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But from her.
She shifts slightly, and my brain pings like a proximity alarm. I don’t move. I just… track her. The way her fingers twitch. The flutter of her breath. The little huff she makes in her sleep when she’s too warm but refuses to kick the blankets off.
If this is what bonding does, no wonder Lucian looks like he’s permanently five seconds from throttling someone.
She’s wearing his shirt.
Lucian’s.
Black, soft, clearly expensive, probably ironed by a man who fears god - and Lucian’s calendar reminders.
And it’s wrapped around her like it belongs there.
Which is annoying.
And kind of hot.
Mostly annoying.
I want to strip it off her, and not just because I’m feeling territorial - but yeah, okay, a little because I’m feeling territorial. It’s clinging to her in places I’m not evolved enough to ignore, and the bond?
The bond is just sitting there in the background as though to say,Go on, touch her. She’s yours.
And my response is all,Cool,but maybe we could do that without waking up the Lucian Doomsday Protocol.
The thing is, I didn’t expect her. Not like this.
She grounded me. And I don’t mean some cheesy poetic metaphor - I mean combat-grounded. Like finding cover in a firefight. Like silence after the last shot.
My instincts read her like a situation report: volatile, high-stakes, beautiful as hell. And somehow, she still curled into my arms like I was home.
This isn’t simple. This is complicated as hell.
But it’s also familiar.
Being around them - the other alphas - there’s a rhythm to it. A structure.
Theo’s steady and calm, as well as easy to predict. He's the kind of man who checks corners without being told.
Kai… is chaos. But he reminds me of a combat medic I once knew. Kept everyone laughing even when his hands were covered in blood.
And Lucian is precision and pressure - top of the chain, running cold unless the situation calls for heat.
I get this. I know how to move in this.
They don’t realize it yet, but we’re falling into a formation. And it might not be clean, or perfect, or even practiced; but it sure as hell is real.
Theo warned us. Told us how multi-bonding doesn’t just bind an omega to her alphas - it binds them to each other. Instincts syncing, emotions bleeding through, and I can feel it, I think - shadows and pressure, a ripple in the blood.
A pack.
I’ve seen it in the field: makeshift packs under fire, bonded by survival and trust. We didn’t call it that, but the instincts were the same.
Watch each other’s backs.
Take the hit if you have to.
Don’t leave anyone behind.
