Page 39 of False Catch

"Do you?" She looks at each of us in turn. "Because from what I observed walking up, you're already exhibiting pack protection patterns around Ms. Callahan."

Nobody responds. She's not wrong.

"Here's how this works," Torres continues. "I observe. I report. If I see anything that suggests inappropriate dynamics - scent marking, territorial behavior, bonding indicators - I'm obligated to file it. Three strikes and your season ends. Clear?"

"Crystal," Gray says tightly.

"Good. Let's see how you row."

We move through our usual preparation routine, but everything feels different under her scrutiny. I'm hyperaware of every interaction, every glance, every breath.

Gray barks orders with his usual efficiency, but there's something protective in how he positions himself between Torres and Reese whenever possible. Bo helps Reese adjust the foot stretcher in the cox's seat, his hands lingering a moment longer than necessary. Jackson actually makes eye contact with her - brief, but significant for someone who usually communicates through grunts and shoulder shrugs.

We're all orbiting around her now. Not obviously, not in ways Torres can document, but in a thousand small adjustments that add up to one truth: she's ours.

The thought should disturb me. I've spent three years keeping myself separate from the team's dynamics, maintaining distance even while living in the same house. It's safer that way. Cleaner. Less complicated.

But watching Reese settle into the cox's seat with newfound confidence, hearing the authority in her voice as she calls out commands, I understand why they're all falling into her gravity. She's not just commanding the boat. She's giving us permission to be what we are together.

As we carry the shell to the water, I catch Reese's scent. Or rather, scents. Plural. She smells like Zane - cinnamon and warmth. But underneath that, there's something else. The whole team's scents layered together in a way that shouldn't be possible unless...

No. We're not a pack. We're not bonding. That's not what this is.

Except I know what pack formation looks like. Watched my older sister go through it in college. The gradual scent integration. The unconscious synchronization. The way individual identities start to blur at the edges, creating something larger.

We're speedrunning through stages that usually take months or years. And we don't even realize it.

Except as we settle into the boat and push off from the dock, something clicks. For the first time in days, we move as one from the very first stroke. No hesitation, no fighting for rhythm. Just nine bodies and one voice creating perfect synchronization.

"Length through the back," Reese calls, and her voice is different. More confident. More certain. "Feel each other. Match pressure."

And we do. It's effortless in a way that makes my chest tight. Like my body knows exactly where everyone else is without looking. Like we're connected by invisible threads.

Like pack.

"Pick it up to half pressure," she commands.

The boat responds instantly. No lag, no adjustment period. Just smooth acceleration that makes the hull sing through the water.

I can see Torres in the launch, making notes, her expression unreadable behind sunglasses. But there's something in her posture - a slight forward lean, the way she's stopped writing - that suggests surprise.

We run through our standard pieces - starts, steady state, power tens. Each one better than the last. By the time we're doing full pressure work, we're flying. The boat feels weightless, skimming across the surface like we've transcended physics.

"Hold water," Reese calls as we approach the dock.

We stop in perfect unison, blades squared and buried.

"Fuck me," Zane breathes, still panting. "We haven't moved like that since..."

"Ever," Jackson finishes flatly. "We've never moved like that."

"The boat was actually set for once," Tyler adds, and coming from him, that's practically a declaration of love.

"Whatever just happened," Gray says carefully, "we need to figure out how to replicate it."

"That was what we're capable of when we stop fighting ourselves," Reese says quietly.

Gray meets her eyes across the length of the boat. "Or when we stop pretending."