Epilogue Three
THISTLE
My life was turning into a dream.
I’d soaked in a huge, bubbly tub for three hours tonight with Rogue. Knox and Ace had returned from their first trip a week ago with the best gift an Omega could dream of.
“When do you think the next hunt will be?” I asked as Rogue threw stray pillows back onto my nest bed.
Rogue snorted. “No idea, Kitten. I know he said something about arranging a meeting. He’s trying to get the team more organised.”
He pulled another sliver of vibrant pink from my roots. I’d been working on the mural today. “I think I might need a bubble-cat backpack to put you in.”
We settled into bed, and Rogue turned on a movie while I pulled out my huge pinboard, happy to curl up against him and organise my photos and art.
It wasn’t long before Knox appeared, settling in on my other side and covering me with kisses as I worked.
Ace came in sometimes—and sometimes was enough for me.
Life was everything I’d ever dreamed of.
I had bites from every one of my Alphas—and more than that, they loved the marks I’d given them. Marks I’d once been afraid would make me less.
I had a family at last—one that wanted me for me. And the Misfits were epic neighbours.
Knox and Ace did get along like thickest thieves, but it turned out to be a good thing. I’d never felt Ace so pleased all the time, and Knox had told me the hunts for Ring members might go on for years.
The cherry on top was that I’d realised that it came with presents!
Knox had said that was my superpower—bottling up all the crazy and letting it out on the monsters who deserved it. So we had a special room in the basement with chains for when I got my next gift. Plus, it was completely perfect, because Rogue was a homebody just like me, so I was never alone.
I had room for more photos on this board, but my favourite was in the middle. It had taken some doing. Ace had his golden mask, and ShadowRogue’s outfit was already striking, but Knox was too plain so I’d had to beg him to put the muzzle back on.
The resulting picture of us all was the coolest thing I’d ever seen.
I clutched Bunny, seated on the ground while Ace, Rogue, and Knox posed behind me, looking like the most badass pack you could think of. I had matte gel pens in which I’d scribbled all of our names.
Then there was the picture of me and Bambi covered in paint with our bunny backpacks. Beside it was the shot of me, Bambi, and Bella the day Knox and Ace had arrived home—their first successful catch.
That was when I knew I was truly in a dream.
The picture was from the end of day one with Bella.
Bambi had taken the first turn, and she was smiling wider than I’d ever seen, holding up a peace sign, knife handle in her other fist as she rested her head on Bella’s shoulder, her wild hair matted up from all the blood.
I was on the other side, clutching our plushies so they didn’t get stained and holding the phone for the selfie.
The stupid bitch had lasted a week, which—considering how much I’d wanted her dead—I was quite proud of. It had taken a lot of work to make it last that long.
On top of that, I’d known right before it was over so Knox could come down and see. It was poetic that her mate’s scent had been enough to drag her back to consciousness right before those last moments.
“Please,” she’d whispered, voice weak, tears leaking down her cheeks. “Don’t leave me… Alpha, please… Save me.”
It was like something loosened in his chest, and I thought I felt a final moment of closure through the bond.
Afterwards, I found him in the art room.
He stayed there all night, and me and Bunny sat on the window ledge silently waiting at his side until he was finished.
The piece depicted a young man I didn’t recognise.
He had black hair, and a crooked front tooth.
He wasn’t smiling, but he wasn’t sad, either.
After that, Knox burned all the old black canvases he’d once caught me looking at, and hung the picture of the man in the art room next to the one he’d done the night we’d met Bambi. They were both displayed beside my mural.
He hadn’t said anything, and I hadn’t asked, finding something beautiful in the mystery, just glad he let me stay and watch as I felt, through the bond, an ancient wound slowly stitch up at last.
Next to the Bambi pictures was one I’d drawn of me and Glade in front of a lightning storm—my sister, the one who’d given me Ace. I was still working on the colours of that one.
Then there was a recent photo of Ace and Rogue.
Rogue looked sickened, lying on the couch as Ace—a triumphant grin on his face—held a pair of tweezers with the Monopoly dog in them.
That picture had been taken by Vance after the Misfits had all placed bets on whether Ace would accidentally kill him getting it out.
To Rogue’s horror, I’d stashed the dog in my nest too, but it was important to me—it was how they’d all met.
The art room was a living canvas—one that changed week by week.
Around me in the nest I was piling up stacks and stacks of art. I wanted to get good enough to go down to a market one day and have someone I didn’t know buy a piece.
Sometimes I even caught Ace in my nest, re-arranging furniture with a stiff expression after a particularly out of control fuck had left it in disarray.
I didn’t accuse him of caring how it looked, then he might never do it again, but I caught flashes of his furious instincts demanding he make it right.
I did sketch out the scene, though, tucking it behind the portrait I’d done of him.
My Alphas had also taken me on a group date to the Grand Canyon and it had been breathtaking. We’d sat there all day, sitting on a rock, and I drew and painted the scenery over and over.
My life was no longer fragments of chaos; it was finally flowing together. Every piece of art, every photo, every memory on the board fit into a larger picture: a pack, a family, a future. And everything fit perfectly: my Alphas, Bambi, and the Misfits.
The best part—my Alphas all slept in my nest—sometimes at the same time.
My prized photo was the one I’d snuck in the middle of the night from the light of the bathroom.
Ace was passed out, sprawled across the foot of the bed—it was the day they’d come home from their first hunt, so he was wiped out.
Rogue and Knox had both been cuddling me—until I’d carefully wriggled free—so then it had kinda looked like they were cuddling each other in the picture.
I’d decorated it along the edges with gel pen hearts and stars and added it to the centre of the display.
My pack.
I looked up from the pictures as Rogue turned the TV off, settling into bed when the door creaked and Ace came in.
My heart all but exploded in my chest.
A full pack night.
He was a stubborn prick sometimes, but he was getting better at recognising when he needed my scent to stay steady—and I knew he wanted to be top of his game for the hunts they were planning.
Sometimes partway through the night there’d be a scuffle, and next thing I knew, it would be Ace holding me instead of Knox.
What’s an Omega to do with so many possessive Alphas, Bunny?
Rogue was never involved—both Ace and Knox had reluctantly acclimatised to his pack lead position. Plus he was just too big to fight, so that was that.
I put away my board and settled into bed, taking one last look at it before I burrowed beneath the covers in the middle of all my Alphas.
Beside some of the pictures and my favourite art pieces was a torn-out picture of a glacier like the one I’d kept from the magazines my father owned growing up.
I remembered staring at it for hours, thinking how pretty it was.
Made so much sense to me now. The colours were made of dreams: teals and ice blues to match the eyes of Rogue and Ace.
Beside it, I’d placed one more cut-out—a beautiful image of honey spilling from a honeycomb.
A mirror image of Knox’s eyes in the firelight when we’d spent an evening sketching and listening to music together in the armchairs in the ballroom.
The day I’d met Ace, it had been so clear to me I’d always known he was out there.
Before, I’d thought I was good for no one at all, but he’d been waiting, and so had Rogue.
Knox was different—he was the unexpected.
Someone who loved me without a scent match at all, and that was a special kind of love.
I hugged Bunny tight as I settled into the covers between the scents of ink and antique wood, honied bourbon, and the flash of a fresh lightning storm. My fingers gently traced the bites along my neck.
There was enough love stuffed into one day for a thousand years of living, so I had no idea how I was gonna handle another day of it, let alone a whole life full.
Guess we’ll just have to find a way to manage, won’t we, Bunny?
THE END