Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
GIDEON
I roll out of bed and head to the kitchen. My legs feel a little shaky too, which is ridiculous and also accurate. I run the water, dampen a cloth, and curse under my breath at the scratchy, useless excuse for towels Penelope has in her drawer.
When I come back, Silas is stretched out on one side of the bed, propped on his elbow. He looks calm, but I know him well enough to see the contentment sitting underneath it. He’s smug and trying not to show it.
I throw the cloth at him, and he cleans up what our girl didn’t already handle before tossing the rag in the hamper. He climbs out of bed, grabs his clothes from the chair and shrugs them on, buttons left half-done, and pads out toward the kitchen.
“I’ll start coffee,” he says over his shoulder.
When I join him in the kitchen after getting dressed, Silas is at her counter like he has done this a hundred times. He moves easily, filling the machine, grabbing mugs from the right cabinet, measuring grounds the way he likes them.
Penelope enters the kitchen soon after, her hair damp and hanging all sexy-like, wearing a purple sweatsuit.
She narrows her eyes at both of us. “Stop looking smug.”
“We’re not,” I lie.
“You are absolutely smug,” she says.
I lean over and steal a quick kiss from her, unable to resist. “A little.”
She huffs, but there is a ghost of a smile.
“I made coffee,” Silas tells her as she kisses him softly.
“I like him,” she tells me.
“I know,” I say. “It is deeply rude that I have competition.”
She rolls her eyes.
I watch her walk out of the room barefoot and have to physically drag my gaze back to something that is not the backs of her legs. She returns moments later with slippers on her feet.
“Good look on you,” Silas says.
“Which one?” she asks. “The sweats or the post shower hair.”
“Both,” he says, and he’s right.
I take the mug he hands me and lean against the counter near her, shoulder almost brushing hers. For a moment it feels unnervingly normal—morning, coffee, casual silence, if you ignore the whole step-family, sex club, nephew-disaster part.
We drink quietly. The coffee is strong and dark and starts putting my brain back in order.
I see the moment her mind starts to wander down the same road as last night.
Her fingers tighten around the mug as she stares into it like she’s reading something at the bottom.
“We need to talk about him,” she says.
She doesn’t say his name. She doesn’t have to. The air shifts.
“We do,” I answer.
Silas nods once. “We know he tried to blackmail you. We also know you would’ve set the place on fire if anything happened you didn’t choose.”
He’s right. She’s not timid. She doesn’t fold. If something had gone wrong, we wouldn’t be piecing it together backward; we would’ve heard the explosion in real time.
Her shoulders hunch a little. “I let him,” she says, the words heavy. “In the closet. I told him how to touch me. I was mad and turned on and overwhelmed, and I wanted to feel something that wasn’t that. He was there, and he wanted me, and it felt like taking back control. So I did.”
I nod slowly. “There’s nothing wrong with you choosing that. Not with wanting it. Not with using him for it.”
Her mouth twists. “He’s still my student in my TA class and my stepbrother.”
“He was your student before last night.” Silas’ voice is even. “You knew that when you told him no. You knew that when you decided to cross that line. That choice is on you, and you’re already carrying it. We’re not here to pile shame on top.”
She looks up at him like she almost can't believe he’s not angry with her.
“You should be mad,” she says.
“Oh, I’m mad,” Silas replies. “Just not at you.”
“At him,” she says quietly.
“At him,” I confirm. “For taking advantage of what he knows about you. For using your secrets as leverage. For pushing when you already said no.”
“He did back off a little after I went on that study date…session with him,” she says. “He stopped talking when I said no more words, just fingers.” She grimaces. “God, that sounds worse out loud.”
Silas’ eyes soften in that way he gets when he is being extremely rational and extremely kind at the same time. “It sounds like consent layered over terrible timing. Messy and human, not criminal.”
“Either way,” I say, “he’s not our focus right now. You are. We’ll handle him separately. You’re not going to be alone in that, and you’re not going to have to pretend everything is fine if he keeps pushing.”
Suspicion creases her brow. “What does handle mean?”
“Talk first,” Silas says. “Firmly. With both of us. No threats. No violence. Yet.”
The yet hits something primal in me too, but I keep my face neutral.
“I don’t want you to scare him off campus,” she says. “Or cause trouble with Abi. She’s already going to be a nightmare when she finds out about us.”
I snort. “Abi can survive a bruise to her pride. She’s survived worse.”
Silas’ eyes flicker.
“We meant what we said,” I continue. “We let you lead with Talon. If you want distance, we will support that. If you want a confrontation, we will back you up. If you want to pretend the closet never happened and keep it professional, we keep an eye on him and step in if he forgets his place.”
She exhales slowly. “Okay.”
Silas studies her. “You don’t have to decide today.”
“I know,” she says. “I’ll probably change my mind ten times.”
“That’s allowed,” I tell her.
She goes back to staring at the laminate, eyes fixed on the tiny chip near the edge like it holds all the answers. I know that look. I have my own version of it.
“There’s another thing,” she says eventually.
“Of course there is,” I mutter into my mug.
She sets hers down because her hands have started shaking.
“You two are Abi’s brother and former brother-in-law,” she says.
“You’re Talon’s uncles. You’re going to be my…
family by marriage. You know how that sounds, right?
I’m the stepdaughter who’s already slept with the uncle and the other uncle and kissed the stepbrother.
There isn’t enough therapy in the state for that sentence. ”
Silas and I both go still.
“So,” she continues, voice scraping a little, “we should probably stop. It’s the smart move.
The clean one. We had some fun. We keep it in the vault, and I go back to being the TA who doesn’t sleep with anyone related to her stepmother.
You go back to finding women who aren’t tied into this mess. We cut our losses.”
The words hit hard, even though I knew they were coming. They make sense. They’re logical. They’re also completely unacceptable.
“Is that what you want?” I ask.
Her eyes shine, but she keeps her chin up. “Yes,” she says, then shakes her head. “No. I don’t know. I know it’s what I should want.”
“That’s not the same thing,” Silas says quietly.
“You being Abi’s family makes this uglier than it already was,” she goes on. “She’ll weaponize it if she finds out. She’ll hurt my dad with it. And I’m so tired of dealing with her bullshit.”
“We won’t hand her ammunition,” I say.
“You exist,” she says. “That is the ammunition.”
Silas steps closer, bracing his hand on the counter next to hers, not quite touching but anchoring the space. “Penelope,” he says. “Look at me.”
She does.
“You’re not the one who made this messy,” he says. “Abi did that a long time ago. She made this family a minefield long before you walked into it. You being with us doesn’t break anything. It just shows the cracks that were already there.”
I nod. “If anyone should back out to make it simpler, it should be us, not you.”
Her voice is small when she asks, “Are you going to?”
“No,” we both say.
She lets out a sound that hovers between a laugh and a sob. “You’re both idiots.”
“Probably,” I say. “But we’re not walking away unless you tell us you don’t want this. Not because of how it looks on a family tree. Not because Abi is a hurricane in heels. Not because some gossip column would need a flowchart to explain us.”
A little snort escapes her. “We’d need algebra for this.”
“Exactly,” I say. “If you want out because your feelings changed, we walk. If you want out because you’re scared, we slow down and tread carefully. If you want in and you’re just worried about everybody else, that’s a different conversation.”
She looks at the floor, then at us, like she’s trying to decide which world she wants to live in.
“It scares me,” she says finally. “A lot.”
“Me too,” Silas answers.
That surprises her. “You?”
“Yes,” he says. “I’m not used to sharing someone I care about with anyone. I’m not used to the idea of being step-anything to the woman in my bed. It’s messy. It makes my head hurt if I think too hard.”
“It makes me want to punch Talon twice as much,” I add.
She chokes out half a laugh.
“But,” Silas continues, “it also feels right when you’re between us. When you laugh. When you call me out on my shit. When you look at him like he hung the moon and me like I moved the tide. I like how this feels more than I’m afraid of the rest.”
Her eyes flick to mine.
“I’m not interested in some neat little box if it doesn’t have you in it,” I say simply.
The pressure behind her eyes breaks; a tear slips free. She wipes it away, annoyed. “Don’t say things like that unless you mean them.”
“We mean them,” we say together.
Of course we do. That's the problem and the solution.
She breathes in. Out. Color starts to come back into her face.
“Okay,” she says. “We try.”
Relief hits so hard I have to close my eyes for a second. Silas’ shoulders drop a fraction, the closest he gets to sagging.
“But we take it slow,” she adds. “And honest. No hiding things. No half truths. Club rules apply outside the club too. Full consent. Full disclosure. If something feels off, we stop and talk about it. If one of us taps out, the other two listen. And if this ever starts to hurt more than it helps, we reassess before it explodes.”
“Agreed,” I say immediately.
“Completely,” Silas echoes.
Her smile is small and shaky but real. I want to frame it.
“Tonight,” I say, “we go to Velvet. We sit down. We talk kinks, limits, what we want out of this, all of it. We give ourselves the kind of structure we would give any other scene. Only this is not just a scene.”
“This is our life,” Silas says.
“And Talon,” she reminds us.
“And Talon,” I say. “After we talk as a trio, I’ll talk to him. Uncle to nephew. Not to scare him off you, but to set him straight about threats and lines.”
Silas smiles, slow and sharp. “And if that doesn’t work, I’ll talk to him.”
“Try words first,” she says.
“We will,” he promises.
The room lightens again. Not fixed, not safe, but less oppressive.
She rinses her empty mug and sets it in the sink. “I need a nap.”
I arch a brow. “Want company?”
“Nice try,” she says. “You’re both in timeout until tonight. I need my brain on straight.”
“I’m offended,” I mutter.
“You’ll live,” she shoots back.
Silas steps in and cups her cheek, thumb brushing her skin. “We’ll pick you up at eight.”
“Together,” I add.
“Scandalous,” she says.
She leans into his hand for a second, then rises on her toes and presses a quick kiss to my jaw. It feels like being chosen even though I know she’s choosing both of us.
“I’m terrified,” she admits.
“Good,” Silas says, voice soft but sure. “That means it matters.”
I rest my hand at the small of her back, steady. “Terrified and relieved,” she adds quietly.
The words land in my chest with a weight that feels right.
“Us too,” I tell her.
For the first time since last night, it doesn't feel like we’re standing at the edge of a cliff waiting to fall.
It feels like we might actually be building something instead.