"I'm sure," I say, more confident now. "I don't want you to assume anything either. But I also don't want you to assume I want space just because my heat is over."
What I want, I realize,is to choose. Not to be left alone because it's what someone thinks I should want, and not to be smothered because someone thinks I need protection. I want to choose, each moment, what feels right.
The relief that floods their faces tells me everything I need to know.
"Okay," Julian says simply, but there's warmth in his voice that makes my chest tight. "We'll stay."
Movie night happens naturally. Julian claiming one end of the couch with a poetry book, Callum taking the other end, me settling in the middle where I can lean against both of them. It's not the desperate closeness of heat, but something better: the choice to be close because we want to be.
Halfway through the movie, I find myself watching Callum more than the screen. The way lamplight catches in his darkhair, how his shoulders fill out his flannel shirt, the careful attention he's paying to the romantic comedy he probably wouldn't have chosen but is watching because I wanted to.
The solid comfort of his presence pulls at something deep in my chest, not heat-driven need, but the simple desire to be closer to someone who makes me feel safe.
Without overthinking it, I shift position, moving from my spot between them to curl up against Callum's side. He goes still for a moment, surprised, then his arm comes around me with careful warmth.
"Better?" he asks quietly, his voice rumbling through his chest.
"Much," I murmur, settling more firmly against him.
Julian's hand finds my ankle, thumb tracing gentle circles through my socks. The casual intimacy of it, the way they both touch me like I'm something precious they're allowed to hold, makes my eyes heavy with contentment rather than exhaustion.
As the movie continues, I feel myself drifting, not toward sleep exactly, but toward a kind of peace I haven't felt in years. Surrounded by the scents and sounds of people who choose to be here, who want to take care of me not because they have to but because they want to.
When Callum starts purring. A low, rumbling sound that vibrates through his chest where my head rests. I let my eyes slip closed and allow myself to float on the edges of consciousness. Safe and warm and exactly where I belong.
"Perfect," I whisper against his shirt, meaning it completely.
This is what I came here looking for without knowing it. Not the absence of people, but the presence of the right people. Not independence from caring, but the freedom to choose who I care about.
And the freedom to choose when I want to be cared for, I think drowsily.To ask for help when I need it and handle things myself when I don't. To be strong enough to be vulnerable.
As I drift toward sleep, surrounded by the quiet contentment of an ordinary evening with extraordinary people, I think about all the Tuesday nights that might stretch ahead of us. All the small moments and quiet comforts and simple joys of building a life together.
It's going to be messy sometimes. Complicated. We'll have to figure out logistics and boundaries and how to be a pack.
But right now, with Callum's purr vibrating against my cheek and Julian's thumb tracing patterns on my skin, all of that feels manageable.
Because we'll figure it out together.
All of us.
Chapter 26
Julian
Inotice things. It's what I do—catalog details, analyze patterns, understand the systems that make people tick. It's served me well in business, helped me build a quiet, ordered life in Honeyridge Falls, and apparently made me irresistible to exactly one omega who appreciates the way I pay attention.
Which is why I know something's troubling her.
It's Tuesday morning, a week and a half since Lila's heat broke and we stumbled into whatever this beautiful, complicated thing between us has become. I'm sitting at her kitchen table with my laptop, supposedly working on quarterly reports for three different businesses, but really watching her move around the space we've all somehow claimed as ours.
She's making coffee with the kind of attention that suggests her mind is elsewhere. The same thoughtful energy she's had for the past few days, actually. Ever since the mail came and she grabbed it before any of us could offer to help, disappearing into the living room for exactly seven minutes before returning with empty hands and a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes.
Seven minutes. I counted because when someone you care about suddenly gains a new layer of consideration in theirexpressions, time becomes important. Seven minutes is long enough to read something twice, maybe make a phone call, definitely long enough to receive news that requires careful thought.
The way she's been moving since then isn't wrong. Lila's too genuine for anything truly wrong, but there's a new carefulness to her interactions. Like she's protecting us from something she's not ready to share.
This morning she checked the locks, windows, and that loose floorboard Callum fixed. Twice.