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He doesn’t say a word. Just walks back into the bunker with me slung over his shoulder like a duffel bag full of orgasms and doomsday potential.

The others are in the main room, of course. Pool sticks in hand, radio humming softly in the background, and all of them doing their best not to look like they’ve been betting on which man would break me next.

Wade’s the first to spot us. His mouth tilts into that slow, sweet cowboy smile as he straightens from where he’s cleaning something suspiciously sausage-shaped on a cutting board.

Dean cackles immediately. “I’ll be damned,” he says. “Look at that glow. Maple got tree-fucked and carried home like a prize sow at the county fair.”

“I didn’t squeal,” I mumble into Brock’s back, still too satisfied to even lift my head.

“You moaned,” Brock rumbles, low and smug.

Dean whistles. “That’s a yes. That’s absolutely a yes.”

Brock sets me down on the couch like I’m fragile now, which is hilarious, considering twenty minutes ago he had me not so gently pressed into bark like he was building a shelter out of my soul.

He brushes my hair out of my face, kisses my forehead, then turns to Wade. “Give her some aftercare.”

Wade raises a brow, hands already reaching for the throw blanket and a glass of water like he was born to comfort post-coital chaos. “Yes, sir.”

I blink up at Brock. “You’re leaving me?”

He doesn’t even flinch. “Evan and I have a date at the range.”

Evan, who was trying very hard to not be involved in this moment, goes completely still. Then deadpans, “If that’s what a day at the range looks like, I’ll take my chances with Daddy Holden.”

Dean loses it. “Doc,” he gasps, pointing his pool cue like a sword. “You do not want alone time with Daddy Holden. That man will tactical-debrief your soul.”

Holden, who’s been lurking in the corner like the professional brooder he is, just wipes a hand over his face and mutters, “How’s her aim?”

“Impeccable,” Brock says, without a hint of humor.

“Oh my god,” I groan, dragging a pillow over my face. “Someone drown me in Gatorade and compliments.”

“You heard her,” Wade says, already tucking the blanket around me and handing me a glass. “Gatorade and compliments. Let’s go.”

Dean winks. “You’re a goddess and a menace, and I would still lick bark off that tree for a turn.”

Evan mutters something about needing a sedative.

Holden walks out without a word, probably to draft an emergency rotation schedule.

And me? I take a sip of water, sigh dramatically, and melt into Wade’s arms like the sweet, deranged, bunker-wife I’ve always dreamed of being.

This is fine.

Totally normal.

Absolutely sustainable.

Right?

…Right.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Maple

Days melt into weeks like butter on skillet cornbread, and somehow, without ever really planning it, we’re not just surviving anymore.