Chapter 25 #2
After a while, he pulled back just enough to press his lips to my forehead.
Then he reached over me to the nightstand.
I heard the tissue box shuffle, felt him shift back, and then his hand between my thighs, cleaning me up with the kind of careful attention that made my chest tight.
He wiped himself off, tossed the tissues toward the trash and settled back behind me, his arm heavy and warm across my waist.
I pressed back into him. His chest was still warm from the exertion, his heartbeat slowing against my back.
We lay there for a while. The room was soft without my glasses—just shapes and morning light, the blurred outline of the dresser against the far wall. I didn't need to see clearly right now. I could feel everything that mattered.
"I missed this," I said. The sex was part of it, and my body was still humming with that. The weight of him. The quiet. The way the world got smaller when Mason was around. Not suffocating. Just manageable.
"Missed you too." His voice was low, his mouth against my hair. "Feels like we've been on different schedules for weeks."
"Because we have been."
A soft thump on the foot of the bed. Whiskey had apparently decided the coast was clear and launched himself onto the comforter. He picked his way up between our legs, turned in three precise circles, and settled into the space behind my knees, purring like a small engine.
Mason huffed a laugh. "He's got timing."
"He waited. That's growth."
Mason's thumb traced a lazy circle on my hip. "How's your team looking?"
I smiled. "Good. A lot better than the first week.
The aerial drills are actually clicking now—Theron introduced field comms last week, enchanted earpieces, and it's made the coordination so much tighter.
Raze is still the loudest person on comms, but he's fast. Lunessa's getting scary precise with her ward reinforcements. "
"And Draven?"
"Solid. His detection work with Amrion is the best on the team." I kept my voice easy. "How's Burke treating you?"
Mason exhaled. "Burke is Burke. Runs us like a military unit. Precision drills, no wasted time. He's fair, just..." He searched for the word.
"Intense?"
"Relentless." A pause. "Kane and I are handling it. We work together when we have to. It's not comfortable, but it's functional."
There was more there, but he didn't push it and I didn't pull. We'd both gotten good at knowing when to leave space.
"What about Kali?" I asked. "How's the guardianship going?"
His arm tightened around me slightly. Not tension—focus. This was the thing that occupied his mind the way the investigation occupied mine.
"Slow. The legal process in supe society is complicated when the current guardian is the Lord Protector.
" He said Silvius's title like it left a bad taste.
"I've been consulting with someone Moriyana recommended—a fae legal specialist who handles custodial transfers.
She's good. But it's layers of bureaucracy, and Silvius hasn't formally contested it yet, which almost makes it worse. Like he's waiting."
"Is Kali okay?"
"She's tough. She knows what's happening. I told her." His voice softened in a way that was specifically about his sister. "She said, 'About time.'"
That sounded exactly like Kali.
"I've been looking at properties too," he continued. "Want to know my options so that when the legal side clears, I can move fast. There's a place in Drakehaven that could work—two bedrooms, good sight lines, space for wards. I've got a viewing this afternoon."
"That's great, Mason."
"Yeah." He pressed his lips against the back of my head. "What about you? You've been busy in the evenings."
"Library stuff, mostly. Research. You know how I get when I'm pulling on a thread." I kept it light. Vague. Not a lie, just a shape without detail.
"Mm." His thumb traced my hip. "I've noticed you've been spending a lot of time with Draven."
My stomach tightened. Not because Mason sounded jealous. Because he didn't.
"Yeah," I said. "We've been working on some stuff together. He's been really solid."
Mason was quiet for a moment. His arm stayed around me, steady and warm.
"Good," he said. And he meant it. "I can't be there the way I want to be right now.
With Kali and the guardianship and training under Burke, I'm stretched.
Knowing someone's got your back when I can't be there.
" He paused. "Draven's a good man. I've seen how he is with you in training. He pays attention."
The simplicity of it cracked something open in my chest. No possessiveness. No insecurity. Just a man who loved me recognizing that someone else cared about me too, and being grateful for it because he couldn't be everywhere at once.
I laced my fingers through his where they rested on my hip. "Nobody replaces you."
"I know." His voice was low, certain. The mate bond held steady between us. "That's why I don't worry about it."
I stroked Whiskey's ear where he was purring against my knee, and the guilt sat quiet and small in my chest, right next to the warmth. Because Mason was being open and generous and trusting, and I was holding back everything that mattered.
I'd tell him. Just not yet. Not this morning, with his arm around me and Whiskey purring and the bond steady between us.
Late morning. The lazy energy was starting to give way to the day asserting itself.
"What's your Saturday look like?" I asked.
Mason stretched behind me, his joints cracking. The bed shifted under his weight. "Property viewing at two. Then I'm meeting the legal specialist again—she wants me to bring documentation about Kali's schooling and medical history. After that, Kali and I are having dinner. Just us."
"That sounds perfect."
"What about you?"
"Laundry. Desperately needed laundry. And then Whiskey and I are going to sit on the couch and do absolutely nothing."
"Big plans."
"The biggest."
He laughed. The sound rumbled through his chest and into my back, and I wanted to bottle it.
I sat up, dislodging Whiskey, who gave me an affronted look and relocated to Mason's pillow. I grabbed my glasses from the nightstand and put them on—the world snapped into focus. I swung my legs off the bed and stood, stretching. Mason's gaze tracked me.
"Shower?" I said.
"Right behind you."
I padded into the bathroom, Mason unfolding from the bed behind me. Mason filled the doorway, all six foot six of him, looking at me with that expression that was equal parts soft and hungry.
I opened the medicine cabinet and popped my birth control pill out of the pack, swallowed it with a handful of water from the tap.
Mason leaned against the doorframe. "You know the magic handles that."
"I like to be sure."
"A belt and suspenders woman."
"A woman who understands probability." I turned on the shower and tested the temperature. "Some of us don't have supernatural contraceptive magic to fall back on."
He stepped up behind me, his hands finding my hips, and leaned down to my ear. "Well, let's see how good your backup plan is."
I pulled him into the shower with me.