Chapter 47 #2
"She sounds like you," he said quietly, his voice barely above a whisper, rough as gravel. His pale eyes glistened in the dim light, and he blinked rapidly, fighting against the tears he never let himself shed.
"I learned from the best." I pulled his hand to my lips and kissed his scarred knuckles, one by one, slow and reverent.
"She taught me that wild things recognize each other.
That home isn't a place—it's the people who see you exactly as you are and love you anyway.
" I looked at all three of them, my heart so full it felt like it might burst. "You're my home now. All of you."
The silence that followed was thick with emotion, heavy with words none of us knew how to say.
Outside, the bayou hummed its endless song—frogs and insects and the distant splash of Gumbo patrolling his territory.
Inside, we breathed together, tangled in our nest of borrowed blankets and offered shirts and promises not yet spoken.
"So," Remy said eventually, his voice rough but steadying, like he was pulling himself back together piece by piece. He propped himself up on one elbow, looking down at me with those amber eyes that sparkled even in the darkness. His free hand traced lazy patterns on my hip. "Tomorrow."
"Tomorrow," I confirmed, my heart kicking against my ribs at the word, sudden and sharp. I pressed my palm flat against my chest, trying to steady myself. "Harper first. Then you. Then Silas."
"You sure about the order?" Harper's voice rumbled against my back, vibrating through my bones, and I felt his hand splay wide across my stomach—protective, grounding. "We can change it if you want. It's your choice, Artemis. It's always your choice."
"I'm sure." I twisted to look at him again, reaching up to touch his face, tracing the worry line between his brows. "You're my Head Alpha. You were the first one to see me, the first one to make me feel safe. It's right that you're first."
His eyes closed, and he turned his head to press a kiss into my palm. The gesture was so tender, so unlike the fierce Alpha the world saw, that my heart clenched.
"And I'm second because I'm the prettiest?" Remy asked, breaking the moment with that irrepressible grin. His dimples flashed even in the low light, and he struck a mock-pose, one hand behind his head like a pinup model, making me snort despite the gravity of the moment.
"You're second because you make me laugh," I told him, poking his chest with my finger hard enough to make him grunt.
"Because when everything is hard and scary, you remind me that joy is worth fighting for.
Because you see me—really see me—and you're not afraid of what you find.
" I poked him again for good measure. "Also because if I made you go last, you'd pout for a week, and nobody wants to deal with that. "
"I don't pout," Remy protested, his lower lip jutting out in what was definitely, absolutely a pout.
"You're literally pouting right now." I reached up and poked his protruding lower lip with my fingertip, making him sputter.
"This is a dignified expression of mild displeasure." He drew himself up with as much hauteur as a man lying in a nest of blankets could manage, which wasn't much.
"It's a pout." I kept my face perfectly straight, even as laughter bubbled in my chest.
Harper's chest shook with silent laughter behind me, his breath warm against my hair. "It's definitely a pout."
"Betrayal," Remy declared, pressing a hand to his heart, his eyes going wide with theatrical wounded outrage.
"From my own Head Alpha. I am wounded." His grin softened into something more genuine, more vulnerable, the performance falling away like a shed skin.
He caught my hand and pressed it flat against his chest, over his heart.
I could feel it pounding beneath my palm, fast and strong, betraying the emotions he hid behind jokes.
"And Silas is last," I continued, turning to meet those pale, watchful eyes, "because he's my unexpected gift.
The one I didn't know I needed until he was already there.
Because he understands the darkness, and he doesn't try to fix it—he just sits with me in it until we find our way to the light together. "
Silas made a sound low in his throat, something between a growl and a whimper, the noise vibrating against my lips.
He pulled me toward him, past Remy, and kissed me—deep and desperate and full of everything he couldn't put into words.
His scarred hands cradled my face like I was something precious, something fragile, even though we both knew I was anything but.
When he finally let me go, we were both breathing hard, foreheads pressed together, his thumbs stroking my cheekbones.
"I don't deserve you," he rasped, his voice wrecked, shattered into pieces. His breath came in short pants against my lips, warm and unsteady. "Any of you."
"Bullshit," Harper said flatly from behind me, his voice cutting through the heavy air like a blade.
I felt his chest shake with a silent huff, and his hand squeezed my hip.
The blunt profanity startled a laugh out of all of us—Remy's bright and surprised, mine watery, Silas's more of a choked exhale.
"He's right," I said, pulling back to look at Silas properly, cupping his scarred face in my hands so he couldn't look away.
His pale eyes were bright with unshed tears, his jaw clenched tight against the emotion threatening to spill over.
"That's survivor's guilt talking, not truth.
You deserve everything good, Silas. You deserve love and home and pack.
You deserve to be happy." I kissed his scarred cheek, feeling the uneven skin beneath my lips, then his closed eyelids, his lashes fluttering against my mouth, then the corner of his lips where they trembled.
"And starting tomorrow, I'm going to spend the rest of my life proving it to you. "
We lay there for a long time, wrapped around each other in our nest of mingled scents and borrowed warmth.
The moon rose outside the window, painting silver stripes across the floor.
Gumbo rumbled somewhere in the darkness beyond the cabin, a prehistoric lullaby that had soothed me to sleep since childhood.
"I'm scared," I admitted into the quiet, the words small and honest, barely louder than a breath.
My fingers twisted in the fabric of Remy's shirt, needing something to hold onto.
"Not about the bonding—I want that more than I've ever wanted anything.
But after. When we're tied together forever. What if—"
"What if what?" Harper's voice was steady, unshakeable, an anchor in the dark. His hand rubbed slow circles on my stomach, grounding me, pulling me back from the spiral of doubt. I could feel the calluses on his palm through the thin fabric of my shirt.
"What if it changes things? What if being bonded makes you see me differently?
What if I'm not—" I swallowed hard, forcing myself to finish, my voice dropping to a whisper.
"What if I'm not enough?" The silence stretched, but it wasn't uncomfortable.
It was the silence of three men choosing their words carefully, understanding the weight of what I'd just confessed.
"Artemis." Remy spoke first, his voice stripped of all performance, nothing but raw honesty.
He shifted closer, his nose brushing mine, his breath warm against my lips.
"You are the most enough person I have ever met.
You are too much in the best possible way.
You are exactly right, exactly as you are. "
"The bond won't change how we see you," Harper added, his arm tightening around me, pulling me back against his broad chest until I could feel his heartbeat against my spine—slow and steady, the rhythm of absolute certainty.
"It'll just make official what we already know.
That you're ours, and we're yours, and nothing in this world or the next is going to change that. "
"I spent years believing I didn't deserve to live," Silas said quietly, his voice rough but steady, each word deliberate and hard-won.
His thumb traced circles on my hip, the touch grounding him as much as me.
"That I was broken beyond repair. Then I met you, and you looked at me like I was whole.
Like I was worth something." His breath caught, his chest hitching against Remy's back.
"The bond isn't going to change that, Artemis.
It's just going to make it permanent. And I can't think of anything I want more. "
The tears came then, silent and warm, tracking down my cheeks into the pillows. But they weren't sad tears—they were the kind that came from being too full, from having more love than your body knew how to contain.
"I love you," I whispered, the words slipping out on a shaky breath, feeling sacred in the darkness. "All of you. So much it terrifies me."
"Good terror or bad terror?" Remy asked, his hand finding mine in the darkness, his fingers interlacing with mine and squeezing gently. I could feel his pulse thrumming against my wrist, quick and alive, matching the rhythm of my own racing heart.
"The best kind," I said, lacing my fingers through his, holding on tight like he might float away if I let go. My voice was steadier now, the fear receding in the face of their certainty. "The kind that means it matters. The kind that means I have something worth being afraid to lose."
"You won't lose us," Harper promised, his lips brushing my temple, warm and soft, lingering there like a benediction. His arm was a solid weight across my body, anchoring me to this moment, to this nest, to them. His voice dropped even lower, rough with emotion. "Not ever."
"Good." I sniffed, wiping my eyes with the back of my free hand, feeling the wetness smear across my skin. I blinked hard, trying to compose myself. "Because you're all stuck with me now. No returns, no exchanges. You knew what you were getting into."
"A stubborn, sharp-tongued Omega who argues with everyone and keeps a nine-foot alligator as a pet?" Remy pretended to consider this, tapping his chin thoughtfully, his brow furrowed in mock-deep thought. "Yeah, we knew exactly what we were getting into."
"Gumbo is not a pet. He's family. There's a difference." I lifted my chin, my tone brooking no argument on this particular point.
"The difference being that pets don't eat uninvited guests?" Remy's eyebrows climbed toward his hairline, his lips twitching with barely suppressed amusement.
"Exactly. See? You're learning." I patted his cheek with exaggerated approval, making him laugh and catch my hand, pressing a kiss to my palm.
Silas's chest rumbled with a quiet laugh—rare and precious, a sound I was still learning to coax out of him. His pale eyes crinkled at the corners, softening his usually stoic face. "She's got you there."
"Everyone's got me today," Remy complained, throwing his free arm dramatically across his forehead, but he was smiling, his dimples cutting deep grooves in his cheeks. "This is a very hostile nest environment."
"You love it," I told him, poking his ribs and making him squirm.
"I love you," he corrected, catching my hand and stilling it against his chest, his voice going soft and sincere, the humor draining away into something real. His amber eyes held mine, no masks, no performance. "All of you. Even when you gang up on me."
"Especially when we gang up on you," Harper rumbled, his voice vibrating through my back where I pressed against him. Remy laughed—bright and warm, filling the small room like sunlight, his whole body shaking with the joy of it.
We fell asleep like that—tangled together in our nest, hearts beating in sync, the moon watching over us through the window.
Tomorrow, the bonding would begin. Tomorrow, everything would change.
Tonight, we had this. Four people who'd found each other against all odds, wrapped in warmth and love and the wild magic of the bayou.
It was more than enough.
It was everything.