I step out from behind him.
RJ's hand tightens.
"It's okay," I say.
I step between them.
I squeeze RJ's hand. I reach forward and put my other hand on Dalton's chest — feel his heartbeat under my palm, the bond between us running warm and steady. His eyes drop to my face and I hold his gaze.
The mark at my wrist blazes — both bonds, my hands on two of my fated mates and—
It doesn't build. It doesn't warn.
It just hits.
Nothing like the others — not the slow warm recognition of Leo, not the collision-ignition of Dalton in a hallway. This is a door blown off its hinges in a winter clearing with snow on the ground and blood on Dalton's collar and miles of forest between here and where RJ started this morning.
The mark at my wrist doesn't pulse.
It burns.
RJ makes a sound I've never heard from him — not the warning sound, not the anguish of the clearing, not my name pulled up from underneath language. Something that has no word for it. Something that is only ever made once.
His hand around mine goes from anchoring to crushing.
I hold on.
Dalton's hand comes up and covers mine against his chest, his eyes on my face, the bond between us wide open in response to what's happening beside it.
And then it's done.
RJ is bonded.
I feel it settle into place — not the pull. Something permanent now. Something that knows exactly where it belongs and has stopped looking.
He presses his forehead to the back of my head. His chest against my back. His hand still crushing mine.
"Mate," he says.
Not a claim this time.
A fact.
Chapter eighteen
Alex
We walk back through the trees.
RJ stays close. Every few steps his hand finds my arm, my shoulder, the back of my neck — brief contact, checking, then releasing. Dalton walks on my other side, moving carefully, feeling his injuries from the fight. He doesn't complain.
RJ looks at him.
Not the drive-blind focus of the campus — something more deliberate. Reading Dalton the way a dominant alpha reads something that has been near his mate and hasn’t decided yet if it’s allowed. His jaw is set. His hand finds my arm again and this time doesn't release.
Dalton feels it. He doesn't look back. He adjusts his position by half a step — not retreating, not conceding — just giving the two of us more space — and keeps walking.
It's a choice. I feel it through the bond, what it costs him to make it.
