Husband With Benefits

The moment Cai stepped into the chaos that was his family home, the sheer volume of voices and laughter hit him like a wall. He paused wondering where he should look for her. the way Kael had been taken aside for interrogation, if she was going to be subjected to something similar.

What he didn’t expect was the scene that unfolded before him.

In the middle of the living room, Lily stood there cradling little Aranya ¹in her arms, her soft voice humming a tune as she kissed the baby’s head. The sight made him pause mid-step.

For a moment, he simply stared, blinking as if his mind couldn’t process what he was seeing. A strange thought lodged itself in his brain, one so ridiculous he almost laughed at himself. Baby fever. That was a thing, right? But wasn’t it something women usually got? How in the world had he, a grown man, fallen prey to it?

Because that’s exactly what it felt like. Seeing Lily, glowing with a maternal warmth he didn’t even know she had, holding his little cousin like she was the most precious thing in the world, sent his heart somersaulting in his chest. Or maybe it was lower in his stomach, a sensation he refused to call ’butterflies’. He wasn’t the kind of guy that got butterflies. But whatever it was, it made him feel a little unhinged.

And then she looked up.

Her gaze caught his, and her lips curved into a soft, serene smile that nearly knocked the breath out of him and caught him off guard. It was something gentler, something that made his chest tighten in ways he wasn’t prepared for.

She held that smile for a heartbeat before turning back to Aranya, resuming making odd expression to coax a smile out of her.

Cai felt faint. Legitimately faint.