Page 120 of Knot Their Safe Haven
"Your intelligence that terrifies weak men. Your compassion that saves broken omegas. Your fury that could reshape the world if properly directed."
"The way you've started trusting us despite decades of betrayal teaching you otherwise."
We're both leaning toward her now, pulled by gravity she doesn't realize she generates. Her breathing has changed, chest rising and falling faster beneath that white blouse with its orange bow.
"Together?" she asks softly.
We know what she means without clarification.
"How you can tell us apart," we say in unison. "How you see us as individuals while accepting we're a matched set. How you don't make us choose between being ourselves and being twins."
"Every other omega has wanted to separate us," I explain. "To claim one and tolerate the other."
"Or wanted us to perform twinness for their fantasies without acknowledging we're different people," Damon adds.
"But you see Dante and Damon while accepting we're also Dante Damon. Singular and plural simultaneously."
She's quiet for a long moment, processing our words with that brilliant mind that probably shouldn't be this attractive.
"I'm glad you're older," she finally says.
"Than?"
"Than Alessandro. Than what society expects. Than what I thought I wanted." She fidgets with her wine glass. "There's something taboo about being nearly forty with a thirty-five-year-old claiming me. But you two are forty-two. Alexis is forty-two. It feels... balanced. Like I'm not robbing cradles or being predatory."
"Predatory," Damon repeats with amusement. "Yes, you definitely seduced us against our will."
"Shut up."
"Make me."
The challenge hangs between us, heavy with possibility. She looks at the carved pumpkins, the empty wine bottles, the privacy of our pavilion as evening deepens around us.
"What do you want to do now?" I ask, voice carefully neutral despite the want coursing through my veins.
She laughs, but it's different—darker, edged with something that makes my cock take interest.
“Honestly? I want to strip out of these clothes and see which of you is better at covering me with pumpkin guts.”
I nearly lost control of my wine glass. The way she said it—sharp, unblinking, as if she were requesting a dessert menu instead of proposing the single most erotic, unhinged spectacle this side of a Renaissance bacchanal—stole the breath right out of my lungs. Damon coughed, caught between laughter and disbelief, while I worked my jaw, trying to realign my brain with the rest of my body.
Velvet ran her tongue casually along her lip, as if tasting her own provocation. She tilted her head, regarding us both with apredatory sort of amusement, and I realized she was enjoying our total, stupefied paralysis.
“Now you’re just showing off,” I said, and my voice came out rougher than planned.
“Isn’t that the point?” She spun her pumpkin on the table, sending a crescent of seeds skidding across the blanket. “I had the distinct impression we were supposed to try things that scare or excite us today. Pumpkins are only the beginning.”
I could sense Damon recalibrating, his hazel eyes darkening as he tried to summon a retort that would one-up her. But Velvet owned the moment, balancing herself between us, radiating smugness and vulnerability in equal measure. She leaned back on her palms, arching slightly, and let her gaze rest on Damon.
“Would you actually do it?” she asked, voice suddenly soft enough that it could have been mistaken for shyness, if not for the impish glimmer in her eye.
Damon grinned, recovering his composure. “Only if there’s a prize for the winner,” he shot back.
“Winner gets what?” she replied, drawing it out for maximum effect. Her eyes flicked over to me, and I felt the challenge like a physical touch.
“First taste,” I said before thinking. The words just appeared, shameless and direct, and hung there between us, raw as a peeled nerve.
Silence. Velvet’s cheeks deepened from pink to scarlet, her breath catching in her chest. She didn’t look away; she held my gaze, daring me to take it back. I wouldn’t.
