Extra Bonus #97: Winter Break - Cobalt Brothers Hot Tub Chat (Patreon)

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RESOURCES:  Check out this narrative timeline graphic to visually see when this bonus scene takes place.

SPOILER WARNING: There are spoilers from BURN BRIGHT in this bonus scene. We highly recommend reading the book for reading this bonus.

I REST MY ELBOWS on the stone edge while sitting in my family’s hot tub—the one connected to the heated pool. Vapor rises off the water. It’s the night after Christmas, and nothing catastrophic has happened, not while the nuclear bomb that is me has been around my family.  

I can honestly say I’ve loved this winter break.  

I’ve loved being here.  

Especially with Harriet. She’s with my mom and sisters watching the newest Little Women together in the home theater. 

I’m outside, under the stars, on a cold December night. And I’m not alone. All four of my brothers are in the hot tub with me. It kind of feels like old times. But then again, it feels like better new times.  

Us being grown now.  

“Mom and Dad definitely know it was me and Harriet,” I tell them, since we’ve been talking about my pregnancy scare now that we’re not around the girls. We’ve been trying to avoid this being blasted to our sisters and parents. Harriet wanted it contained, which I get. She just met Jane this break. I wipe a wet hand down my face, then relax backward in the warm water. “Dad went through the whole ‘safe sex’ talk with me again. For ten minutes. He hasn’t given one that lasted more than a minute since I was fourteen.” 

On my left, Eliot says, “I received that ten-minute talk two hours ago.” He raises and lowers his brows.  

I start to laugh.  

Beckett smiles across from me. “Four hours ago for me. They must be making rounds.” They being both Mom and Dad. I get why he included our mom. They always make decisions together. Beckett looks over to Charlie, who’s smoking a cigarette beside him.  

“I was skipped.” 

“So was I,” Tom says, raking his hands through his hair. It’s completely wet since he dunked himself under the water. Every now and then, he shivers and lowers himself deeper in the hot tub. “So either Charlie is gay and won’t have any surprises or Dad knows not to treat us like we’re teenagers who don’t know what they’re doing.” 

“You know what you’re doing?” Charlie mocks Tom.  

Tom flips him off with two fingers but quickly submerges his cold hands underneath the water. “Holy fuck, it’s cold.” He dips down to his chin, more so in the middle of the tub. 

Eliot catches my gaze to ask me, “Did you tell Dad you wear condoms?”  

“No, he would’ve known I was lying.” 

Eliot opens his arms. “You wouldn’t be lying if you start wearing them.” 

I scrunch my brows at him. “Is this your way to get me to use extra protection—because I’m not doing that, man. She’s on the pill. I’m not sleeping with anyone else.”  

Beckett makes a what the fuck face at Eliot. “There is no avenue where you’d wear condoms in a serious relationship.”  

“Sure there is, brother,” Eliot says. “It’s called Eliot Alice Will Never Have a Surprise Pregnancy Avenue.” 

“I’d park there,” Tom quips.  

Eliot motions to him. “Tom knows it exists.” 

I nod to Eliot. “In my fucked-up mind, this isn’t a worst-case scenario that I’m visualizing, so I’m not going to act like I need to fuck Harriet in a bomb shelter.” 

Eliot narrows a look at me. “Maybe Dad should’ve had a thirty-minute talk with you, brother, because it sounds like you might knock up your girlfriend in a bomb shelter.” 

I laugh hard with Beckett, and I notice Tom and Eliot exchanging a smile. It makes me feel good. Charlie passes his cigarette to Beckett after another drag, and I’m a little surprised when Charlie asks me, “What is the worst-case scenario in your mind?” 

“Besides all of you dead?” My phone buzzes on the stone edge beside me, but I don’t immediately check it.  

“Besides that,” Charlie says, looking me in the eye.  

Beckett blows a line of smoke upward, then shifts over to hand the cigarette back to Charlie again.  

I stare up at the star-blanketed sky, and normally, I can pick out constellations—but they all glaze together in a streak of brightness. “Just Audrey lately.” My frown deepens. “After the frat party, it’s pretty much always involving Audrey.” I run my wet fingers through my hair a few times. “I know I can’t control bad things from happening, but stopping myself from picturing it is…not easy.” I let out a strained breath. “Anyone want to swap brains?” 

“Charlie might,” Tom jokes.  

“Pass,” Charlie says, pulling himself out of the hot tub. I think he’s about to make a quick exit, but he must just be hot. Because he stays, keeping his legs dunked under the water.  

Charlie skims me, but he doesn’t say anything else.  

I think about asking him something, but do I really want to test his mood? Maybe I should leave this one good thing alone tonight.  

So while Eliot talks about auditioning for new plays soon—The Mousetrap inevitably coming to an end—I check my phone.  

XANDER: You should see the Christmas lights this year.  

My cousin sent me a picture of the lights on the fir tree at the lake house. Same lights we were tasked to detangle together last year. It’d been a miserable Christmas for me. One of the worst I can remember, and Xander despising me didn’t help.  

But he wasn’t the cause of how isolated I felt.  

I smile as soon as I see the knotted strands haphazardly thrown onto the tree. Just blobs of bundled lights. I almost burst out laughing in the hot tub.  

XANDER: Proof that you really should exist in this world bc fuck those lights without you. Never again. I would rather scrub toilets.  

I text back with wet fingers.  

BEN: Definitely a two-person job.  

BEN: And how much do those brand-new toilets need scrubbed? 

XANDER: It’ll still take me a century. Where there is a way to delay, I will find it. Kinney already called me a procrastination goblin. On my birthday. 

BEN: Miss your sister trying to eat my soul during your birthday. 

XANDER: Let’s swap sisters so Audrey can gift me another smutty novel to see my reaction. That was fucking diabolical. Not even Luna has done that to me, and she writes this stuff.  

BEN: Was it really that bad? Do I want to know?   

XANDER: I’m sparing you. Was not ready. Need bleach. 

I look up and tell Tom, “Xander is texting,” since he was about to ask. It leads all of us to talk about the renovations for the lake house. They happened this past year, but none of us have obviously seen them since we’re in Philly for Christmas. But our cousins have been sending us photos of the expansion and updated bathrooms. Heated floors. Backlit LED mirrors. 

More importantly, there are more bedrooms.  

So I end up shooting Xander another text.  

BEN: Strange thinking if I’m up there next year, we might not have to room together. 

XANDER: Yeah. My luck, I guess.  

I know what he’s saying. We’re just now talking again.  

Setting my phone aside, I ask Tom, “So what’s the plan if Harriet spends the night?” We haven’t roomed with each other for that long before we left New York for break.  

“Set the room on fire. Watch Harry burn,” Tom cackles.  

I glare. “Not funny.” 

He points at Beckett. “Beckett Joyce was laughing. Blame him for finding me hilarious.” 

Beckett is smiling, but he definitely wasn’t laughing. I just tell Tom, “Seriously, man.”  

He stands higher out of the water. “You can just tie something on the door. Like a literal suit tie. And I won’t go in there. I can crash on the pull-out.” 

I nod. “Okay, yeah, I’ll do the same for you.” 

He raises his hands. “I’m not thinking about hooking up with anyone right now. I have major issues—” 

“No, really?” Charlie cuts in. 

Tom splashes him, wetting Charlie’s cigarette. Eliot and I laugh at Charlie’s lethal look on Tom, to which Tom does not give a shit. Tom just tells me, “My band is all that matters.”  

The sliding glass door suddenly opens.  

Tom groans, “This is why we shouldn’t talk about Harry. It’s how you summon her.”  

“Talking about me, Tommy?”  

“Complaining,” Tom mutters, sinking back into the water. Chin-deep.  

I smile up at Harriet as soon as she comes over. She’s in silk pajamas but hikes up the legs to come sit behind me. “Cobalt boy,” she greets.  

“Fisher.” I reach up and cup her cheek, guiding her toward me. Her lips pull into the start of a smile as I kiss her. My chest floods. I break apart to ask, “Movie over?” 

“Not yet.” 

I slide lower so she can see over my head. Her calves brush my skin in the water. Her legs spread around me. Charlie is trying to light another cigarette, almost frustratingly. He passes it to Beckett.  

“I’ve been tasked to take a poll,” Harriet tells all of us. “Who’s your favorite March sister? Audrey thinks she knows the answer.” 

“We’re all going to collectively tell her one answer, right?” Tom asks our brothers. “To fuck with her.”  

“Why are we fucking with Audrey?” I ask them.  

“Because it’s fun, dude.” 

Eliot confirms, “One answer.” 

I look up at Harriet behind me. Her fingers tangle in my hair as she says, “Dude, she might come out here and demand a real answer. She’s serious about this.” 

Then she comes out here. “Fine, one answer,” I agree with my brothers. “Who are we saying?” 

“Charlie chooses,” Eliot says.  

“Beth March. She dies. We feel sorry for her. The fucking end,” he snaps, waiting for Beckett to light the cigarette between his lips.  

“What bit Charlie in the ass?” Tom says. 

Charlie gives him an eviscerating look.  

“Dude.” Tom raises his hands out of the water. “I come in peace.” 

Harriet smooths strands of my hair back, and I rub her leg under the water. Charlie reroutes his cold gaze onto Harriet, and I sit up straighter.  

“Charlie,” I warn.  

“What are you still doing here?” he sneers.  

“Charlie,” I growl.  

“It’s fine, Ben.” Harriet picks herself up out of the hot tub. “I’d rather be with the girls anyway. Fuck you, Boy Genius.” She leaves at that.  

Beckett quickly blows out smoke and hands Charlie the cigarette. He whispers in his ear, then tells me, “Pip, just let it go. Please.” 

I’m trying.  

But the thought of Charlie constantly making Harriet feel unwelcome is an unwelcome feeling in my body. “You can’t cast her out every time you see her with me,” I tell him. Because I don’t know why else he’s reacting like this, and I can’t stop how I am with her just to make him feel better.  

“I’m not. I barely have.” Charlie takes a deep drag, then says, “Congratulations.” 

“On what?” I say tensely.  

A line of smoke leaves his lips. “On finding someone who loves you back.”  

Thank you for reading this month's extra bonus! It's coming at the very tail end of the month, but it doesn't make it any less special. We love getting to showcase some more brotherly moments and expand on things that have happened in BB and the Winter Break bonuses. We hope you enjoy this one!

That's officially all for April. We'll be back next month with more bonuses, more podcasts, and all the fun things. 😊

xoxo Krista & Becca

 “Winter Break: Cobalt Brothers Hot Tub Chat," Copyright © 2026 by K.B. Ritchie