He scrambles away from me until his back hits the headboard, knees drawn up to his chest, arms wrapped around himself like he’s trying to hold his own pieces together.
No. No no no?—
Phoenix is there before I can move.
She flows onto the bed like water, positioning herself behind Mason so he’s sandwiched between us. Her arms wrap around him from behind and she hooks her chin over his shoulder, voice dropping to a murmur I can barely hear.
“Shh. It’s okay. You’re safe. Remember what you said a few minutes ago? How much you wanted him here? How you couldn’t stop thinking about him?”
Mason shudders in her arms. His breathing is ragged, panicked, but Phoenix’s proximity seems to ground him. His grip on his own forearms loosens incrementally.
“That’s it,” she continues, stroking his hair. “Just breathe. Nobody’s going to make you do anything you don’t want. But you asked for him, honey. Remember? You asked me to bring him to you.”
Hurt lances through my chest at the sight of my omega needing someone else to soothe him into accepting my presence. But I try my best to push it down.
Phoenix meets my gaze over Mason’s shoulder. Her amber eyes hold mine with focused intensity.
Then she winks.
“Come on, honey,” she murmurs, guiding Mason forward. “Let him hold you. Just like you wanted. Just like you’ve been asking for.”
Mason allows himself to be repositioned. Still trembling. Still uncertain. But when his body settles against my chest again, something in him seems to exhale. Like a held breath finally releasing after years of waiting.
My lips find his forehead first.
Then his temple. The hinge of his jaw. The curve of his throat, where his pulse hammers visibly beneath the skin. Each kiss deliberate. Reverent. Not driven by heat-lust but by something older and deeper—the slow, devastating process of reclaiming something sacred that was lost.
Mason starts to shiver again.
Phoenix’s hand appears, rubbing gentle circles across his back. Her touch a steady counterpoint to the tremors rolling through him.
My mouth finds the claiming bite.
The sound Mason makes is devastating, a groan that’s half arousal, half overwhelming emotion. His body arches toward me involuntarily before he catches himself, pulling away with a gasp.
He turns toward Phoenix.
Not away from me exactly, buttowardher. Seeking something. Needing something that I can’t give him in this moment, some anchor outside the intensity of our bond.
“Go back to Judah,” Phoenix urges softly. “He’s right here. You need?—“
Mason kisses her.
The movement is sudden, desperate. His hands cup her face as his mouth claims hers with a hunger that makes my breath catch. Phoenix’s eyes fly wide, full of surprise and confusion, before flickering to meet mine over Mason’s shoulder.
I read her alarm and a genuine desire not to be made to push Mason away.
Watching them makes the knot in my chest unfurl.
So I give her a wink of my own.
Phoenix’s eyes widen for a flashing second before Mason’s insistence demands her complete attention.
I lean away, resting back on my spread palms. Still close enough to be within reach, but telegraphing that I’m willing to give them the space they need.
Watching this should probably bother me. But it really,reallydoesn’t.
There should be jealousy. Some possessive alpha instinct should be screaming at me to tear them apart, to reclaim what’s mine.
