Chapter 12
The mansion was quiet, the kind of quiet that only came during daylight hours, when the vampires were deep in their death-like sleep and the rest of us could finally breathe without feeling the weight of their presence filling the walls.
Sunlight streamed through the tall windows, filtered by the thick velvet curtains the brothers hated but tolerated for our sake. Dust motes danced in the light, soft and gold, like the world had briefly forgotten what darkness was.
I sat curled on one of the long sofas in the sitting room, the faint sound of laughter carrying from the adjoining play area.
Layla’s son, Aleksander, was sitting on the rug surrounded by a small army of wooden animals and toy soldiers. Beside him, Sorcha’s daughter, little Suraya, was trying to teach him how to make the toys “fly.” Mostly, it ended in laughter and toppled blocks.
There was a kind of calming peace in this house, but peace, I’d learned, could be a fragile thing.
Sorcha entered from the kitchen, a tray in her hands stacked with cups of coffee and a plate of pastries. Layla followed close behind, a smile tugging at her lips even as she looked over her shoulder toward the hallway.
“They’ll sleep until sunset,” she said softly, catching my look. “Roman and the others could sleep through the apocalypse if they needed to. Especially after last night.”
I took one of the cups she offered, fingers curling around the warmth. “Do they always do that?”
“Disappear before dawn and come home covered in blood?” Sorcha asked dryly, settling beside me. “Yes. Unfortunately.”
I smiled faintly. “I thought it was just Volken.”
Layla laughed softly, tucking a strand of her dark hair behind her ear. “Oh, it’s all of them. Roman, Lucien, Draugr, Viking…they’ve always been like this. Always preparing, always protecting. But it’s gotten worse since Caesar resurfaced.”
At that name, Sorcha’s expression tightened. “Lucien hasn’t talked about it, but I can feel it through the bond. He’s… angry. And he’s trying to hide it.”
Layla nodded, her gaze distant. “Roman, too. He pretends he’s calm, but his power hums differently when something’s wrong. I can feel it in the walls.”
I hesitated, then said quietly, “Volken’s been the same. He doesn’t say much, but it’s like he’s… somewhere else lately. I can feel it. The bond pulls tighter when he’s gone too long.”
Sorcha’s hand found mine, warm and grounding. “That’s how it starts. The bond, it’s not just love. It’s energy. It ties your life to his, your emotions to his power. When he’s unsettled, you feel it. When he’s angry, it pulls at you.”
Layla added softly, “And when he’s hurting, it will ache. Even if he doesn’t say a word.”
I swallowed, my throat suddenly tight. “That sounds terrifying.”
Sorcha gave a small, knowing smile. “It can be. But it’s also beautiful. You’ll learn that, too.”
Before I could answer, a soft laugh echoed from the rug where the children were playing. Aleksander was tugging on Suraya’s curls, earning a high-pitched giggle.
Layla sighed, half amused, half exasperated. “He’s definitely Roman’s son, already starting fights and charming his way out of them.”
Sorcha smirked. “She’s no better. Lucien says she’s already learned how to stare people down until they do what she wants. I wonder where she gets that from.”
Layla and I both laughed, and for a few moments, it felt like the world outside the mansion didn’t exist. Like there weren’t demons, traitors, or dark vampires whispering behind the shadows.
It was strange, how quickly the three of us had fallen into something that felt like family. Maybe it was the shared madness of loving these impossible men. Maybe it was survival. Either way, it was real.
The moment was broken by the sound of footsteps approaching. Gideon appeared first, broad-shouldered, his expression as unreadable as ever. The faint shimmer of sunlight that managed to sneak through the curtains cast gold over the scars lining his forearms.
“Ladies,” he greeted with a short nod. His voice was deep, steady…always steady. “Just making sure everything’s quiet.”
“Everything’s fine,” Layla assured him, though there was fondness in her voice that spoke of long familiarity. “You’re worse than Roman when he’s pacing.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Gideon said simply, his gaze sweeping the room before shifting to me. “Runa.”
I blinked, caught off guard. “Yes?”
“You should stay inside until sunset. Volken gave orders.”
“Of course, he did,” I muttered under my breath, earning a smirk from Sorcha.
Ivan appeared a heartbeat later, leaning lazily in the doorway, his dark hair tousled, shirt half buttoned like he’d just rolled out of bed though I knew changelings never really slept like humans.
“If she so much as sneezes, Volken will have my hide,” he said dryly. “And I like my hide.”
“Then you’d better keep it out of trouble,” Sorcha teased.
Ivan’s mouth quirked, his eyes glinting with mischief. “I’ll try, sunshine. Though trouble seems to find you Dragic women without any help.”
Layla threw a balled napkin at him, which he caught easily, laughing as he retreated down the hall.
“Changelings,” she muttered, shaking her head. “Half wolf, half chaos.”
Gideon gave her a pointed look, lips twitching. “And yet you trust us with your lives.”
She smiled. “Because you’ve earned it.”
Gideon inclined his head slightly, then turned toward the children. “Little one, your mother’s coffee is getting cold.”
Aleksander’s tiny head snapped up, eyes wide like he’d been caught in mischief. “Sorry, Uncle Gideon,” he said solemnly, before handing Suraya her toy soldier as if that would make up for it.
Sorcha laughed. “Oh, he’s learned that tone from Roman.”
“Scary,” I whispered, and Layla giggled beside me.
The lightness was fleeting, though. Beneath it, I felt it, the bond pulling faintly in my chest, like a tug on a thread that wouldn’t loosen. Volken was awake now. Or close to it, and he was restless.
I stared into my cup, pretending to sip, trying to ignore the quiet thrum of worry in my blood.
He was hiding something. They all were, and if the whispers I’d overheard last night from the guards were true about Caesar being in the city again then I had a feeling whatever came next would tear the fragile peace to pieces.
Layla touched my arm gently, pulling me from my thoughts. “You’re part of this family now, Runa. No matter what happens out there, remember that.”
Her smile was warm, but her eyes… her eyes held the shadow of someone who’d already survived the kind of war I could only imagine.
I nodded, clutching her hand back. “I will.”
And in that moment, surrounded by women who had been through hell and still managed to laugh, I realized something:
Family wasn’t always blood. Sometimes, it was forged in fire.
We sat a little straighter, the moment settling into something practical. Layla’s smile went soft but fierce. “They’re knotted,” she said, tapping the side of her cup. “You can see it in Roman when he thinks no one’s looking. That kind of rage will eat him alive if he lets it.”
Sorcha folded her hands, eyes going distant for a beat. “They won’t stop until they make the bastards pay. That’s in their bones. But a night out, something loud, something stupid might break the edge. Give them a night where they remember how to breathe.”
I surprised myself by speaking before I could overthink it.
“We need a plan and it can’t be just us begging them to leave the house.
They listen to logic only so far, then they go stomp on things.
But they’ll listen to a challenge, to a slight.
” My voice warmed with the thought. “Make it competitive. Invite them to Havoc, tell them a rival club tried to poach one of our DJs, throw in a bet. After all Roman hates to lose, doesn’t he? They’ll go. They have to.”
Layla’s laugh bubbled out, delighted. “That’s perfect. Hit their pride and make it about territory, their ego. Viking will bite at that like it’s dessert.” She glanced at Sorcha, conspiratorial. “You and I can set it up. Something to make them forget the knives for one night.”
Gideon inclined his head once, voice low. “We’ll have two teams. One to escort everyone, one to sweep for trouble. Nothing happens without a signal. We can do all that but you ladies know that first you need their permission.”
I felt the knot in my chest loosen a fraction.
The plan was ridiculous and childish, and exactly the medicine we all needed.
We’d give them noise and music and a reason to laugh so hard that their jaws hurt.
I roll my eyes at my own silly thoughts, maybe for one night the ghosts at the edges of their minds would have to sit down and watch.
“Fine,” I said, the decision solidifying like steel. “We get them out and we make it loud.”
Layla reached across and squeezed my hand. “Then let’s convince our monsters to come play.”
The women smiled, and for the first time in days the future felt a little less like a battlefield and more like something we might survive together.
Gideon’s expression didn’t change; he never smiled when danger was in the air.
He set his cup down with a soft thud and leaned forward, fingers steepled.
“Listen to me,” he said, his voice flat and careful.
“Putting all of you in one place with the brothers, there will be loud music, strangers, booze, you know that is a pressure cooker. If one of them sees something that spikes their temper, they’ll go.
Hard. And if they go, there’s no stopping the tide until it’s washed half the city away. ”
The room went quieter. Even the children’s muffled laughter seemed to retreat a little into the background.
“I get it,” Layla said, meeting his eyes.
“And we’ll control it. We’ll set boundaries.
” She reached across and squeezed my hand again as if to anchor both of us.
“Gideon, we appreciate you looking out. But this isn’t just for them.
It’s for us too, we need to remind them what normal feels like, even if normal is a warped version of ours. ”
Gideon’s jaw loosened a fraction, but his gaze stayed steady. “You know what I signed up for when I swore my blade. I’ll watch the perimeter. I’ll have men in the wings. But understand this, if something happens, I won’t be choosing sides. I’ll be choosing containment. Your lives matter.”
Sorcha’s face softened at that, and Layla gave him a grateful, quick nod.
I could see Gideon weighing us, our stubbornness, the hard edge that comes from living with knives at your ribs, and then, finally, he gave the smallest of inclines. “Fine. But I want a signal. One word. One move. And everyone moves. No hesitation.”
“Agreed,” Sorcha said immediately.
The practicalities snapped into place with the efficient calm of people used to planning violence: who watches the front, which exits stay clear, which staff are on clean-up, what to do if a demon shows up uninvited.
Layla and Sorcha started sketching out the surprise elements, a DJ to bait Viking’s ego with a rival sound, an unexpected floral theme that would make Roman roll his eyes, just enough glitter to distract them from their knives.
Gideon stood, finally, and checked the time. “Do it quick,” he said. “Soon the men will be up.”
We worked fast. The men on the perimeter, the playlists chosen, the innocuous bets and slights earmarked that would be sure to lure Viking’s pride but not start a war.
We assigned roles of who would sit near Roman to make sure he didn’t wander off into silence, who would stay close to Lucien, who would keep an eye on Draugr when his temper rose like a storm.
As plans folded into place, a thin thread of excitement wove through me, tangled up with the stone of worry lodged in my gut.
This was reckless, yes…because we were women who had been through hell and had the audacity to want a night that didn’t feel like survival.
But it was also necessary. If we could make them laugh until they forgot to breathe for a second, then maybe the knives would not be the first thing their hands reached for the next time the world shook.
I caught Layla’s eye and she grinned, wicked and tired at once. “We’ll pull it off,” she promised. “And if they explode, we’ll drag them out and glue them to chairs until they sober up.”
Gideon’s sigh was part warning, part surrender. “Just… keep the exits clear. And keep your phones with you.”
We left the sitting room with lists, calls already half-made, and the fragile, fierce hope that for one night we might give them, and ourselves something that wasn’t war.
Even as we moved, I felt the bond tug lightly at my ribs, Volken’s presence coiling in the dark somewhere out of sight. He would hate this. He would be furious and amused and impossible. But for once, maybe, he’d come and maybe, just maybe, for a night he’d remember how to laugh.