23. Chapter Twenty-Four #7
“That doesn't make you weigh less.” I told Tavian, giving his shoulder another useless push before surrendering.
“It should.” Tavian muttered, shifting until he was apparently comfortable and leaving me to deal with the consequences. Luca returned with water and held the cup until I had a secure grip.
“Drink.” Luca instructed me as he settled beside my hip, keeping one hand beneath the cup until he saw me lift it and watching with the quiet determination of someone who would sit there until I complied.
“Yes, Mom.” I told Luca before taking several long swallows, watching one of his eyebrows rise over the rim while cool water eased the dryness in my throat.
“I'll accept that if it gets you to drink.” Luca replied, completely unbothered by the accusation as he waited for me to finish before taking the cup.
“Terrifying.” I told Luca as I handed it back, wiping a drop of water from my lower lip.
“Hydrated.” Luca corrected me with quiet satisfaction as he placed the cup somewhere I could reach it again without leaving the nest. Malek returned with fruit and something salty enough that my body immediately reminded me how much energy I'd just used.
He settled behind me again after I ate, one hand returning to my hair while Luca cleaned the worst of the mess from my skin and adjusted the blanket across my legs.
Tavian somehow ended up partly on Malek and partly on me, one leg stretched across Malek's thigh while his shoulder remained wedged against mine. Malek tolerated the arrangement for almost a full minute before his gaze dropped to the offending limb.
“Move your leg.” Malek told Tavian eventually, looking down at it while Tavian continued lying there with his eyes shut.
“No.” Tavian answered Malek without opening his eyes, making absolutely no effort to obey as the faintest hint of amusement appeared at the corner of his mouth.
Malek stared at him for several seconds, then picked up Tavian's leg and moved it himself.
Tavian waited approximately two seconds before putting it back in almost exactly the same place.
I started laughing, and Luca joined me immediately. Malek looked at Tavian again before apparently deciding he wasn't worth the effort and left the leg where it was.
“You love me.” Tavian mumbled to Malek, still without opening his eyes as satisfaction crept into his voice and his purr rumbled faintly against my thigh.
“I tolerate you.” Malek corrected Tavian, although the deep purr vibrating through his own chest weakened the claim considerably.
“That is basically the same thing.” Tavian replied, sounding completely satisfied as he settled farther into both of us and finally stopped moving.
Their purrs eventually softened as the room darkened around us.
I lay in the middle and looked at what I'd made, taking in the blanket I'd moved repeatedly before finally deciding where it belonged, now twisted around all four of us.
Malek's shirt remained near the pillows, carrying enough cedar that I could smell it beneath the stronger scent of the man himself.
Tavian's seed and shell sat on the low shelf exactly where I'd placed them, Luca's blanket was tucked beneath one of my legs, and my own shirt had become part of the soft mess surrounding us.
Across the room, my camera equipment sat safely at the worktable.
The cases were closed, the cards protected, and one battery glowed quietly in the charger within easy reach.
My work was still there, along with tomorrow morning's shoot, Mara's expected check-in, the assignment I would eventually finish, and everything that came after it.
None of it had to disappear for this to fit.
The word slipped into my thoughts before I could stop it.
Home.
My chest tightened as I stared at the ceiling, where shadows from the courtyard shifted faintly across old stone.
Tavian's breathing had slowed against my leg, Malek continued running his fingers lazily through my hair, and Luca's hand rested warm against my waist with his thumb occasionally moving over my skin.
Home shouldn't have scared me as much as it did, but I'd spent most of my adult life becoming very good at leaving.
I knew how to pack efficiently, live out of cases, sleep in rooms that weren't mine, finish an assignment, and move on to the next one.
Even my apartment had mostly been where I returned between trips, not somewhere I had ever been afraid to miss.
This was different, and not because I suddenly wanted to stop leaving. I didn't. There were still places I wanted to photograph, assignments I wanted to take, flights I hadn't booked, forests I'd never walked through, and animals I'd only ever seen through somebody else's lens.
But lying between three purring Alphas in a nest I'd deliberately built with my own hands, with my cameras waiting across the room and tomorrow's work still part of my plans, I realized I'd found somewhere I already wanted to come back to before I'd even left.
That was the part that scared me.
I meant it.