Page 106 of What We Become

“After,” I say, turning in Knox’s hold so I can see all of them, “we sleep together. Actually sleep. In the big bed, limbs tangled, someone snoring⁠—”

“Holden snores,” Milo volunteers.

“I do not.”

“You absolutely do. It’s like a piglet snuffling around on the ground.”

I laugh, and Knox’s hand tightens at my back.

“Then it’s settled,” I say, and my voice comes out steadier than I feel. “We play until we’re all sated and exhausted. Then we sleep. And tomorrow we go back to being people who hunt monsters. And who monsters hunt back.”

Knox’s hand slides up my spine, stopping between my shoulder blades. “Fury.” Just my name, but it carries everything—warning, want, the size of what we’ve just agreed to. “We don’t have to. If you don’t want to. We could leave. Start again somewhere else.”

“I read that contract, Knox. There’s no leaving this. And honestly, I don’t want to.” I turn my face into his chest, breathe in the smell of woodsmoke and clean sweat. “I can’t let Stephen chase me out of my own life. And none of us can walk away when what we do is making the world safer.”

I lift my face from Knox’s chest and look around at the five men I’ve chosen.

“Take me upstairs,” I say.

TWENTY-FOUR

SAGE

The stairs creak under my bare feet. Eli’s hoodie brushes my thighs with every step, and the rope burns on my wrists sting in a way I’ve decided to enjoy. I don’t look back. I don’t have to—five sets of footsteps behind me, and only one of them is trying to be quiet. The sex room door is still open.

I step inside and turn, already reaching for the hem of the hoodie. “Safe word is Hangmen,” I say, my voice steady even as my pulse kicks.

Eli nods. “Ropes,” he says to the others. “Just enough to hold her open for us.”

The others file in, and the air thickens with intent. Knox moves first, his hands gentle as he guides me to the cross, while Holden unclips the leather cuffs and threads silk through the waiting rings. The cool wood presses against my spine as Knox settles my wrists into the wide loops, positioning them above the marks Eli left earlier.

I breathe through the stretch in my shoulders.

“You say if it’s too much,” Knox says.

I nod.

Holden drops to his knees and binds my ankles, spreading me wide while keeping the loops loose enough that my ribs don’t pull. The air is already stifling with the heat of five men closing in.

Milo steps up beside me, tracing a single finger down the center of my stomach. “I think we should start with sensory deprivation,” he says, a smile curving his lips. “It’s scientifically proven to heighten nerve responses. I read an article. Well, half an article, but I got the gist.”

Holden sighs, a sound of profound suffering, but a long strip of black silk appears in his hands. “For once, the menace makes a valid point.”

He steps behind the cross, and the silk slides over my eyes, pulling snug and plunging me into absolute darkness. My breath hitches. Without my sight, the room shrinks down to the sound of five men breathing, the crackle of the fire, and the sudden, acute awareness of my own exposed skin. The loss of control makes my anxiety give a familiar little spike.

In for four. Hold for four. Out for four. The same count that did nothing for me inside a wall. It works here. Here I picked the room.

“We’ve got you, Fury,” Knox rumbles, his massive hands settling heavily on my outer thighs. The heat of his palms anchors me instantly, grounding me in the dark.

“Just feel us, little savage,” Eli murmurs from somewhere to my right. His knuckles graze my hip bone, sending a shiver skating up my ribs.

Then they’re everywhere.

Micah’s mouth finds my neck, his lips soft and open, sucking a fresh mark onto my skin. Milo’s hands trace the dip of my waist. Holden shifts lower, his thumbs pressing into the sensitive flesh of my inner thighs, parting me wider.

“Beautiful,” Holden breathes. “Fucking perfect.”

He coats his fingers in my slickness and slides them deep inside me with the exact ruthlessness I crave from him. I arch against the cross, a broken sound tearing from my throat. The silk rope pulls taut against my wrists.