Chapter 27
CHAPTER
TWENTY-SEVEN
JULIUS
I woke up before I fully moved, and it was the first thing I noticed. It wasn’t the light creeping in through the windows or the ache in my back and neck from sleeping on the couch.
It was her.
Only her.
Isla was still there, curled into me like she hadn’t moved all night. Her back was pressed against my chest with my arm locked around her waist. It was the same way we always slept, and I loved that it hadn’t changed despite what happened last night between all of us.
I didn’t remember falling asleep, only recalling not wanting to let her go. My body stiffened a bit as I opened my eyes, blinking slowly, trying to adjust to the quiet. Through the silence, I felt it.
Him.
I didn’t have to turn my head to know where Kraven was, but I did anyway. He was exactly where I expected him to be—on the other side of her. His hand rested on her hip like it belonged there.
For a mere second, everything inside me snapped tight. It was instinct, that familiar, violent pull to lose my shit. My arm held her harder against me before I could stop it.
She stirred, slow and soft at first. She wasn’t startled or tense. She was comfortable.
Happy.
It was what stopped me from wanting to lose control over what I allowed to happen, over what I started with. When I left the house yesterday, I didn’t know where to go, but ended up at a random bar I was dealing at. I didn’t get drunk, but I had a few drinks. It was the only way I could loosen up.
It was the only way I could consider what Kraven was insisting on. I let my mind think of what life would be like if we could just share her. I didn’t think it would go this far last night, but one thing always led to another when it came to us, and this was no different.
Isla wasn’t uncomfortable being there between us, probably since she was used to it, but this time, it was in an unusual way. My chest hardened more than it should have. I wanted this. I chose this… I kept reminding myself that.
“Already up?” I greeted, barely above a whisper.
She froze for a second, tilting her head up, trying to place where she was for a moment.
“I didn’t mean to wake you,” she murmured.
“You didn’t,” I replied, loosening my hold on her. I didn’t move my arm. I didn’t even think about it.
“You’re up,” Kraven announced, already awake too.
I sighed, my hand dragging lightly along her side, preparing myself for I don’t know what. I didn’t look at him right away, not wanting to. I didn’t trust what I’d see or feel.
He was watching her, not me.
His Kitty.
He was calm and focused, like this was something he already accepted before I even showed back up last night. It should’ve pissed me off, and it normally would. I swallowed at the thought, shifting behind her. I focused on sitting with that thought rather than reacting to it.
If this was going to work, if we were really going to try this, I’d need to change my reaction to how I handled Kraven and her. It was what came with the title of sharing her. This wasn’t something I could easily walk away from. It wasn’t something I regretted either.
I chose this, and now I was living with the aftermath of what that meant and where we went from there.
“We’re not pretending this didn’t happen.” I blurted the words before I could think them through.
The second I said them, I knew I meant them. Every single word.
Kraven didn’t hesitate. “No,” he agreed. “We’re not.”
She shifted slightly in my arms, her fingers brushing lightly against my forearm like she was trying to understand this too.
“You’re both still here.” She smiled.
I huffed out a breath, a laugh catching in my chest.
“Yeah.” I blinked. “We are.” Narrowing my gaze at her, I questioned, “What, you think I was going to leave?”
Isla met my stare. “I think you may have thought about it.”
“I wasn’t going anywhere. Not ever again. I’m not leaving you, Isla. I need you to believe that again.”
That familiar tension floated in my chest, but it didn’t hit the same way this time. It didn’t burn. It didn’t break. It was simply there.
I finally pulled my arm back, slower this time, watching her more carefully. She didn’t flinch or lean away, staying where she was.
Between us.
Right in the middle. She wasn’t forced to stay there. She was choosing to. I pushed myself up off the couch, running my hand through my hair.
“I need coffee,” I announced.
It was a weak excuse, and we all knew it. I needed a second to breathe, trying to figure out what the hell I was supposed to do with all this.
Kraven moved quickly. “You don’t have to run.”
I shook my head, not looking back. “I’m not running.”
“It looks like it. I know what this is, Julius.”
“Do you?” I shot back.
His gaze didn’t waver. “Yes.”
I glanced back at Isla, who was now watching both of us. But not in a cautious way, which was the expression I was used to.
“I don’t know what this is,” I said. “I don’t know how this works, but I know one thing,” I continued. “I’m not losing her.”
Kraven nodded. “Good.”
I scoffed. “That’s it?”
“What do you want me to say?”
I hesitated, unsure. Nothing about this made any sense, yet there we were, trying to make sense of it. Or maybe that was only me. I was standing there having a conversation I never thought I’d have with either of them. Nothing about this was normal. It was unfamiliar and uncontrolled.
“I’m not losing her to you.” I forced the rest out. “Or losing her without you.”
Kraven studied me for a second before he nodded. “Then stop acting like you are.”
I looked back at her again. At the way she was sitting there, just watching.
Waiting.
And for the first time, I didn’t feel like I was losing her.
ISLA
I didn’t move right away after Julius walked into the kitchen.
I just sat there. Even with the space he created, I still felt him. Still felt the imprint of his arm around me and the heat of his body lingering like he hadn’t really left at all.
Kraven didn’t move either. He stayed exactly where he was, watching me the same way he had been when I woke up.
He called me out. “You’re thinking too much,” he whispered, only loud enough for me to hear.
I blinked, my gaze shifting to him. “Am I that obvious?”
“Yes.”
A small, breathless laugh escaped my lips. “That’s not comforting.”
“It’s not supposed to be.”
I shook my head slightly, looking down at my hands. “I don’t even know what I’m supposed to think or feel,” I admitted.
He didn’t respond right away, not trying to fill the abrupt silence. That was one of the things I loved about him. Kraven never tried to fill the stillness in the air. He always accepted it, waiting for it to pass.
“You don’t have to decide anything right now,” he said after a moment.
I looked back up at him. “That’s what you keep saying.”
“Because it’s true.”
“But it doesn’t feel like it is.”
His expression changed. “How does it feel?”
I hesitated. Unaware of how to explain it without sounding like I was losing it.
“I guess I feel like everything has changed, and there’s no going back to what we were before.”
“What we were before wasn’t any place I want to be.”
The certainty in his voice should have scared me, but it didn’t. It helped me.
“Kitty, I decided a long time ago I wasn’t walking away from you.”
“And this?” I questioned. “What we did…?”
His gaze didn’t waver. “It doesn’t change anything about how much I love you. If anything, it added to it.”
My breath caught. Footsteps sounded behind us as the weight of Julius’s presence loomed over us.
I could feel his stare on us, on me. It was obvious he was trying to figure it out without having to ask the question out loud.
“Coffee?” Julius offered, breaking the tension.
I turned, glancing up at him. “Please.”
His eyes lingered on me for a second longer than necessary before he turned back toward the kitchen.
Kraven didn’t move, and when Julius came back, he didn’t hand me the cup right away. Again, he just stood there until I reached for the mug, my fingers brushing his.
“Sit.” I smiled.
Julius’s eyebrows lifted, playfully responding, “You telling me what to do now?”
“Maybe,” I challenged, holding his gaze.
And suddenly, I was between them again. It was just like before, only this time…
We weren’t pretending it didn’t mean anything.