Chapter 33
JESS
It starts small.
Three weeks in, and I finally have a routine—if you can call it that. Eli’s out the door by seven most mornings, badge clipped to his shirt and travel mug in hand.
Rowan works from his office, drafting blueprints or stalking client calls with that quiet-focus face he gets. Cassian’s usually in the workshop behind the house, sanding something, cutting something, or muttering over a half-finished table he swears is “almost done.”
Days blur together in the comfortable kind of way.
Breakfast with whoever’s home. Rowan dragging me out to the porch for “actual sunlight.” Cassian showing me how to tell the difference between a dovetail joint and “whatever crime IKEA is committing this week.” Evenings with Eli teaching me how to dice onions without losing fingertips.
Nothing dramatic—just life. Quiet, steady, dangerous in its own way because it felt… good. Like a rhythm I wasn’t supposed to want.
Which is why the shift catches me off guard.
A wrongness in the air I can’t pin down. The sheets feel too rough. The blanket is too light. Every shift of fabric against my skin scrapes at me like static. I kick them off, pull them back, twist them into a useless knot at the foot of the bed.
The house hums with the same soft quiet as always—wind against the windows, the air conditioner’s low exhale—but I can’t settle. My pulse trips every few beats, like my body’s waiting for something I forgot to give it.
I press a pillow over my face and breathe in fabric softener and faint traces of Eli’s detergent. It helps for a second. Then doesn’t.
My skin’s buzzing and my room feels like it grew three sizes overnight—too big, too empty, too loud.
I sit up, swing my legs over the edge of the bed. It could just be I need a snack. Or caffeine. Or an exorcism.
I glance at the digital clock beside the bed. 3:07 a.m.
Shit!
Maybe just stretch my legs or something.
I grab a water bottle from the mini-fridge in my room and step into the hallway. The floors are cool under my bare feet, and the house smells faintly of them, easing this gnawing in my gut for half a second.
A small pile of laundry in a basket props open the laundry room’s door. Rowan’s hoodie is on top. Faded navy from too many washes, the cuff still torn.
I shouldn’t. It’s not mine.
But my fingers are already reaching.
The fabric’s soft, worn thin in that perfect way, and when I bury my face in it—sandalwood and rain hit me so hard my knees almost forget how to work. The wrongness inside me eases for half a breath.
I tug it over my head before I can think. The hem brushes my thighs, and I breathe in deep, greedy lungfuls of him. My heart slows. My shoulders unclench.
It’s stupid how good this feels. Like I’ve been holding my breath for years and only just remembered oxygen’s a thing.
I crawl back into bed, wrap my arms around my middle, and tell myself it’s just comfort. Not instinct. Not the strange pull I’ve felt since the night they first scent-marked me.
The air conditioner clicks off, and the silence sharpens.
Under the hoodie, my skin prickles. The air’s turned heavy, sticky, like the whole house can’t sleep either.
I shove the blankets aside again, restless. My body doesn’t want to sleep. It wants… something else.
Something that smells like all of them, like home.
At 4 am, I give up pretending sleep’s an option.
The hoodie helps, but only for about five minutes before that itch under my skin is back—low and insistent, like an alarm I can’t shut off.
The room looks fine. Normal. Nothing out of place.
So why does every corner feel like it’s watching me?
I throw the blanket off again and start pacing.
The air smells stale—wrong. I crack up the ceiling fan cause I’m pretty sure if I try the window, the guy’s house alarm will go off.
Even at full speed and wobbling, the fan doesn’t help.
I pull the hoodie tighter, fingers fisting in the hem like I can hold onto his scent.
My eyes land on the pile of extra pillows shoved against the wall beside my dresser—half hiding the tote I never unpacked after the bay.
The pirate flag from mini-golf sticks out like it’s saluting me, a tiny shred of black plastic glory.
One of the shark plushies leans against it, grinning like it knows something I don’t.
I should leave them alone. But I’m already moving before the thought finishes.
I start arranging them without really knowing why, shifting them into a corner, layering one over another until the space feels smaller.
Safer. The pirate flag ends up stuck near the top like a victory banner, the shark squished beneath a pillow as the world’s weirdest guard dog. Still, it’s missing something.
I tiptoe downstairs, looking around for something that I don’t know what.
Then I spot Eli’s Churro. The little stuffed penguin from the fair, and I snatch it up off the kitchen counter, holding it to my chest. And I grab the anime cloak Eli was wearing last night, then Cassian’s T-shirt, which I spot in the laundry basket as I make my way back to my room.
Carefully, I lay everything out just so, including the manga books of the anime we watched together.
It’s only when I step back that I realize what I’ve done.
A nest.
A freaking nest.
I huff out a laugh that sounds a little too close to a sob. “You’ve officially lost it, Jess.”
Except—My body doesn’t agree. The longer I look at it, the more my chest loosens. My palms tingle, my pulse slows. Something inside me likes this.
I crouch, tug the comforter from my bed, and drag it over, ignoring how the fabric snags. It lands in a heap, and I sink my fingers into it, smoothing it out like it matters.
The hoodie’s scent wraps around me, but it’s not enough. I need more.
The compulsion hits like hunger. I’m back in the hallway before I realize it, barefoot, half-possessed.
Cassian’s sweatshirt hangs off a hook near the door, smelling faintly of amber and leather.
Eli’s flannel is draped over the back of the couch, still carrying that faint citrus-clean scent that’s so him.
By the time I get back to my room, my arms are full.
I drop everything onto the nest and crawl in after it, arranging, tucking, layering, until it feels right. Surrounded by them—by their scents, their warmth, the quiet weight of belonging—I finally breathe again.
For a minute, it’s perfect.
Then the air thickens. My skin flushes hot. The little pulse between my thighs starts to ache, slow and insistent.
No. Not now.
I press my face into Rowan’s hoodie, trying to drown it out. But it’s too late. The heat rolling under my skin isn’t a metaphor anymore.
Something deep inside me wakes up and stretches, purring.
Perfect.
The nest should’ve helped.
For a while, it does. I curl into it until the edges blur, every breath thick with their scents—Rowan’s rain-and-wood calm, Cassian’s leather and amber, Eli’s clean spice. My brain finally stops clawing at itself. My pulse settles.
Then the air shifts.
It’s subtle at first—a whisper of warmth, a tingle at the back of my neck. I blame the hoodie. The blanket. Anything but what it really is.
But the heat keeps building, slow and sneaky. My thighs press together on instinct. My breath goes shallow. The pulse between my legs starts to match the one in my throat.
“Oh no,” I mutter into Churro’s felt wing. “No, no, not now.”
The penguin doesn’t answer, obviously. His beak pokes my chin like he’s disappointed in me.
I bury my face in Rowan’s hoodie again, trying to breathe through it, but the scent hits harder this time—deeper, sweeter, like the air itself is leaning closer.
The hoodie’s too hot now. Everything is. I shove it halfway off, then pull it back on because the loss of scent feels worse. My body can’t decide what it wants—heat or comfort, contact or space.
A drop of sweat slides down my spine. I twist, restless, the nest rustling around me. The pirate flag flops over my shoulder; one of the sharks tumbles into my lap. I clutch it like a lifeline.
“I’m fine,” I whisper to no one. “It’s just… hormones. Bad timing. I can handle—”
A wave hits mid-sentence—liquid fire curling low in my stomach, rolling outward. My hips arch before I can stop them.
“Okay,” I breathe, voice shaking. “Maybe not fine.”
The air feels charged, electric. My scent’s changing—I can feel it, taste it in the back of my throat, syrupy and sharp. My body hums with it, begging for something I’m too proud to name.
Every muscle aches for touch, for scent, for pack.
I drag the hoodie’s collar to my nose again and inhale like it’s oxygen. Rowan’s scent crashes through me, dragging up memories I shouldn’t think about—his hand on the small of my back, his voice rough when he called me good girl.
The ache deepens. I squeeze my thighs tighter, but it only makes it worse.
My body’s not asking anymore. It’s deciding.
Somewhere down the hall, a floorboard creaks. Footsteps.
I freeze, breath caught. The scent in the room thickens instantly—mine, tangled with theirs from the fabric around me.
A low sound catches in my throat. Not a word. Not even human.
And then, just outside my door, a voice—low, rough, familiar:
“Jess?”