We spenta lot of the next twenty-four hours in the conference room, only leaving for short hours at a time to eat, shower, or take quick naps. There was a constant rotation of Harem Project guys as well as someone from our friends’ families at all times.
It was sometime late at night when we determined our target. The facility with the most humans. There was reasonable belief that it was the headquarters of Silence, even with the humans present.
My stomach churned whenever I tried to imagine what they were doing with humans. What they did to monsters was bad enough, and we weren’t defenseless. Humans, though. They were basically declawed kittens in the hands of monsters who meant them harm.
Some of us have been home for a few hours and just crawling out of bed. I wasn’t in my own bed, even though I was alone. I couldn’t remember the last time I actually slept in my bed. Too lonely. And my husbands’ beds smelled of them, even when they weren’t there.
Opening my eyes, I stared at the ceiling as the afternoon sun peeked determinedly through the curtains. Even though I’d only slept for a couple hours since two nights ago, my eyes were wide open.
We had a plan of sorts. That meant we had a real deadline. And while my fear had been simmering just beneath the surface for weeks now, I was oddly calm. Still afraid, but there was a numbness to it now, too. As if I gave in too deeply to the fear, I’d be able to do nothing else.
The quiet of the house should have been unsettling. I liked to hear noise these days. To hear my men and wife moving around. Living. Breathing in our space.
But I heard nothing. Not from Tara’s bed, anyway.
With a breath, I rolled to my side and slid out. My feet hitting the ground left aslaphanging in the air. It felt too loud, like I could feel the sound over my skin. I was quiet when I went into his ensuite and moved absently through a shower and brushing my teeth. I was still moving without focus or attention while I dressed in whatever clothes I pulled from his closet, not seeing if they were mine or his.
When I finally blinked, pulling my mind from the distracted place inside me, I found that I was standing in the ballroom. While I say this about many rooms in my house, the ballroom was probably one of my favorite rooms.
We’ve held so many celebrations here. New Year’s. Birthdays. Holidays. Friendly gatherings. I’d had visions of getting married in here. I could see it when I closed my eyes. Flowers and vines decorating the space in light colors, emphasized with pops of blue and green. Rows of our friends watching. And our wife gifting the bouquet to the next family.
We’d gather in a big group hug and just breathe each other in. Exchange vows and pledge our life and love to each other. Again and again. I could marry these men over every single day and it would never lose its deep meaning.
Then we’d file outside for the celebration. There’d be more food than you could ever eat all of. There’d be a long, winding, snaking table that we’d all sit together at. We’d dance and laugh well into the night. Maybe even sleep under the stars.
Hands on my hips made me jump, and I spun to find Aratiri smiling at me. With my heart in my throat, I smiled in return.
“Hey,” I said.
He brushed his fingers across my face. “Hey,” he answered, voice quiet. “What’re you thinking?”
My gaze wandered around the room, but the vision had already faded. Shaking my head, I brought my attention back to him. “Just of all the times we’ve had in this room. All the good memories.”
“We’ll be making so many more,” Arat said, pulling me against him.
I wrapped my arms around his neck, letting our foreheads touch as he held me close. Our bodies swayed in the quiet, as if we were moving to phantom music.
“Yeah,” I agreed, not hearing any conviction in it.
“You don’t think so?” he asked.
I was shit at lying, so I just shrugged. While I didn’t want to say I didn’t think so, there was a part of me that thought we weren’t going to make it out of that building alive. And while I didn’t fully give into that doomsday prediction and held out hope that we were going to be well enough prepared for whatever we found there, the fact that we were going to be surroundedinsidea dangerous facility felt a little final to me.
Arat sighed, one of his hands moving up my spine to rest between my shoulder blades. “Wewillcome home.”
I nodded, still not trusting my voice to sound convicted with my confidence.
He smiled a little. A quiet, sure smile. “Do you know why I believe that?”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because our happily ever after hasn’t even started yet.”
My brows knit together. “It hasn’t?”
He chuckled. “Hadley’s here, yes. But our family hasn’t even settled into having her yet. We’re still learning each other. Finding the right pattern and happiness. Remember how long it took us to learn to live with Notus?”
I grinned. He was a bit of an eccentric diva when he arrived. It was a hilarious and yet frustrating year that continued well into the time that Nephele and Tempest joined us. And then one day, everything just clicked, and it was as if we were trying to stand right outside the happy zone instead of shifting, just slightly, until we all aligned as we were always meant to.
