Page 100 of End Game

Ronan shrugs. “I suppose anything can change. But I have never looked at what you and Micah have and thought I wanted that position.”

Something in my chest seizes momentarily.

Beside me, Dex goes very still.

Ronan looks at Cami. “And I don’t look at you and Griffin and wish you weren’t married. Or that I would be your priority over him.”

Her eyes immediately shine, and she blinks hard. “Okay.”

“What I want from all of you is different.”

“Which is?” Griffin asks.

Ronan considers that. “Permanence.”

Nobody jokes.

“I want to know I’m part of the life we’re building. If we’re all growing old together, I want that. I want to be considered. I want to be invited to things and told when anyone is sick and consulted when a decision affects me or the polycule. I want to know that if something changes, nobody quietly decides I’m the easiest relationship to cut because I am not in that primary position or I don’t share a bank account or a marriage certificate or whatever else with anyone.”

Fuck.

Dex’s thumb stops moving over my hand.

Cami looks wrecked.

Ronan apparently notices, because he adds, “But none of that requires me to be anyone’s primary.”

Cami swallows. “So you’re really okay being…”

She stops.

“Secondary?” Ronan supplies.

“I hate saying it.”

“Then don’t.”

“But technically?”

He thinks about that one longer. “Yes. If we’re using hierarchy to describe practically priority.”

Dex shifts beside me. “But you’re not secondary to the family.”

Ronan looks at him. “No, I’m not.”

Dex exhales.

Cami reaches across Griffin and holds her hand out.

Ronan looks at it for a second before taking it.

She doesn’t grab him. Doesn’t assume.

She offers

He chooses.

“I need that part really clear,” she says. “Because I can be okay saying Griffin and I are primary if we’re talking about marriage and medical decisions and insurance and where I’m spending Thanksgiving when his mother will berate him if I don’t show up.”