"Nervous?"
"Terrified." I take a long drink. "This is where it all falls apart, isn't it? The second we step on campus."
"Maybe." Oakley leans against the counter, cedar scent warm and steady. "Or maybe we actually pull this off."
"You're optimistic this morning."
"I had a good night's sleep for the first time in months." His smile is soft. Private. Meant for me. "Hard not to be optimistic."
Corvus appears in the doorway, tablet already in hand because of course it is. He's fully dressed, hair perfect, looking like he's been awake for hours. Probably has been.
"Status report," he says, because he can't help himself. "Vespera's schedule is uploaded to the shared calendar. Her firstclass is Movement at nine, which overlaps with your Voice class, Dorian. Oakley, you have Scene Study at the same time."
"So we can all walk her to the theater building together," Oakley says.
"And look like the controlling pack we're trying not to be," I point out.
"Or look like the pack we actually are," Corvus counters. "She's living with us. People will know. Might as well own it."
He's right, but it still makes my stomach clench. The whispers. The looks. The inevitable questions about how the scholarship Omega ended up claimed by the pack that spent months hunting her.
"Cover story," I say. "We went away together over summer. Courted her properly. She accepted."
"Will anyone believe that?" Oakley asks.
"Does it matter?" Corvus sets his tablet down, meets both our eyes. "She's ours. We're hers. That's the only truth that counts."
Footsteps on the stairs. All three of us go still, tracking her movement. She appears in the kitchen doorway wearing jeans and one of my shirts—the one she kept—and looking nervous and defiant in equal measure.
"Morning," she says.
The word lands like a grenade. So casual. So domestic. Like this is normal. Like we do this every day.
"Morning," I echo. "Coffee?"
"Please."
I pour while Oakley wordlessly starts making eggs and Corvus pulls up her schedule to double-check something. We move around each other like we've done this a thousand times instead of once. Like we're actually a pack instead of four people who barely survived six weeks in captivity together.
She sits at the island, wrapping both hands around the mug I give her. Watching us with those green eyes that see too much.
"You're all being weird," she finally says.
"We're being normal," Corvus protests.
"That's what's weird." But she's smiling slightly. "You're trying too hard."
"We want this to work," Oakley says, plating eggs and setting them in front of her. "Is that so bad?"
"No." She takes a bite, chews thoughtfully. "Unexpected. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop."
"No shoes," I promise. "This. Whatever this is."
"A pack," she says quietly. "This is what being pack looks like. Apparently."
The word settles over the kitchen like a benediction. Or a curse. Hard to tell which.
We eat in relative silence, the kind that's comfortable instead of tense. When she's done, she carries her plate to the sink and Oakley immediately moves to wash it.
