“LOOK WHO FINALLY CRAWLED HOME!”
Beck, of course.
He barrels in like a storm, wearing a grin, hair a mess, eyes laden with humor that’s doing heavy lifting. He looks healthier thanthe last time I saw him, sturdier, definitely clean, with recovery carved into him like a second skin.
He stops at the side of the bed and spreads his arms. “I would hug you, but you’re basically a stitched-together corpse, and Ella would murder me.”
Ella’s glare could cut steel. “Correct.”
Beck leans in anyway, voice dropping conspiratorial. “Did you seriously only come back because you got shot? You couldn’t just… visit?”
I lift my hand weakly, and he lights up. “Oh! He’s flipping me off. That’s how you know he’s okay.”
Zane snorts, Jace’s mouth twitches, while Dad watches all of it like he’s pretending not to be relieved. It’s been a decade since we were all in the same space like this. Ten years since I let myself stand under the same roof as the people who knew me before the scars, before the ghosts.
They’ve all changed, but so have I. Zane’s got more weight of responsibility in his eyes, Jace’s edges are sharper, honed by war and fatherhood. Beck, well, Beck looks like a man who fought his own demons and somehow came out breathing. And Dad looks tired. Not weak—never weak—just tired.
He clears his throat. “You’re going to be okay, son. Welcome back.”
Beck rocks back on his heels, hands shoved into his pockets. “So, since we’re all here and you’re not dead, how about we address the elephant in the room?”
“Beck,” Zane warns.
“What?” Beck holds up a hand. “I’m just saying what everyone’s thinking.”
Jace crosses his arms, picking up from where Beck and I left off. “He’s right. What’s the deal with Kate and Julian?”
They are all looking at me, waiting for answers. I could dodge, lie the way I always have, keep the door shut, but there’s no point since I’m sure they’ve already figured it out by now.
“They’re mine,” I decree.
Ella’s breath catches softly by my side, Beck’s eyebrows shoot up, Zane doesn’t blink, and Jace’s gaze sharpens—soldier brain recalculating everything.
Dad is the one to cut into the silence. “So you’re aware that the boy is yours?”
I nod. “It’s kind of obvious. I knew it the moment I saw his eyes.”
“And Kate?” Jace inquires, voice careful.
“Kate is complicated. We still haven’t figured out what we are, but they are my family. Unexpected, but mine,” I answer, the words absolute.
“Wow, never thought I’d see the day,” Zane chuckles.
Jace exhales slow. “About time you brought something home besides trouble.”
Beck grins, relief bleeding into humor. “Technically, he brought home both.”
“Beck!” Ella snaps.
“What? It’s the truth.”
Jace’s gaze stays on me, steady. “You sure about them?”
I meet his eyes so he can see the sincerity in mine. “Yes.”
He nods like that’s enough, thus ending the interrogation. They all accept without further questions, and that hits me somewhere deep. I didn’t realize how much I’d braced for rejection.
Beck claps his hands once, breaking the heaviness. “Well then, family meeting adjourned. He’s alive, he’s stubborn, he’s apparently a father, and—“
