I want to stay.
The thought hit me like a punch to the chest, and I felt myself recoil from it even as it settled into my bones. I wanted to stay. I wanted to try. I wanted to stop running and let myself fall into whatever this was. The words wouldn't come. They lodged in my throat like broken glass, too dangerous to speak aloud. Because saying it would make it real. Saying it would mean admitting that everything I'd fought for, everything I'd sacrificed, three years of running, of hiding, of slowly killing myself to stay free, had been for nothing.
Or maybe it had been for this,a traitorous voice whispered.Maybe you had to run so you could choose to come back.
I squeezed my eyes shut, the war inside me raging. Part of me wanted to say the words, to give him what he was asking for. But another part, the part that had kept me alive for three years — screamed that this was a trap. That the moment I admitted I wanted to stay, I'd lose whatever leverage I had left.
Through the bond, I felt Mason tense behind me. He could feel my turmoil, I realized. Could feel the war raging inside me.
"I'm not ready," I whispered, hating the way his arms tightened around me, hating the flicker of pain I felt through the bond before he could shield it, my voice small and broken in the quiet room. "I'm not ready to say that yet. But I'm..." I swallowed hard, forcing the next words out, my fingers curling against his chest. "I'm not running. Not right now. That's all I can give you."
He was quiet for a long moment, his breath warm against my hair, his heartbeat steady against my spine. Then he pressed a kiss to my hair, his arms gentle around me, his thumb tracing soothing circles on my stomach.
"That's enough," he said roughly, and I felt the truth of it through the bond — his acceptance, his understanding, his willingness to wait, all of it washing over me like a warm tide. "That's more than enough." Even as I let him hold me, even as I leaned into his warmth and breathed in his scent, the words echoed in my head like a confession I wasn't brave enough to make.
I want to stay. I want to stay. I want to stay.
I didn't know if that made me weak or strong. Didn't know if I was finally healing or just finding a new way to destroy myself. All I knew was that lying there in his arms, the bond humming between us like a second heartbeat, something inside me was shifting. Changing. Becoming something I didn't recognize.
Not their possession. Not their prisoner. Not quite their Omega. Not yet.
But maybe — terrifyingly, impossibly — something close.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
AVA
I caught myself purring.
Not on purpose. Not because someone was touching me or holding me or making me feel safe. Just... purring. Standing alone in the kitchen, waiting for the coffee to brew, the sound vibrating in my chest like it belonged there. I stopped the moment I noticed, pressing my hand to my sternum like I could physically silence it. But the damage was done. The realization settled into my bones with the weight of an anvil.
I was becoming what they wanted.
The thought should have felt like a victory, survival, adaptation, making the best of a bad situation. Instead, it felt like drowning. Like watching myself disappear one piece at a time, replaced by something softer, something that craved their touch and their scent and their approval.
The old Ava would have been horrified.
The new Ava... I wasn't sure she existed at all. It had been three days since Mason. Three days of floating in a haze of contentment that terrified me more than any of their threatsever had. I'd stopped flinching when they touched me. Stopped counting the exits. Stopped planning.
I'd started leaning into Caleb's chest when he carved his creations by the fire. Started seeking out Leo's sharp wit when the silence got too heavy. Started waiting for Ethan to explain things, genuinely curious about the science behind my own biology, listening for Mason's footsteps, my heart lifting when he entered a room.
The bond hummed between us constantly now, a five-way thread of emotion that I couldn't untangle no matter how hard I tried. Their feelings bled into mine until I couldn't tell the difference. Was this contentment mine, or theirs? This warmth in my chest, was it love, or just the bond doing what bonds did?
Did it even matter anymore? I carried the coffee to the bathroom, needing a moment alone. The face that looked back at me from the mirror was almost unrecognizable.
Soft eyes. Flushed cheeks. Lips still swollen from Leo's kisses that morning. And marks, god, so many marks. Caleb's bite on my shoulder, scarred over but still visible. Ethan's neat claiming mark on the curve of my neck. Leo's messier one just below. And Mason's, fresh and pink, throbbing faintly with my pulse.
I looked claimed. I looked owned. I looked like exactly what I was — an Omega who belonged to her pack. Something deep inside me started to panic. I gripped the edge of the sink, knuckles going white, forcing myself to breathe through the tightness in my chest. This was fine. This was survival. This was?—
This is you giving up.
The thought came unbidden, sharp and accusatory. I tried to push it away, but it lodged in my brain like a splinter. I wasn't fighting anymore. I'd stopped fighting. For three years, fighting was all I knew. Running, hiding, surviving on pure stubborn refusal to become what biology said I should be. That fight hadnearly killed me, yes. But it had also been the only thing that was truly mine.
And now? Now I purred without trying. Scented them for comfort. Craved their touch like oxygen. I was becoming soft, pliable, content. Everything they'd wanted from the beginning.
If I stopped fighting... who was I?
The testing started small.
