“God, yes.” He collapsed into a chair at the small kitchen table. “Is she still sleeping?”
“For now. Silas is with her.” Through the bond, I could feel both of them. Sable’s exhausted peace. Silas’s gentle watchfulness. “Her body needs recovery time.”
“We put her through a lot last night.” Beau rubbed his face. “Two knots at once. Three claiming bites. First real heat with pack support.”
“She wanted it.” I poured coffee, black for Beau, and set it in front of him. “She chose it. There’s a difference.”
“I know.” He wrapped his hands around the mug like he was cold despite the warm morning. “Doesn’t stop me from worrying I pushed too hard.”
“We all did exactly what she asked for.” I leaned against the counter, my own coffee forgotten. “But I understand the concern. I keep running scenarios in my head. What if the dual knotting caused damage. What if the claiming bites formed wrong. What if we missed something critical.”
“That’s your tactical brain trying to find problems where there aren’t any.” Beau took a long drink. “She’s fine. More than fine. I can feel it through the bond. She’s happy, Dane. Settled. Like something that’s been wrong her whole life finally clicked into place.”
He was right. Through the bond, I could feel Sable’s emotional state clearly. No distress. No regret. Just bone-deep satisfaction mixed with exhaustion.
But that didn’t stop the part of my brain trained for threat assessment from cataloging everything that could still go wrong.
“We need a plan,” I said, because planning made chaos manageable. “For when we go back to town. For how we handle work. For living arrangements. For what happens the next time she goes into heat.”
“Dane.” Beau’s voice carried gentle warning. “We’ve been bonded for less than twelve hours. Maybe we don’t need a complete operational plan just yet.”
“Planning prevents problems.”
“Planning also prevents living in the moment.” He set down his coffee mug with deliberate care. “I know your instinct is to control everything. To anticipate every possible threat and have contingencies ready. But this isn’t a tactical operation. It’s a relationship. It’s messy and unpredictable and we’re going to make mistakes.”
“Mistakes get people killed.”
The words came out harder than I intended, and I saw Beau flinch slightly. But he held my gaze.
“Your team dying wasn’t because of a mistake, Dane. It was bad intelligence and shit luck and being in the wrong place at the wrong time. You’ve carried that guilt for three years like it’s penance you owe. But Sable doesn’t need a tactical coordinator. She needs a partner.”
“I don’t know how to be a partner without being a coordinator.” The admission felt like exposing a wound. “I’ve spent ten years in command positions. My value comes from being the person who sees problems before they happen. Who makes the hard calls. Who keeps everyone safe.”
“And you can still do that,” Beau said quietly. “But you also have to let other people keep you safe sometimes. You have to trust that we’re strong enough to handle the messy parts without you planning for every contingency.”
I wanted to argue. Wanted to explain that planning was how I contributed, how I proved my value, how I made sure no one else died because I’d missed something critical.
But through the bond, I could feel Sable stirring upstairs. Feel her moment of disorientation, then recognition. Feel her reaching for the bonds to make sure we were real, that last night had actually happened.
Feel her relief when she found us.
“I’m going to check on her,” I said, abandoning my coffee and heading for the stairs.
The master bedroom was warm with morning light filtering through the curtains. Sable was sitting up in the nest, Silas beside her, both of them looking sleep-rumpled and content.
“Morning,” I said from the doorway.
Sable’s face transformed when she saw me. Not the polite professional smile I’d seen for weeks. A real smile, unguarded and genuine. “Hi.”
“How are you feeling?”
“Sore. Tired. Happy.” She touched the claiming bite on her neck, my bite, with careful fingers. “This is real, right? I didn’t dream it?”
“It’s real.” I moved into the room, drawn by instinct and the bond pulling me toward her. “We’re bonded. All four of us. Permanent.”
“Permanent,” she repeated, testing the word. “I’ve never had permanent before. Nathan made sure of that.”
“Nathan was an idiot,” Silas said, his usual humor absent. “Anyone who couldn’t see your value doesn’t deserve to be used as a comparison point.”
