"Parker." Jace's voice cuts through the panic, steady and sure. "Look at me."
I do, finding his dark eyes across the room, and something in them — concern, maybe, or recognition — makes my breathing slow just a fraction.
"We didn't mean to scare you," Cal says softly. "The electrical system's been glitching all week. We've been trying to override it remotely, but?—"
"You've been avoiding us," Silas finishes, still watching me like I might bolt. Which I might.
"You three ambushed me with impossible declarations and expected what, exactly?" My voice sounds thin, threadbare, but steadier. "Was I supposed to just accept that you all supposedly want me and, oh, by the way, I wouldn't have to choose? What does that even mean?"
"It means," Silas says, moving closer but stopping when I tense, "that we've already chosen. All three of us. We chose you six years ago, twelve years ago, maybe longer. The only question is whether you choose us back."
Before I can run, before I can think, his arm snakes around my waist, pulling me back against his chest in one smooth motion. He's solid heat and controlled strength, his body a wall I can't push through, won't push through, because somewhere beneath the panic is a traitor voice whispering that this is what I've wanted since I was seventeen and first realized that looking at them made me ache.
"Let me go," I whisper, but my body betrays me, melting into his warmth like wax near flame.
"No." His voice rumbles through his chest into my spine, and when his free hand slides into my hair, gripping just enough totilt my head back, I stop breathing entirely. "We let you go once. Watched you disappear for six years. Not happening again."
Jace approaches with that measured stride that makes everything feel inevitable, and when he stops in front of me, close enough that I can smell his cologne — something expensive and dark that makes me think of shadows and sins — my knees threaten to give out. His hand rises, fingers ghosting along my jaw before sliding down to rest against my throat, not squeezing, just... holding. His thumb finds my pulse, rabitting against his skin, and something dark and satisfied flashes in his eyes.
"Tell me, Parker," his voice drops to that dangerous register that makes heat pool low in my belly, makes my thighs clench involuntarily. "Do you want to stay a princess locked in her tower, safe and untouched and alone?"
His thumb strokes over my pulse point, and I can feel my heart trying to escape through my skin, each beat a confession he can read like braille. Cal moves into my peripheral vision, his hand sliding over my hip, and suddenly I'm surrounded — Silas behind me, Jace in front, Cal at my side, and nowhere to run even if my traitorous body would let me.
"Or," Jace leans closer, his breath fanning across my lips, making them part without permission, "do you want to beourprincess?"
The words sink into me like hooks, pulling at every carefully constructed wall. My body trembles, but not from fear anymore — from want so acute it feels like dying, from need so desperate I can taste it like copper on my tongue. Every nerve ending is alive and screaming, the ache between my thighs so intense I have to lock my knees to stay standing. My breath comes in shallow pants that fog the air between us, and I know they can see it —the flush spreading down my chest, the way my pupils must be blown wide, the way I'm shaking apart in their hands like I've been waiting my whole life for this moment.
Do I want this? God, yes. I want it so badly I can't breathe around it, can't think past it, can't remember why I ever thought running was the answer when every cell in my body is screaming to stay, to let them keep me, to finally stop pretending I don't dream about this, about them, about what it would feel like to stop fighting what feels as inevitable as gravity.
The word 'yes' sits on my tongue like a lit match, ready to burn everything down, and they wait — three men who could take whatever they want holding themselves back, letting me choose, letting me decide if I'm brave enough to admit what we all already know.
That I'm theirs.
That I always have been.
14
JACE
She stands in the center of the room, fear and want braided so tightly through the lines of her body I can’t tell them apart. The ocean wind steals through the open balcony doors, tugging at the hem of her dress. Her eyes flick from me to Cal, to Silas behind her, and the air sharpens, turns electric. I feel the pulse of it low and deep, a physical ache like a hunger—one that’s been curdling in my gut for a decade—suddenly near to breaking the skin.
She tries to hide it, but her hands shake. So I steady her by touch—one thumb pressed to the pulse in her throat, the other hand at her hip, claiming territory but giving her time to surrender it. She lets out a sound, quiet but unmistakable, and I know she’s as close to the edge as I am.
“Tell me you want this,” I say. I keep my voice soft, but the words vibrate through my teeth like a threat. “Or tell me to stop, and I’ll stop.”
She blinks. Swallows hard.
“Don’t,” she says, voice rough as new gravel. “Don’t ever stop.”
That’s all it takes.
I motion to Silas. He pulls the balcony door shut, clicks the deadbolt, and when he leans in, he’s all heat and want. He crowds her from behind, big hands finding her waist and holding her steady. Cal, always needing to be first, slides his body against her side so she’s bracketed by the three of us.
I take her mouth, hard, devouring the gasp that breaks her composure. She tastes like heat and salt and something sweet that’s all her, that I want to drown in. Her spine arches on instinct, pressing her tightly to Silas, who buries his face in her hair and breathes her in like he’s been starved for oxygen.
Cal trails kisses down her neck, tongue teasing the hollow of her collarbone, hands roaming — testing her boundaries, mapping her reactions. When he drags his teeth across her earlobe, Parker shudders, her knees almost buckling.
Silas murmurs, “Easy, firefly,” and steadies her with hands that dwarf her ribs, fingers splayed for maximum coverage and minimum mercy.
