Chapter seven #2
"Tell me to stop." I'm kissing her jaw, her neck, the mark Deklan left. My tongue traces the bruise, and something dark and possessive surges through me. "Tell me to stop and I will."
"Don't stop." Her hands slide up my chest, over my shoulders, into my hair. "Don't you dare stop."
I pull back. Just enough to see her face. Her eyes are blown wide, lips swollen and pink, cheeks flushed. She looks wrecked. She looks perfect.
"Not here," I say. My voice is barely human. "Not in the nest. The nest is yours, yours to invite us into, yours to control. But Willow," I press my forehead to hers. "I need you. I need to be inside you. I need to knot you. I need…"
"Yes."
"…to claim you. Properly. All of us. Together."
She goes very still.
"Together?" she repeats.
"All three of us." I pull back enough to see her face. "Knox. Deklan. Me. That's what a triple match means, Willow. That's what we signed up for. That's what we've been dying for since the moment you walked through that elevator."
Her pupils are so wide her eyes look black. Her scent is so thick I can taste it, honey and vanilla and slick and want. Her chest is heaving.
"You'd share me," she says. "At the same time."
"We'd worship you." I frame her face in my hands. "At the same time. And every time after that. For as long as you'll have us."
Her lip trembles. "What if I'm not, what if I can't?"
"You can." I press a kiss to her forehead. "You will. And we'll make sure of it."
She looks at me, searching, weighing, deciding. And then she nods. A small, certain, fearless nod. "Okay," she says. "Okay. Yes. I want, I want all of you."
Something in my chest cracks open. Not the Alpha, not the predator, not the possessive beast that's been clawing at my insides for three days. Something deeper. Something that feels like the kid I used to be, alone and unwanted, believing he'd never be enough.
She wants us. She wants me.
"Today," I say. "Tonight. When Lily's asleep. When you're ready."
"I'm ready now."
I laugh. The sound surprises me, rough and raw and genuine. "I know. But I want to do this right. I want the nest. I want the time. I want," I swallow. "I want it to mean something."
Her expression softens. The fear is gone. The doubt is gone. What's left is something warm and steady and certain.
"It already means something," she says.
And then she kisses me.
This time, she's the one who initiates. Her hands pull me down, her mouth finds mine, and the kiss is soft. Not desperate. Not hungry. Soft. A beginning. A promise.
I hold her, and I don't take more than she gives. And when she pulls back, breathless and smiling, I feel something I haven't felt in thirty-four years.
Peace.
The morning is chaos.
Lily wakes up at 7:15, earlier than usual, and announces her presence by standing in her crib and screaming "UP!" at a volume that could shatter glass. Willow laughs, a real laugh, bright and warm, and extricates herself from the nest to go get her.
I watch her go. The oversized shirt rides up as she walks, and I catch a flash of bare thigh that makes my cock twitch. I adjust myself and follow.
Knox is already in the kitchen. He's standing at the counter, coffee in hand, and the moment Willow rounds the corner, his entire body goes still. His green eyes track her with an intensity that borders on predatory.
"Morning, little omega," he says. His voice is rougher than usual. "Sleep well?"
"Better than I have in days." She lifts Lily onto her hip. "Someone's hungry."
"Pancakes," Lily demands. "Now."
"Bossy," Knox says, grinning. "I like it."
I move to the stove. The routine is familiar now, three days old, but already a pattern. I cook, Knox cuts fruit, and Deklan sits at the island with his laptop while Willow handles Lily. It's domestic. Ordinary. The kind of morning that happens in families.
Family.
The word settles in my chest, warm and heavy.
We eat breakfast. Lily covers herself in syrup despite my explicit no-syrup rule.
Knox feeds her strawberries and makes her giggle by pretending to eat them himself.
Deklan reads emails and pretends he's not watching Willow over the top of his glasses.
And Willow? Willow sits at the table with Lily in her lap and smiles.
Not the fragile smile from yesterday. Not the terrified smile from the first day. A real smile. Full and warm and certain.
It makes my chest hurt.
After breakfast, I pull Knox and Deklan aside while Willow takes Lily to the living room.
"Tonight," I say.
They both look at me. Knox's eyebrows shoot up. Deklan's jaw tightens. "She asked for it?" Knox says.
"She asked for all of us."
Knox exhales. A long, controlled breath. His hands are trembling slightly. "About goddamn time."
"She needs to be sure," Deklan says. His voice is steady, but his pulse is hammering in his throat. "Not just willing. Sure. After last night, after what Serena said, she needs to be choosing this, not getting swept up in it."
"She is choosing." I hold his gaze. "She kissed me this morning. She said she wants all of us. She's sure."
Deklan nods slowly. His hand curls into a fist on the counter, then releases. "Then we do this right. The nest. The ritual. All of it."
"Agreed."
"What about Lily?" Knox asks. "I love that kid, but I do not want her walking in during, "
"My assistant is arranging a sitter," I say. "A vetted omega from the agency's childcare division. She'll arrive at 6 PM and stay overnight in the guest suite."
Knox stares at me. "You planned this."
"I've been planning this since 3 AM."
"You didn't sleep."
"No."
"JD."
"I'll sleep tonight." I glance toward the living room, where Willow is building a block tower with Lily. "After."
Knox follows my gaze. His expression softens. "You're in love with her."
The word lands like a bomb. Love. Not want. Not desire. Not the biological imperative of a scent-match. Love. But I don't deny it.
"Aren't you?" I ask instead.
He's quiet for a long moment. "Yeah. I am."
We both look at Deklan. The Beta stands at the island, arms crossed, glasses slightly askew. His face is unreadable, the mask firmly in place.
"Deklan," I say.
"I held her while she cried," he says. His voice is quiet.
Controlled. But there's a crack underneath.
"I put my mouth on her and told her she was home.
And then she almost left anyway." He pauses.
Swallows. "If she had left, if she had gotten on that bus, I would have followed her.
To Millbrook. To the end of the earth. I would have found her and brought her back. "
"That's love, brother," Knox says softly.
Deklan's jaw tightens. "I know what it is."
The silence stretches. Three men in a kitchen, each carrying the weight of a lifetime of loss, looking at a woman in the next room who might, impossibly, impossibly, be the one to make it lighter.
"Tonight," I say again. "We do this right. We claim her. Together."
Knox nods.
Deklan nods.
And in the living room, Willow looks up from her block tower and meets my eyes through the doorway. Her scent drifts toward me, honey and vanilla, warm and certain, and she smiles.
I don't smile back. Not yet. Instead, I hold her gaze and let her see everything, every ounce of want, of need, of the terrifying, consuming thing that's been growing in my chest since the moment she walked into my life.
Her pupils dilate, her lips part, and her scent spikes.
She knows.
The day passes in a haze of anticipation.
Willow takes Lily to the park again, Eastwood, the same one, because Lily likes the fountain, and this time, Knox goes with them. Not hovering. Not interfering. Just present. Walking beside Willow, pushing Lily on the swing, buying them both ice cream from a vendor. Normal things. Family things.
I watch from my office window. Sixty-eight floors up, they're tiny, two dots and a smaller dot moving through the park. But I can see enough. I can see Willow laugh. I can see Knox lean close and whisper something that makes her blush. I can see Lily toddle between them, one hand in each of theirs.
Family.
I turn away from the window and try to work. I get through exactly four emails before I give up and start planning the evening instead.
The guest suite is prepared for the sitter. My assistant has confirmed the omega arrives at 6, is experienced with toddlers, and is fully vetted. Lily will be safe. Cared for. Close by but out of earshot.
The master bedroom is... not ready. Not yet. Willow's nest is still there, built from our shirts and the bedding, and I don't want to disturb it. It's hers. Sacred. The place where she finally let herself believe she belongs.
But I add things. A bottle of water on the nightstand.
Soft lighting, I dim the overheads and turn on the bedside lamps.
Clean sheets on the guest side of the bed, in case she wants to expand the nest. And, after a moment's hesitation, a small vase of wildflowers. Like the ones Deklan put in her room.
I'm placing them on the nightstand when Deklan appears in the doorway.
"Wildflowers," he observes.
"Don't."
"I didn't say anything."
"You were thinking it."
"I was thinking that JD Blaine, CEO of Blaine Capital, the man who once made a Fortune 500 CEO cry in a board meeting, is putting wildflowers on a nightstand for a woman who makes him lose the ability to form sentences."
"Get out."
He doesn't leave. He leans against the doorframe and watches me adjust the vase. "She's going to say yes."
"I know."
"She already said yes."
"I know that too."
"So why do you look like you're about to face a firing squad?"
I straighten the vase. Step back. Look at the room.
"Because if I mess this up, " I stop. Swallow. "If I hurt her. If I push too hard. If I take when I should give. If I make her feel like a function instead of a person…"
"JD." Deklan's voice is sharp. "You carried her out of a bus stop at 3 AM. You knelt on a wet sidewalk and begged. You put wildflowers on a nightstand." He pauses. "You're not going to hurt her."
"You don't know that."