21. Idris
Idris
By late morning, Theo is showered, dressed, and soft-eyed between us.
His hair is still damp where Sloane keeps touching it, and he’s wearing one of Sloane’s sweatshirts with a pair of loose pants I have to tie twice so they don’t slide off his hips.
He walks on his own, but barely, with Sloane close to one side and me at the other, and every few steps he leans into whichever Alpha is closer.
Garrett is still on the call when we reach the dining room.
I can hear his voice through the study door, low and clipped, the cadence professional enough that anyone else might miss the territorial strain beneath it.
He’s shoved himself back into work shape, but his scent hasn’t settled all the way back under control.
Sloane hears it too. His jaw tightens, then he looks down at Theo and smooths one hand over his damp hair. “You need food, sweetheart. Then you can decide where to pass out.”
Theo leans into the touch, tired enough that his answer comes slowly. “Callie?”
“She had her meeting,” I tell him, pulling out the chair nearest Garrett’s usual place because Theo’s eyes keep tracking toward it. “She’ll be home soon.”
Theo nods, but he keeps glancing toward the front hall while Sloane gets toast and fruit onto a plate.
I make tea, wrap a blanket around Theo’s shoulders when he murmurs warm, and watch him accept small pieces of food from Sloane’s fingers.
Alpha care has worked. It’s working in the softened line of his shoulders, in the way he lets me adjust the blanket, in the way he lets Sloane press a kiss to his hair without bracing for the next demand.
The front door opens before he finishes the toast.
Theo’s head lifts first.
Calliope steps inside with rain in her hair, her blouse damp at the shoulders, and a dark smear of grease along one sleeve.
She looks tired and windblown, her bag hooked over one shoulder and one heel not quite settled back on her foot, but her face changes the second she sees Theo wrapped in the blanket.
“Oh, Star,” she says, and every soft part of him reaches toward her voice.
Sloane is already moving. He crosses the room in three long strides, takes her bag before it can slide off her shoulder, and pulls her into his chest with one arm around her waist. She goes into him without hesitation, turning her face into his shirt for one breath while his hand moves over her damp back.
“What happened?” Sloane asks.
“Flat tire.” Calliope’s voice is muffled against him for the first two words, and then she tips her head back to look at him. “I’m fine. It was annoying, not dramatic.”
Sloane’s hand moves to the grease on her sleeve, then to the damp hair near her temple. “You changed it?”
“I started to.” Her mouth curves when his expression tightens. “Mara circled back before I got the spare all the way out, and campus security had a compressor. I had it handled, baby. It was a tire.”
I reach for my phone and find an empty pocket.
The small wrongness of that hits before I place the phone upstairs on the dresser, abandoned when Theo whined down the hall.
I don’t turn my sound off for Calliope. I don’t miss her calls at Blackline, in meetings, or in the middle of problems that should take my whole attention.
“Did you call?” I ask.
Calliope looks over Sloane’s shoulder at me, still relaxed against his chest. “Once. I was going to say I’d be late and ask if someone could text Mara in case my phone died. Then she pulled in behind me, so I didn’t need anything.”
“I don’t like missing your calls,” I say, and that is the truth of it. Not guilt. Not panic. Just a fact with an edge I don't enjoy.
“I know.” Her face softens at once. “Theo needed you. I figured you’d see it once everyone came up for air.”
Sloane huffs against her hair, still holding her close. “I’m glaring at the tire anyway.”
“That’s between you and the tire.” She pats his chest, then looks past him when Theo makes a small sound from the table. Her whole expression warms again. “Come here, sweetheart. Let me see you.”
Theo pushes the blanket down and stands before any of us can help him.
His knees go loose almost immediately, but Sloane turns with Calliope still tucked into his side and reaches out to steady him.
Theo catches Sloane’s hand, then takes two careful steps forward until he’s close enough for Calliope to cup his face.
“There you are,” she whispers.
Theo closes his eyes when her thumbs brush beneath them.
He smells like all of us, and I see the exact moment she notices it.
Her breath catches softly, her lashes lowering as she inhales the layers on him: Sloane’s smoke and sugar in the sweatshirt, my tea and rain still warmed on his skin, Garrett’s mint and leather threaded beneath from the first part of the morning.
Her expression opens with so much tenderness it feels almost private to witness.
“You smell like them,” she says, barely above a whisper.
Theo’s eyes open. “Good?”
“So good.” She smiles, and the smile shakes a little at the edges. “You’ve been loved this morning, Star.”
Theo leans up. He doesn’t rush the kiss, and neither does she.
Calliope waits until he chooses the last inch, then meets him softly, one hand still at his cheek and the other resting over Sloane’s arm at her waist. Theo makes a small sound into her mouth, and she answers it with another kiss, slow enough that I can see her taste what we left on him and love every trace.
Sloane’s scent blooms warmly behind her. I step closer, not to interrupt, only to keep Theo steady when his knees dip again. Calliope feels the shift and draws back with her forehead touching Theo’s for one more breath.
“Food,” she murmurs. “Then you can tell me everything I missed.”
Theo’s mouth curves, tired and pleased. “Blue bowl.”
“You found it.” Calliope kisses his cheek once, then lets Sloane guide both of them back toward the table. “I got your message. Major household event.”
Garrett’s study door opens before Theo sits.
He comes out with the phone still in one hand and his expression held in a careful line.
The call has put him back into his public shape, but the territorial edge beneath it hasn’t gone anywhere.
His gaze takes in Calliope’s wet hair, the grease on her sleeve, Sloane’s arm around her, and Theo still turned toward her like he can’t quite stop.
“What happened?” Garrett asks.
“Flat tire,” Calliope says, warm but tired. She keeps one hand on Sloane’s chest while he settles her into the chair beside him. “It’s fixed.”
Garrett’s jaw tightens. “You should’ve called.”
“I did.” She glances toward me with a small, reassuring lift of her brows. “No one answered, so I handled it.”
Garrett looks to me, and I see the question he doesn’t ask because the answer is already in the room. We were upstairs. Our phones weren’t with us. Theo needed us, and Calliope handled her own problem the way she has clearly handled plenty of problems before us.
Theo settles back into the chair near Garrett’s place at the head of the table, but he keeps watching Calliope.
She watches him back, soft and openly pleased, with Sloane’s arm resting across the back of her chair.
The room feels warm again for a minute. Rain ticks against the windows, tea steams on the table, and Theo takes another bite of toast because Calliope smiles at him when he does.
Garrett moves behind Theo’s chair and rests one hand on the back of it. “Finish eating, Theo. You’ve had a long morning.”
Theo nods, but his attention stays on Calliope.
She leans forward when he makes a tiny sound around the next bite, the kind of sound that could be discomfort or only sleepiness. Her hand lifts before she thinks better of it, fingers open and gentle, aimed for his hair.
Garrett growls.
It’s low. Automatic. Territorial enough to tighten the air, but not loud enough to turn into a scene.
I’ve heard Sloane make almost the same sound in the ugly edge of rut, when someone moves too quickly toward a body he’s guarding.
Theo is close to heat, still sensitive from the spike, and the table is full of Alpha scent.
Every biological explanation is right there.
Calliope flinches, and her hand stops halfway to Theo’s hair.
Theo curls tighter under the blanket and turns toward Garrett’s side of the table. He doesn’t pull away from Calliope entirely, but he folds toward the nearest Alpha anchor, his scent spiking with confusion before Garrett’s hand settles on the back of his neck.
“Easy,” Garrett says, rough from the call and from the morning still riding him. His hand is steady on Theo, firm without dragging him closer. “He’s sensitive.”
Calliope lowers her hand at once. “Right, sorry.”
Sloane’s arm tightens behind her chair, and his eyes cut to Garrett, then Theo, then Calliope’s face. He doesn’t speak immediately. The room is too charged for a fast Alpha reaction, and Sloane knows it even though the effort costs him.
Theo looks back at Calliope with worry gathering in his eyes.
“I’m okay,” she tells him, her voice soft and sure. She lets Sloane draw her closer until her shoulder rests against his chest, and she keeps her hands folded around her mug instead of reaching again. “Eat a little more for me, Star.”
Theo obeys after a hesitation. Garrett’s hand stays at his nape, and Sloane’s thumb moves slowly over Calliope’s shoulder while her hands remain folded around the mug.
I keep looking at the hand she lowered.
Calliope goes upstairs after we finish eating to change out of the damp blouse and comes back in soft pants and one of Sloane’s old shirts.
She comes straight back to the dining room, presses a kiss to Sloane’s cheek when he reaches for her, and lets him pull her sideways into his lap for half a minute before she slides into the chair beside him.
Calliope notices Theo watching and smiles at him. “Still with me?”
Theo nods, then looks at Garrett’s hand before looking back at her. “Sit later?”