her since we were twelve. She punched a boy in the throat for trying to look down my shirt. When the teacher lied and told the principal it was unprovoked, she kicked the teacher in the balls so hard he sang soprano for a month. You think I don’t know what ‘fiercely protective’ means coming from her? You left something out of that little chat you had. I can see it in the way you skip over it. Mama bears have nothing on that woman when Leo is in danger. Nothing. If she thinks for a second you’re toying with him, that this is just some cruel game for you, this entire opulent mansion of yours won’t be big enough to hide you from what comes next.”
The truth of it landed in Sera’s stomach like a stone. She had seen it in Chloe’s eyes last night—a steel core beneath the pragmatic agreement. A line that, if crossed, would have consequences no amount of money could mitigate.
“I’m not trying to be cruel,” Sera said, and it was the least confident sentence she’d uttered in years.
“I believe you,” Ruby said, her tone softening just a fraction. “You don't like men, but you need one to fuck a baby into you because of the whole fetish thing. Makes things complicated and you're using what you've got. But intention isn’t magic. You want a family? A baby? That’s not a business merger. It’s messy. It’s emotional. And you're the one that decided a clinic and an anonymous donor wasn't going to work. It means seeing Leo as a person, not just a genetic donor. It means seeing Chloe as a partner in this weird mess, not a tolerated obstacle. You can’t cold-engineer a life.”
Sera stared at her untouched berries. The grand piano in the music room had fallen silent. The only sound was the hum of the Sub-Zero fridge and the frantic beating of her own heart. Ruby’s words weren’t just criticism; they were a map, pointing out the chasm between her desire and her actions.
“So what do I do?” The question was small, almost lost.
Ruby reached across the table, her fingers brushing Sera’s. “You start by getting him a proper breakfast. You talk to him. Not at him. You see the person, not the project. And you remember that Chloe’s watching. Always.” She squeezed Sera’s hand once, then let go, leaning back. “The fantasy is hot, Sera. No lie, I can't wait to see you with a belly. But the reality is sitting upstairs, probably confused and sore and wondering what the hell his life just became. That’s the part you have to handle. Not the fantasy. The reality. You want this to work? You need to be his friend. A friend with needs and who wants his help with those needs. You're never going to his paramour or some shit like that; you're not into men, we all know that,” she added with a lopsided grin. "But you can be a friend who wants his babies."
Sera looked from Ruby’s serious face to the sprawling, sunlit garden beyond the windows, then back to the two empty place settings waiting to be filled. The momentum of her plan had just crashed into the immovable object of Ruby’s clarity. The next move was no longer about seduction. It was about something far more terrifying.
It was about apology. And change.
Sera stared at her fingers, still feeling the ghost of Ruby’s touch, then nodded once. “Right. Breakfast.”
The kitchen became a flurry of deliberate, quiet activity. Ruby, familiar with the mansion’s culinary enormity, took charge of the savories, crisping bacon in the copper pan and whipping eggs with cream and chives. Sera focused on the fruits and pastries, arranging strawberries and kiwi slices into a mosaic on a bone china platter, her hands unusually careful. The scents of buttery croissants, brewing coffee, and sizzling pork fat wove together into a promise of normalcy she felt utterly unworthy of providing.
She loaded a heavy silver tray, her mind scrambling for the right words. “I just tell them I’m sorry?”
“You could start there,” Ruby said, sliding perfectly scrambled eggs onto a warmed plate. She picked up a second, smaller tray. “And I’m coming with you. Moral support. Also, Chloe might actually believe it if I’m there. Or at least, not inclined to throw your scantily clad ass out a window without opening it first. Seriously, you just got this whole - I want your fiancee to knock me up - thing worked out with her. No lie, one of your most impressive accomplishments, not only getting what you wanted but surviving the negotiation. Why did you have to immediately turn around and piss her off? ”
The walk down the hall to the guest wing felt longer than last night’s journey to her own bedroom. Sunlight streamed across the polished floors, illuminating dust motes dancing in the silence. Sera’s knuckles hesitated over the dark oak door. She took a breath that did nothing to steady her, and knocked softly.
“Come in,” Chloe’s voice called, clear and alert.
The room was bathed in soft morning light, the bedding a tangled landscape of sheets and duvet. Chloe sat propped against the headboard, Leo’s head resting in her lap, her fingers absently combing through his dark hair. He was awake, his eyes cautious and fixed on the door as they entered. A faint blush crept up his neck at the sight of them.
“We come bearing peace offerings,” Ruby announced, her tone breezy as she nudged the door closed with her hip. “And enough cholesterol to forgive most sins.”
Sera moved forward, the weight of the tray a tangible anchor. She set it carefully across the foot of the massive bed. The spread looked absurdly lavish against the rumpled linen. “I… we… made you breakfast.”
Leo slowly sat up, the sheet pooling around his waist. His broad shoulders seemed to tense, a defensive hunch she now recognized as his response to overwhelming situations. He looked at the food, then at Sera, his expression unreadable.
Chloe’s emerald eyes tracked from the tray to Sera’s face, her gaze sharp and assessing. “This is new. What’s the occasion?”
“An apology,” Sera said, the word feeling foreign on her tongue. She clasped her hands in front of her kimono. “A real one. For last night. For… the way I handled everything.”
Ruby placed her tray on the bedside table and perched on the edge of an armchair, a silent observer offering her presence as a buffer.
Sera plunged ahead, the explanation tumbling out. “I have this… fixation. This obsession with pregnancy, with having a family. It’s not rational. I know it’s not. As I've told Chloe, I don't fight it, I embrace it. I won't apologize for that.” She gestured vaguely, unable to meet Leo’s eyes. “But then I saw a solution. You. I engineered everything. The rent, the tour, the… the negligee.” She chanced a glance at Chloe. “I treated him like a transaction. A means to an end. I used your situation, and I am profoundly sorry for that.”
Leo finally spoke, his voice quiet. “You said it was about discussing rent.”
“I lied.” Sera held his gaze, forcing herself not to look away. “It was a pretext. A manipulation. And it was cruel. Ruby rightly just spent twenty minutes explaining to me how monumentally I messed up by not seeing you. The person. Either of you.”
Chloe’s hand found Leo’s under the sheets, her fingers lacing with his. “And what does this apology change? The rent is still due. Our situation hasn’t changed.”
“No,” Sera admitted. “But I have. Or, I need to. If you’ll let me.” She took another step closer, her posture unbending but her eyes softening. “The offer stands. Live here. The rent is what we agreed. I very much want to continue with the... other elements of the arrangement too, but not if you're unwilling. Unless you both ever, genuinely, without any pressure from your bank accounts, want to revisit it. As friends. Not as a transaction.”
Ruby nodded slowly from her chair, a silent affirmation of Sera’s sincerity.
Chloe studied Sera’s face, looking for the cracks in the performance, the gleam of calculation. She saw only strained honesty and a flicker of shame. Her protective rigidity eased a fraction. “You’re serious.”
“I am. Ruby’s here to witness it. She’ll call me on my bullshit if I backslide.” Sera managed a weak smile. “She already has.”
A tentative silence settled. Leo’s eyes darted from Sera to Ruby, his nervousness palpable. His history with Ruby was an old, quiet tension; she’d been Chloe’s confident, flirtatious friend long before she was Sera’s girlfriend, and her open appreciation for both of them had always left him flustered.
“I don’t know what to say,” Leo murmured, his gaze dropping to the sumptuous breakfast.
“Say you’ll eat the bacon before it gets cold,” Ruby chimed in, lightening the mood. “And maybe forgive my girlfriend for being a emotionally stunted chaos gremlin with a single-minded biological clock. She’s a work in progress.”
That drew a faint, reluctant smile from Leo. He reached for a croissant, the simple action breaking the tension. Chloe watched him for a moment, then shrugged one bare shoulder. “Okay. Apology tentatively accepted. On a trial basis.”
“Thank you,” Sera breathed, the knot in her chest loosening.
Chloe picked up a strawberry, her tone shifting to something lighter, practical. “So, roommates then. With weirder-than-average backstory. And just to be super clear, since we’re resetting here…” She bit into the berry, juice staining her lips. “The rent is still three hundred a month, right? For both of us? Because that part of the transaction I’m very happy to keep.”
Because that part of the transaction I’m very happy to keep.”
Sera’s sharp laugh was a release of tension, a real one. “Three hundred. For both. Not a cent more.” She backed toward the door, pulling Ruby up with her. “We’ll leave you to it. Get settled. Whatever you need.”
The door clicked shut behind them, leaving a silence filled only by the scent of good coffee and crisped bacon. Leo stared at the ornate door for a long moment, then his shoulders slumped, the last of his defensive energy draining away. He rubbed his face with both hands, a slow, rough motion.
He rubbed his face with both hands, a slow, rough motion. “I don’t think I can go to class today,” he said, the words muffled by his palms. “My brain feels… scrambled.”
“Don’t.” Chloe peeled a strip of crispy bacon, feeding him a piece. “Just log in remotely. Nobody will know the difference.” She traced the line of his jaw with her thumb. “I’m not leaving you.”
He managed a nod, the simple decision a relief. They ate in silence for a while, the food fortifying something hollow inside him. Sunlight warmed the duvet, and the normalcy of chewing, of swallowing, began to settle his nerves. He pulled his laptop from the nightstand, the familiar startup chime a small anchor in the strange room.
While he clicked through the virtual classroom portal, Chloe curled against his side, her long red hair a veil over his arm. She watched the lecture on macroeconomic principles with him, her presence a silent bulwark against the whirlwind of the last eighteen hours. The professor’s droning voice was a bizarre counterpoint to the memory of Sera’s whisper in his ear, the crush of bodies, the sheer shocking slide of skin on skin.
When the lecture ended, he closed the laptop with a definitive snap. The silence that followed was different, ready. “Chloe?”
“Yeah, baby?”
He stared at the ornate ceiling medallion above the bed. “If she hadn’t… if it wasn’t for the way she did it, all that manipulation and the rent shit hanging over us… the idea of a threesome? With you? And someone like her?” He swallowed. “I would have found that kind of hot. Theoretically.”
Chloe shifted to look at him. “Okay.”
“But,” he continued, turning his head to meet her gaze, his brow furrowed. “If it had been another guy? If you’d suggested that? I’d have been horrified. Sick about it. Does that make me a hypocrite?”
A soft laugh escaped her, a warm puff of air against his shoulder. “No, Leo. It makes you the man I love.” She smoothed a hand over his t-shirt. “I read a study once. Something about women being more open to sharing their partner with another woman than men are with another man. Something about… perceived threat, maybe. I don’t know. It’s just biology and baggage, I guess. Your reaction isn’t weird.”
He absorbed that, the academic part of his mind latching onto the concept. It didn’t erase the confusion, but it framed it. “Are you… are you asking if I’m considering continuing? Helping her with her… obsession?”
She propped herself up on one elbow. “I’m asking what you’re feeling. Now that the financial axe isn’t quite at our necks this second.”
A deep flush crawled up from his collar. He looked away, focusing on a sunbeam cutting across the Persian rug. “I haven’t had nearly enough time to come to a decision. My mind’s just a riot. Yesterday I was worried about textbooks, and now I’m…” He trailed off, the scale of it impossible. “But the sex itself,” he whispered, the admission feeling dangerous. “With you there? That was… awesome. It was just everything else that was terrible.”
Chloe nodded, her expression thoughtful, not jealous. “I know. For me too.” She kissed his shoulder. “We don’t have to decide anything right now. We have a roof. We have time to breathe. And we have each other.”
A firm, deliberate knock sounded at the door. It wasn’t Sera’s hesitant tap from earlier. This was louder, more declarative.
“Yeah?” Chloe called out, not moving from her protective position.
The door opened and Ruby leaned in, now dressed in jeans and a simple black tank top. Her platinum hair was in a messy bun. She held up two sets of keys dangling from heavy brass fobs.“Hey. Sera’s holed up in her study doing… whatever it is she does to make money. I’m headed to the grocery. You two want to come? Give you a tour of the neighborhood, get you some stuff that’s actually yours for the kitchen. My treat.”
It was an offering, a gesture of normalcy. An exit from the gilded room that held so much charged history.
Leo looked at Chloe, a silent question in his eyes. She gave a slight, encouraging nod. “Yeah,” he said, his voice gaining a little strength. “Yeah, that’d be good.”
“Cool. Five minutes,” Ruby said with a quick smile, and closed the door.
Leo swung his legs out of bed, his feet hitting the cool floor. The simple plan—a car ride, a grocery store—felt like a lifeline. He pulled on his jeans from the day before, the mundane act of buttoning his fly grounding him. Chloe watched him, her eyes soft.
“One thing at a time,” she said, echoing his own thought.
“One thing at a time,” he repeated, reaching for her hand.