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I snort, but the edge softens when I catch the flicker of hurt in his eyes. “I seem to recall a certain pup cozy in the back seat of the car as he was being attacked with kisses from a very drunk Doe."

“And I believe it was you who got to kiss her first during your little shower escapade.” Nate’s smile flickers, just for a second. “Maybe if you had followed the rules, you would have gotten more than a taste.”

Jace flips him off, burying his face in a throw pillow. “Fuck off, Professor. It’s different with you two. You’re the foundation. The walls. She melted for the both of you. Where the hell does that leave me?”

I pull his feet into my lap, my grip firm enough to be an answer. “Right where you’re supposed to be. You’re the goddamn fire, Jace,” I say. “The reason she feels warm enough to keep coming back.”

Jace's gaze lingers on me, skepticism mixing with the flicker of appreciation in his eyes. “This is going to change everything, isn’t it?”

The words hang heavy, undeniable, because we already know after tonight there’s no going back.

Nate goes quiet for a while, one hand absently working through Jace’s curls. “We pushed her hard tonight.”

“And she loved it,” Jace mutters.

“Both can be true.” Nate’s gaze settles on me. “But enjoying tonight doesn't mean she knows what she's getting herself into with us. She's only seen a piece of it.”

I nod. “And when she decides she wants more, we give her structure without making it feel like a cage.”

Jace groans. “You two make wanting someone sound like a board meeting.”

“That’s because if we leave it to you,” Nate says dryly, “she’ll be naked again before breakfast.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.” Jace huffs as Nate playfully tugs the ends of his curls, but his eyes say he’s understanding the stakes. His body relaxes incrementally against Nate's chest, and he’s silent for a long moment, just breathing, just being held.

I watch them, the two anchors of my world, and feel the weight of what we have. What we could have with her.

Strange. Complicated. Ours.

"Alright," Nate finally says, his voice calm but absolute. “Tomorrow, we start slow. Coffee. Conversation. No games, no bending her over the furniture until we actually talk.”

Jace blows out a breath. “Fine. Slow. But if she climbs on me again, I’m not promising shit.”

“Something tells me that you and our Little Doe need a chaperone, because in less than twenty-four hours, she has managed to test you twice, and you failed twice.”

He grins, slow and wicked. “Third times when she finally screams my name… or whatever the saying is.”

“And that is precisely why you’ll be sleeping between us again tonight,” Nate says. He hooks an arm around Jace’s waist, lifting him off the sofa and throws him over his shoulder and carries a cursing Jace down the hall to our shared bedroom.

I follow, content for the moment, knowing that three creatures this different have no business getting along as well as we do—and yet here we are.

It’s not easy, not simple, but it’s ours.

The sheets beside me are cold.

Elias has been gone long enough that only the dip in the mattress proves he was here.

I try to go back to sleep. Turning onto my back. Then my side. Neither helps.

The problem isn’t sleep. The problem is that last night didn’t take the edge off. It should have. Three of them, all those hands, sounds coming out of me I couldn’t have predicted. And still my body is sitting here filing complaints.

I squeeze my thighs together. My body is unimpressed.

Preston’s voice surfaces, unbidden: insatiable, with that particular curl of his lip. He said it like a diagnosis.

Two orgasms later, I'm staring at the ceiling wanting more.

Maybe he wasn’t wrong about that part.