“Thanks, X,” Anson muttered.
X just grinned and strummed a chord. “De nada, hermano.”
“Yes,” he told Oliver, surprising himself with the ease of the admission. “She is.”
“Cool.” Oliver nodded, satisfied, then ducked back under the table.
“Oliver James Harmon,” Nessie scolded, “what are you doing under there?”
A suspicious crunching sound answered her.
“He’s feeding the dogs,” Jax reported, peering under the tablecloth.
“Oliver!”
“They’re hungry!”
“They’ve already been fed,” Nessie said, exasperated. “You’ll make them fat.”
“Nah, Kavik needs the calories,” X said. “He’s skin and bones.”
“That dog is nowhere near skin and bones,” Bear said, watching Bramble accept a piece of pancake with the solemnity of receiving communion and King scarf his without breathing. “And King is getting a damn gut.”
“He’s just fluffy,” River protested.
“He’s a food thief, is what he is.” Bear lunged as King’s jaws closed around a piece of bacon that had been left momentarily unguarded. “Dammit, King!”
The Leonberger dove under the table with his prize, nearly upending X’s coffee in the process. Kavik, sensing a party, threw back his head and howled. Goose didn’t even lift his head, too busy accepting pancake offerings from Oliver’s outstretched hand. Echo just watched the chaos with dignified disdain, while Bramble pressed closer to Maggie’s legs, his protection duty not yet complete in his canine mind.
Maggie’s smile grew as the banter flowed around her. She laughed at River’s terrible jokes and helped Nessie try to extract Oliver and several hundred pounds of dog from under the table. When breakfast dissolved into X and River arguing about cleanup duty while Bear physically dragged King away from another bacon heist attempt, she rose to help Ghost and Naomi clear plates.
She fit here, as if she’d always been part of this strange, cobbled-together family.
Us.
“You good?” Jax asked quietly, sliding into the chair Maggie had vacated.
Anson nodded, surprised to find it wasn’t a lie. “Yeah.”
“Scary shit, what happened yesterday,” Jax said, Echo pressing against his leg as if sensing the shift in conversation. “But she’s strong.”
“Stronger than me,” Anson admitted.
“Nah.” Jax shook his head. “Different kind of strong, maybe. You two fit.”
Across the kitchen, Maggie glanced back at him, a smile playing at her lips as she helped dry dishes. The bruises on her throat were still visible, a reminder of how close he’d come to losing her before he’d even fully admitted she was his to lose.
But she was here.
Safe.
Surrounded by people who would die to protect her simply because she mattered to him.
Because he mattered to them.
This, he realized, was what he wanted for his future. Not the solitary perfection of his forge, but this messy, loud, imperfect, and absolutely worth fighting for family. A family pieced together from broken parts, strong at the seams where they’d been mended with gold and trust and second chances.
“Yeah,” he told Jax, his eyes never leaving Maggie. “We do.”
