Bash adjusts the corner blanket one last time before settling at the foot of the bed with his back against the footboard, as though he's been doing this for years.
Nobody speaks for a while.
I stare at the ceiling and think about what the future looks like, not just tonight or tomorrow, but everything that comes after. The future that used to feel like it was narrowing into a set of choices I never wanted and never made.
It doesn't look like that from here.
That's the thing. It's still uncertain. It's still changing. I'm still going to have to go back into that industry and figure out who I am on a set with my new designation. The conversation with the director will still sting tomorrow.
But I fell apart in this room tonight, and these alphas came upstairs and helped me build a nest.
When I look at the future from inside this warm space layered with their scents, it doesn't look like something I have to survive alone.
I pull the heavy blanket higher. Elias shifts slightly until his shoulder brushes mine, and I lean into him.
Surrounded by these alphas—my alphas—I close my eyes.
The future is still uncertain, but I won't be facing it alone.
Chapter 33
Bash
The room has gone completely silent. It's the kind of silence that only happens when everyone in a space has finally stopped bracing themselves.
Maya is asleep in the center of the nest with one hand loosely open against the blanket. She's on her side with her shoulders relaxed and her hair spread across the pillow. Her breathing has settled into the slow, even rhythm of someone who has finally stopped fighting something. The nest rises around her in layers of blankets and pillows arranged by her own hands, and she's curled into the center of it as though she was always supposed to be there.
I've been watching her for twenty minutes.
Maybe more.
I stopped counting.
Adrian is stretched out against the headboard to her left with his legs extended and his head tipped back at an angle that's going to give him a stiff neck by morning. He's not quite asleep yet.
Elias is on the other side of the nest near Maya's right shoulder. He's awake and watching her the same way I am.
The scent in this room is doing something to me. Maya's scent is stronger than usual, vanilla threaded with something bright andcitrus-light, and it's warmer than it was three hours ago. More present. It's been changing all evening, and I've been tracking the shift without letting myself think too hard about what it means.
The truth is that her heat is close.
Closer than two days.
Maybe a lot closer.
Maya exhales softly and turns her face deeper into the pillow. Her shoulders relax by another fraction. I notice that she's drifted a little closer to Elias. She's been doing that all night. Every time one of us shifts position, she unconsciously follows. A week ago she would have moved away. I watched her do it. She always maintained a careful distance whenever one of us got too close.
She's not doing that anymore.
Across the nest, Adrian's breathing changes. The last edge of wakefulness slips away so subtly I almost miss it. His shoulders loosen, his breathing deepens, and then he's asleep.
The room settles another degree.
I look across the nest at Elias and realize he's already looking at me.
“She’s calmer than she’s been,” he says, his voice low enough that it barely carries across the room.
He doesn’t specify since when.
