Chapter 12 Theo
Theo
Icouldn’t wait.
Lucas came home from his date glowing. Actually glowing. He found me in the kitchen and told me everything—the pen name, the books, the fact that she’d written us into her stories for a decade. Three alphas and an omega who returns to her small hometown.
“Scarlett Monroe,” he said. “Look her up.”
I did. By three in the morning, I’d read all four books. I could hear Lucas still awake in his room down the hall, probably doing the same thing.
By sunrise, I’d made a decision. I’d spent a decade holding back, being patient, waiting for the right moment. The right moment was now.
I asked Lucas for her number over coffee. He gave it without question, along with: “Don’t overthink it. Just ask.”
So I did. And now she’s standing in my greenhouse, surrounded by winter blooms, looking at me like I’m someone worth looking at. Telling me she wrote those books because she couldn’t stop wanting what we almost had.
I’ve imagined this moment for ten years.
I didn’t imagine the part where she’d kiss me first and I’d nearly combust.
We walk from the greenhouse toward the cottage, her hand in mine.
The snow crunches under our boots and her scent surrounds me—honey and citrus and something sweeter underneath.
Arousal. Want. My body responds without permission—pulse pounding, every alpha instinct I have screaming to pull her back into the greenhouse and finish what she started.
Ours. What’s ours. She belongs to all three of us.
But right now it’s just me, and I’m focusing very hard on walking in a straight line.
“You okay over there?” she asks. “You’re gripping my hand like it might escape.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. You’re doing that thing where you clench your jaw.”
“I don’t have a thing.”
“You’ve had the thing since ninth grade. You did it whenever you were trying not to say something.” She squeezes my hand. “What aren’t you saying?”
I take a breath. Let it out slowly. Try to think about anything except how good she smells, how much I want to bury my face in her neck and breathe her in.
“I’m trying very hard to walk to my cottage instead of dragging you back to the greenhouse.”
“Oh.” Her scent shifts—honey and citrus going warm and thick. “That’s... good to know.”
“Is it?”
“Very informative.” She’s smiling. I can hear it in her voice. “I appreciate the transparency.”
“I’m working on asking for what I want. Apparently it involves confessing my every thought like a lunatic.”
She laughs. “I like it. Keep going.”
“I want to cook you dinner. I want to sit across from you at my table and watch you eat something I made. I want—” I stop myself. “This is ridiculous. I sound ridiculous.”
“You sound honest.” She leans into my side as we walk. “It’s refreshing.”
The cottage comes into view—snow blanketing the roof, clinging to the window boxes I planted last spring.
“This is my space,” I say. “Converted it a few years back. Office, kitchenette, somewhere to crash when I’m working late.” I planted the window boxes, added hanging ferns to the little front porch. Made it into something that feels like mine, even if I sleep at the farmhouse most nights.
“You have your own little hideaway,” she says, looking at the cottage with something like delight.
“Is that good?”
“It’s very good.” She’s already heading for the front door. “Show me around.”
Inside, the cottage is warm—I left the heat on this morning, hoping—and smells like earth and green things.
Plants everywhere, of course. Potted herbs on the windowsill, a fiddle leaf fig in the corner, trailing pothos along the bookshelves.
It’s small, just one main room with a kitchenette along one wall, but I’ve made it cozy.
Cara walks through, trailing her fingers over leaves, looking at everything.
“It’s like a jungle in here,” she says, but she’s smiling. “I love it.”
“I can’t help myself. If there’s an empty surface, I put a plant on it.”
“What’s this one?” She’s touching a trailing vine near the window.
“String of pearls. Finicky, but worth it.” I watch her examine the delicate beads. “Most people think I’d want to leave work at work. But plants calm me down. They don’t expect anything except water and light.”
“What else did you fill this place with?” She moves to the bookshelf, tilts her head to read the spines. “Gardening manuals? Seed catalogs?”
“Some. And novels, when I can’t sleep.” I shrug. “I wanted to understand what it would be like. To live surrounded by growing things.”
“And what did you conclude?”
“That it takes patience. And faith.” I meet her eyes. “Believing that something invisible underground is going to become something beautiful. Even when you can’t see it yet.”
“Is that the metaphor again?”
“Maybe.” Her smile softens. “I’m a writer. Everything’s a metaphor.”
I move past her to the kitchenette, needing to do something with my hands. “What do you like? For dinner. I’ve got pasta, or I could do stir fry, or—”
“What do you want to make?”
I pause. “What?”
“You asked what I want. I’m asking what you want.” She leans against the counter, watching me. “This is your space. Your kitchen. Make whatever makes you happy.”
Nobody asks me that. Not even Lucas.
“Risotto,” I say. “I want to make risotto. It takes forever and it’s kind of pretentious, but I love it.”
“Then make risotto.” She pulls out a kitchen stool and sits. “Can I watch?”
“You want to watch me cook?”
“I want to watch you do something you love.” Her eyes are warm. “Is that okay?”
More than okay. It’s everything.
I cook while she watches.
It’s strangely intimate—more intimate than the kiss, somehow. Standing at my stove, stirring rice, adding broth ladle by ladle, while Cara Donovan sits at my counter and asks questions about my life.
Risotto requires attention. You can’t rush it, can’t walk away from it. You have to stay present, keep stirring, add liquid at exactly the right moment. It’s the kind of cooking that demands you be here, fully, instead of letting your mind wander.
Kind of like having this conversation.
“When did you take over the nursery?”
“Six years ago. Bought it from the Hendersons when they retired.” I add another ladle of broth, stir slowly.
The rice is starting to release its starch, turning the liquid creamy.
“Old Mr. Henderson built it from nothing. One greenhouse, some savings, and a dream. Everyone told him he was crazy—nursery work in Montana, where winter lasts half the year. But he made it work. When he was ready to sell, I couldn’t let it go to anyone else. ”
“So you took over his dream.”
“Expanded it, actually.” I glance at her. “Added the second greenhouse, started the landscaping side of the business. Made it mine.”
“I’m sure he would be proud.”
“I hope so.” I add more broth. Stir. The rhythm is soothing. “What about you? The romance novels. When did that start?”
“Honestly? Right after I left.” She traces a pattern on the counter with her finger, the same way she used to doodle in the margins of her notebooks in high school.
“I went to college for writing, but I thought I’d be literary.
Serious. The next great American novelist.” She laughs, but it’s quiet.
Sad. “Then I got there and I was alone in a new city, missing everyone, and I started writing something different. Just for myself at first. Little stories about a girl and the three boys who loved her. It was pathetic, really. But it helped me feel less alone.”
“It turned into a career.”
“Eventually. After a lot of rejection and terrible first drafts and crying on my kitchen floor at two in the morning.” She accepts the glass of wine I pour her, wrapping both hands around the stem.
“The first book took three years to write. I almost gave up a dozen times. Convinced myself nobody would want to read about an omega who couldn’t make up her mind. ”
“But you didn’t give up.”
“No. Because every time I thought about quitting, I’d think about you three. About the story I wanted to tell. About how it felt to be loved by people who didn’t ask you to be less than you were.” She meets my eyes. “You kept me going. Even when you didn’t know it. Even when I didn’t deserve it.”
My throat goes tight. “Cara...”
“I know it’s a lot. I know I don’t have the right to say things like that after what I did.” She looks down at her wine. “But you asked what kept me writing. And the answer is you. All three of you. Always.”
I focus on the risotto—add more broth, stir, breathe. If I look at her right now, I’m going to abandon this pan and kiss her senseless.
“Theo?” Her voice is soft.
“I’m glad,” I say, voice rough. “That we helped. Even if we didn’t know it.”
She’s quiet for a moment, watching me cook. I can feel her eyes on me, can smell the shift in her scent—something warm and wanting underneath the honey-citrus. But she doesn’t push. She lets me finish.
That might be the sexiest thing anyone’s ever done for me.
The risotto comes together perfectly—creamy and rich, exactly how I like it. I plate it carefully, add a little parmesan, carry both bowls to the small kitchen table.
“This smells incredible,” she says, sliding off the stool to join me.
“Wait until you taste it.”
We eat at my small kitchen table, knees bumping under the cramped space, passing bread back and forth.
“This is incredible,” Cara says around her third bite. “You’re an amazing cook.”
“I like feeding people.” I shrug. “Lucas and Nate get sick of my experiments, but they still eat everything I make.”
“I live on takeout and frozen dinners.”
“That’s tragic.” I reach over and wipe a bit of sauce from the corner of her mouth with my thumb. Her breath catches. I pull my hand back, suddenly aware of what I did. “Sorry. That was—”
“Don’t apologize.” Her voice is soft. “I like that you don’t think about it. You just... touch me. Like it’s the most natural thing in the world.”
“It feels like it is.”