"That glow?"
"Claimed mate glow." Maria joins us, pressing a mug of coffee into my hands. "Fades after a week or so, but right now you're practically lit up from the inside."
I reach for the coffee and nearly drop it when the ceramic that should strain my wrist weighs nothing at all. I adjust my grip, overcompensating, and watch the liquid tremble in the cup as my muscles recalibrate.
"Strength's up too." Knox settles into the chair beside me, his presence a warm anchor against the overwhelming newness. "You'll need to relearn a few things."
"How much stronger will I be?"
"Strong enough." His hand finds my thigh beneath the table, squeezing once. "You're pack now. Your body's catching up to what that means."
The ceremony happens that afternoon, and it's nothing like I expected.
I'd imagined pomp—ritual words, formal proceedings, maybe something with candles and an altar. Instead we gather in the great room with sunlight streaming through the windows and beer already flowing. Every patched member forms a loose semicircle around Knox and me, their faces ranging from stoic to openly grinning.
Knox takes my hand and tugs me forward. "Brothers."
The room goes still. Even the air seems to hold its breath.
"Sarah has accepted my claim." His voice carries without effort, filling every corner of the room, and I feel the bond between us flare with fierce, overwhelming devotion. "She wears my mark. She's bound to me by blood and choice. I'm making it official—she's my old lady."
Finn steps forward with something in his hands, and I see it's a small leather patch, worn soft at the edges from handling. The lettering catches the light:Property of Knox, Feral Sons MC.
Property.
The word should crawl under my skin and lodge there like a splinter. Should drag up every memory of Peter's control, his ownership, the way he treated me like something to possess rather than someone to cherish. Three years of "you belong to me" and "no one else will ever want you."
But Knox isn't Peter.
Knox has never been him.
He presses the patch into my palm rather than pinning it on himself, giving me the choice even now. "Only if you want it."
I look at the leather in my hands, at the brothers watching with solemn respect, at Knox standing before me with that careful stillness that means he's holding back everything he feels. Through the bond I catch his fear—that I'll refuse, that this one word will break whatever we've built, that my past will finally prove stronger than our future.
I pin the patch to my jacket myself.
Knox's exhale shudders through him, and the brothers erupt—cheers and whoops and Diesel's delighted howl echoing off the rafters. Lisa wraps me in another hug while Maria presses a shot glass into my hands.
"Welcome to the family." Lisa pulls back with her eyes bright. "Fair warning, I run the show when it comes to old lady business. The men only think they're in charge."
Maria raises her glass. "Damn right."
I laugh again, and the sound doesn't surprise me this time.
Principal Amanda Steele meets me at the school's front entrance, her handshake firm and her smile warm in a way that puts me at ease.
"Ms. Mitchell. I've been hoping you'd come by." She gestures for me to follow her inside. "Betty mentioned you used to teach elementary school back east, and I've heard how you handled yourself at the diner—sitting with the Vance boy while his mother dealt with an emergency, keeping him calm and distracted for over an hour. An orc child, and you treated him like any other seven-year-old who needed comfort."
I remember that afternoon—little Billy with his gray-green skin and tiny tusks, terrified because his mother had to rush out when his grandmother fell. The other customers had given us a wide berth, but Billy just wanted someone to color with him and tell him his grandma would be okay.
"He was scared. That's all I saw."
"Exactly." Amanda leads me to her office, gesturing toward a chair. "Knox Stone's mate, a former teacher, who sees our kids as kids first—not as human or monster. That's exactly what we need. Our last substitute couldn't handle the mixed classrooms. Kept flinching every time one of the orc children raised their hand."
Her gaze catches on my collar as I bend to sign paperwork, and I know she's spotted the claiming bite peeking above mysweater. The scar tissue has settled into something permanent now, Knox's teeth marks written into my skin for anyone to see.
A slow smile curves her lips. She understands more than she's willing to say out loud, and that's fine with me.
