Chapter 9
Jasper finishes moving in on a Saturday.
He doesn't make a production of it. No truck, no parade of boxes. Just two duffel bags and a single bookshelf's worth of belongings carried in from his car with quiet efficiency.
Ragon helps him settle the furniture. Drake offers to grab lunch for everyone. Eli hovers in the hallway asking practical questions about outlet placement and whether the room gets too much morning sun.
I watch from the kitchen doorway, fingers wrapped around a mug of tea I'm not drinking.
Marie stands beside me, close enough that our shoulders almost touch. She smells like jasmine and nerves.
"He's really staying," she says quietly.
"Yeah."
"Are you okay with that?"
I glance at her. She's watching Jasper move through the hallway with his second bag, her expression unreadable.
"I don't think what I'm okay with matters," I say.
"That's not true."
"Isn't it?" I set my mug down harder than necessary. "He's here. He's unpacking. We adjust or we don't. That's how this works."
She flinches slightly. "Vee—"
"I'm fine," I interrupt. "Just... processing."
I leave before she can push further.
By evening, Jasper's room is functional. Sparse, but his. The door stays open most of the time, which I notice. Like he's offering transparency. Making himself available without demanding attention.
It's strategic. Careful.
I don't know what to do with it.
What I do know is that my instincts are jangling like alarm bells that won't shut off. New alpha in the house. Territory shifting. Pack dynamics reshuffling.
My omega brain doesn't care that this is supposed to help. It just knows everything feels unstable.
So I do what omegas do when they're stressed.
I seek out my alphas.
Eli first.
I find him in his room, folding laundry with the kind of precise attention that means he's thinking too hard about something. His scent—tea and linen and that subtle warmth—wraps around me the second I step through the doorway.
"Hey," I say quietly.
He looks up, and his expression softens immediately. "Hey yourself."
"Can I...?" I gesture vaguely at his bed.
"Always."
I climb onto the mattress and tuck myself against the headboard, knees pulled to my chest. Eli continues folding, but I can feel his attention on me. Checking. Assessing.
"How are you doing?" he asks after a moment.
"Weird," I admit. "Everything feels off."
"New pack member will do that." He sets a shirt aside, reaches for another. "Give it time. Your instincts will settle once they accept him."
"What if they don't?"
"They will." He glances at me, green eyes steady behind his glasses. "Jasper's good at this. He knows how to integrate without disrupting."
"He's only been here a few days."
"And in those days, has he done anything to make you feel unsafe?"
I think about it. The way Jasper knocked before entering shared spaces. The way he asked permission before moving furniture. The way his scent stayed controlled, never pressing.
"No," I admit.
"Then trust that." Eli finishes the last shirt and moves to sit beside me on the bed. "Come here."
I don't hesitate. I unfold and crawl into his lap like I've done a thousand times, tucking my face against his neck and breathing him in. His arms come around me immediately, one hand sliding up to cup the back of my head.
"There we go," he murmurs. "Better?"
"Getting there."
He holds me while my breathing evens out, his thumb rubbing slow circles against my scalp. My instincts gradually stop screaming, soothed by his presence and his scent and the steady rhythm of his heartbeat under my ear.
"Thank you," I whisper.
"Nothing to thank me for." He presses a kiss to my hair. "I want to help."
Dinner is a carefully orchestrated dance of six people trying to fit around a table meant for six.
Jasper ends up in the extra chair we pulled from the office. He doesn't complain about the squeeze, just settles in and accepts the plate Marie hands him with a quiet thanks.
I sit between Eli and Drake, which feels safest. Marie is across from me, flanked by Ragon and Jasper. The symmetry is almost deliberate—two omegas, separated by the table, each with their alphas nearby.
Conversation is stilted at first. Polite questions about Jasper's old apartment, his work, whether he needs anything for his room. He answers with the same economical precision he does everything—enough information to be helpful, not enough to overshare.
I pick at my food and try to ignore the way Marie keeps glancing at me.
Halfway through the meal, I notice something's missing.
"Where's the hot sauce?" I ask.
"Oh!" Marie brightens. "I moved it to the lazy Susan. It makes more sense there with the other condiments."
My fork pauses. "I had it by the stove."
"I know, but that seemed inefficient? Like, why walk across the kitchen when you could just spin the lazy Susan?" She demonstrates helpfully, turning it so the hot sauce faces me. "See? Better."
It's not better.
It's my system, reorganized without asking, again.
"Right," I say flatly. "Better."
Eli's knee presses against mine under the table. A quiet warning.
I ignore it.
After dinner, Marie offers to help me clean up.
I'm elbow-deep in soapy water when she picks up my favorite wooden spoon—the one with the worn handle that fits my grip perfectly—and opens the wrong drawer.
"That goes in the other one," I say, pointing.
"Oh, I reorganized these too." She smiles. "Cooking utensils on the left, serving stuff on the right. More logical."
Something in me snaps.
"It was already logical. It was my system. Why do you keep moving my things?"
She blinks, startled. "I'm not—I was just trying to help make things more efficient."
"I don't need your efficiency!" My voice rises before I can stop it. "I need you to stop touching my stuff without asking. The pantry, the drawers, the hot sauce—every time I turn around, you've moved something. This is my kitchen, Marie. Mine."
"It's the pack's kitchen," she says, defensive now. "I'm part of the pack too."
"Then act like it instead of trying to erase me from every corner of this house!"
"I'm not trying to erase you!" Her eyes well up. "I'm trying to make things better. I'm trying to contribute. I thought—"
"I don't care what you thought," I snap. "Stop moving my things."
"Vee—"
"I said stop!"
The snarl comes from behind me.
Low, guttural, unmistakably alpha.
I freeze.
Ragon stands in the doorway, blue eyes blazing, dominance rolling off him in waves so thick I can barely breathe. His scent sharpens to smoke and iron and command.
"Enough."
The word cracks through the kitchen like a whip.
My instincts slam me to my knees before my brain catches up. I'm on the floor, head bowed, hands fisted in my lap, every nerve ending screaming submit submit submit.
"You do not speak to her that way," Ragon says, voice deadly quiet. "She is your pack sister. She was trying to help."
"I didn't—" I start.
"I don't want to hear it." He moves closer, each step deliberate. "You've been hostile since she arrived. Territorial. Possessive. It stops now."
Tears burn behind my eyes. "She keeps changing things—"
"She's making a home here. Just like you did five years ago." He stops in front of me, towering. "You're going to apologize. And you're going to mean it."
My throat feels like it's closing.
I force my gaze up to Marie. She's pressed against the counter, face pale, eyes wide.
"I'm sorry," I manage. "I shouldn't have yelled."
"Vee—" Marie's voice cracks.
"Again," Ragon says. "Like you mean it."
"I'm sorry, Marie." The words taste like ash. "I was out of line."
Ragon's hand comes down on top of my head. Not gentle. A firm press of dominance and control.
"Better," he says. "Now go to your room. Cool off. I'll deal with you later."
I stand on shaky legs and flee before he can see me cry.
I make it to my nest before the sobs start.
Huge, gasping things that shake my whole body. I bury my face in my pillow and let it all out—the anger, the shame, the bone-deep fear that I'm losing everything and there's nothing I can do to stop it.
I'm still crying when the door opens.
"Vee?"
Eli.
I don't lift my head. "Go away."
"Not a chance." The bed dips as he climbs into my nest. "Come here."
I resist for exactly three seconds before I'm crawling into his lap, face pressed to his shoulder, fingers clutching his shirt like he's the only solid thing in the world.
"I hate this," I sob. "I hate everything about this."
"I know." His arms band around me, tight and secure. "I know, sweetheart."
"She's taking over my space and Ragon doesn't even care. He just—he just lets her, and then I'm the bad guy when I try to push back."
"You're not the bad guy." Eli's hand strokes through my hair, gentle and repetitive. "But you can't scream at her, Vee. Not in front of the alphas. You know how that looks."
"Like I'm the problem."
"Like you're struggling." He pulls back enough to look at me, thumbs wiping at my tears. "Which you are. And that's okay. But you have to find better ways to handle it."
"I don't know how."
"Then we figure it out together." He kisses my forehead. "But first, you breathe. And you let me hold you until you don't feel like you're drowning."
So I do.
I curl into him and breathe and let him anchor me until the storm passes.
Later—much later, when my eyes are puffy and my throat is raw—Eli convinces me to come back downstairs.
"They're playing a board game," he says. "Low stakes. Easy distraction. You don't have to talk to Marie if you're not ready. Just... be present."
I don't want to.
But I also don't want to hide in my room all night like a child being punished.
So I let him lead me down to the living room.
They're all there. Ragon and Drake setting up the board. Jasper reading the rules with that focused intensity he brings to everything. Marie perched on the couch, looking small and anxious.
When I walk in, she looks up. Our eyes meet.
I look away first.