Bonus Bree
Four years later
The retreat is already loud when I push open the door.
Not waiting-for-me loud. Tuesday loud. The kind of noise that happens when eight people have stopped being careful around each other and just exist—overlapping conversations, someone’s music playing low, the clink of glasses, laughter that keeps interrupting itself.
Four years of this, and I still pause in the doorway sometimes. Not because it’s fragile. Because it’s not.
I take in the room in pieces:
Gray and Wes on the long couch, Wes draped across Gray’s lap like he’s furniture.
Gray’s hand rests on the back of his neck—not gripping, just there.
Wes keeps interjecting into some conversation across the room, and each time he does, Gray’s fingers tighten briefly—a warning—before releasing. Casual. Familiar.
Jace is on the floor near the fireplace, ostensibly playing cards with Stellan, except neither of them is looking at their hands.
Jace says something—I catch the tail end, something filthy wrapped in a joke—and Stellan’s mouth twitches.
Not the distant amusement he used to wear like armor.
Something warmer. He flicks a card at Jace’s head, and Jace catches it, grinning.
That’s new. Or not new—newer. I’ve watched them circle each other for the past year, Stellan’s elegance meeting Jace’s chaos and finding something unexpected there. They haven’t done anything about it. Or maybe they have and I missed it. Either way, the comfort between them has weight now.
Theo is in the armchair by the window with a book, except his eyes aren’t on the pages. They’re tracking the room the way they always do—Wes’s body language, the tension in Rhett’s shoulders, the angle of Jace’s smile. He’s not reading. He’s holding. Grounding the space just by being in it.
Thane, Seth, and Rhett are at the bar in the corner, and that’s the thing that makes me smile.
Thane and Seth couldn’t be in the same room without circling each other like threats once.
Now Seth is leaning against the counter, drink in hand, while Rhett explains something with increasingly emphatic gestures.
Thane’s expression is caught between genuine confusion and aristocratic disdain.
Seth laughs at something, and Thane looks almost offended, then reluctantly amused.
No one has noticed me yet.
I could announce myself. Could walk in and let the energy shift around me the way it used to, everyone recalibrating to my presence like I’m the axis everything turns on.
Instead, I just… join.
Seth sees me first.
Not because he was watching the door—because he feels me. The bond, or just years of learning my rhythms. His eyes find mine across the room and his face does something soft and warm before he’s already moving.
He meets me halfway, drink abandoned on the bar, and his hands find my waist like they belong there.
“Kids down?”
“Both lights green.” I lean into him, let his warmth sink in. “Aiden tried to convince me there was a monster in his closet that required immediate investigation.”
“Was there?”
“It was his shoes. He threw them in there this morning and forgot.”
Seth’s laugh rumbles through his chest. “Terrifying.”
“He was very brave about it.”
His mouth brushes my temple, then my cheekbone, then the corner of my lips. Not a kiss yet—a hello.
“Come on,” he says, tugging me toward the couch. “Rhett’s trying to explain fantasy football to Thane and it’s the funniest thing I’ve seen all week.”
The couch is a sprawl.
Gray hasn’t moved Wes from his lap, just shifted to make room, and Wes’s head is pillowed on his thigh now while Gray’s fingers card through his hair. Rhett is mid-sentence, something about point spreads.
“—so you’re telling me,” Thane says slowly, “that you spend actual currency to pretend you own athletes who then perform for imaginary points.”
“It’s not pretend ownership, it’s—”
“It’s absolutely pretend ownership,” Jace calls from the floor. “That’s the whole point.”
“You’re not helping,” Rhett says.
“I’m never helping. You should know this by now.”
Seth pulls me down onto the couch, and I end up half in his lap, legs draped over Wes’s calves. Wes makes a sleepy sound of acknowledgment, reaches down to pat my ankle without opening his eyes.
“Hi, Bree.”
“Hi, Wes.”
“Gray’s being mean to me.”
“I’m petting your hair,” Gray says mildly.
“Meanly.”
Gray tugs—just slightly, just enough to make Wes’s breath catch—and then resumes the gentle stroking. “Better?”
“…yes.”
Rhett has given up on explaining fantasy football. He’s watching Gray and Wes instead, and I recognize that look—heat banked behind careful observation. Rhett likes to see. Likes to understand exactly what’s happening before he decides whether to join.
“You’re staring,” I tell him.
“I’m appreciating.”
“Voyeur.”
“Absolutely.” He doesn’t even pretend to be ashamed anymore. “You’re one to talk. I saw you in the doorway.”
“I was taking in the room.”
“You were watching Stellan look at Jace.”
Shit. He clocked that?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Rhett’s grin is slow and knowing. “Sure you don’t.”
The energy shifts without anyone announcing it.
Theo sets his book aside. Stellan’s card game with Jace has devolved into Jace trying to build a tower out of the deck while Stellan watches with an expression that’s either fondness or exasperation.
Thane has gone quiet, his attention sharpening the way it does when he’s thinking about something he wants.
Gray’s hand has migrated. Still in Wes’s hair, but lower now, fingers brushing the nape of his neck in a way that makes Wes shift restlessly.
“You’re squirming,” Gray observes.
“You’re teasing.”
“I’m barely touching you.”
“You’re barely touching me in a very specific way.”
I feel Seth’s chest shake with silent laughter behind me. His hand has found its way under my shirt—when did that happen?—palm warm against my stomach.
“You cold?” he murmurs against my ear.
“No.”
“Then why are you shivering?”
Because his fingers are tracing patterns just above my waistband. Because Gray is telling Wes to hold still in that voice. Because Theo has stopped pretending to read and is watching all of us with eyes that see too much.
“Just feeling things,” I say.
“Good things?”
“The best things.”
Jace’s card tower collapses. He swears loudly, which makes Stellan laugh—actually laugh, not the polished chuckle he deploys at dinner parties—and Jace’s head whips around to stare at him.
“Did you just—”
“It was amusing.”
“You laughed. Stellan laughed. Someone mark the calendar.”
“I laugh.”
“You make sounds that technically qualify as laughter. That was different.” Jace is grinning now, delighted. “That was a real laugh. I’m counting that as a win.”
“It’s not a competition.”
“Everything’s a competition. I’m winning.”
Stellan rolls his eyes, but he’s still smiling. And when Jace leans over to gather his scattered cards, Stellan’s hand brushes his shoulder. Casual. Brief. The kind of touch that could be accidental if you weren’t paying attention.
Jace goes still for just a second. Then keeps moving, keeps talking, but there’s a flush creeping up the back of his neck.
Yeah. There’s definitely something there.
Things start overlapping.
That’s the only way to describe it—the room stops being separate conversations and starts being one continuous thing.
Rhett moves to the floor near the fireplace, and Jace immediately lays down next to him, complaining about card-tower sabotage.
Gray pulls Wes upright and into a kiss that goes deep fast, and Wes makes a sound against his mouth that I feel in my own chest.
Theo rises from his chair.
The room notices. It’s subtle—a shift in attention, everyone tracking his movement without looking directly at him. Four years ago, Theo had to ask for attention. Had to earn the space to speak. Now he just takes it.
He crosses to the couch, and the crowd parts for him without being asked. Gray and Wes break their kiss but don’t separate, making room. Rhett shifts Jace’s weight. Seth’s arms tighten around me.
Theo stops in front of us. Looks down at me with those quiet, certain eyes.
“Come here,” he says.
It’s not a question. Not a request. Just a statement of what’s going to happen.
I go.
Theo takes me to the bedroom that branches off the main space.
Not to separate us—the door stays open, the sounds of the others filtering through. Just to have me for a minute. To focus without distraction.
“You’ve been stretched thin all day,” he says, pressing me back against the wall. “I could feel it.”
“Kids. Sanctuary stuff. The delegation from the Council.”
“I know.” His hands frame my face, thumbs brushing my cheekbones. “I’m not asking you to explain. I’m telling you to stop carrying it.”
“I’m fine—”
“Bree.” His voice is gentle but immovable. “Put it down.”
This is what Theo does now. Sees the weight I’m holding and tells me—doesn’t ask, tells me—to let go of it. Four years ago, I would have argued. Would have insisted I could handle it, that I didn’t need help.
Now I just… exhale.
The tension drains out of my shoulders. He watches it go, nodding slowly, and then his mouth is on mine.
Theo kisses like he does everything else—patient and thorough and completely unhurried.
Like he has all the time in the world to take me apart and every intention of doing exactly that.
His thigh presses between my legs and I rock against it without thinking, chasing friction, already desperate for more.
“There it is,” he murmurs against my lips. “That’s what I wanted. Stop thinking.”
“Hard to think when you—ah—”
His hands slide down my body, stripping me efficiently—dress over my head, bra unhooked, panties pushed down until I’m bare against the wall and he’s still fully clothed. The power imbalance shouldn’t be hot, but god, it is.
“All day,” he says, dropping to his knees in front of me, “I’ve been thinking about this.”
“About—about what?”