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Eric waves us away. “I owe Mandy many favors. But doing surgery in the basement of the hotel I own was not how I wanted to spend my Saturday morning. So you can send thank-you cards to Mandy. Also, you’re due for a check-up of your wounds in a few weeks.

Stitches should dissolve on their own, but still we want to make sure you healed correctly. ”

“Thank you,” all of the boys echo in the back like a bunch of Boy Scouts.

“I’ve left your care notes with that one,” Eric says while pointing at a very responsible-looking Jacob.

“But my phone number is at the bottom of the sheet in case there are any other questions. Antibiotics for a few days to prevent infections, pain pills if needed, and your IVs have been removed, so, I think Mandy can handle it from here.”

Eric flees the hotel room like a hound out of hell.

I get it. I wouldn’t want to be in this room either if I was given an option.

I cuddle back to Dante, enjoying his warmth, already wanting to go back the fuck to sleep.

Jesus. Nothing like almost losing your life to realize just how amazing sleep is, especially when pressed against the man that killed for you.

Hayden makes an odd noise as he reads his phone, all the boys turning to look at him.

“Robin just informed me about cleanup… Claude wasn’t there,” Hayden announces, voice light like he’s out of breath. “Just a pool of blood and nothing else.”

“What?” Parker asks in disbelief.

Hayden lifts his head to stare at Jacob, lip caught between his teeth. “Looks like Dante didn’t kill our only lead.”

“Or we are now also facing a zombie epidemic,” Dante says with a laugh. Nobody else laughs though. Despite the fraught nature of the moment, sleep is coming for me again, the dark tendrils tugging me down.

Finally, sleep comes for me as the murmur of voices at the end of the bed floats in and out. Dante pets my hair, murmurs words into my neck, and I fall asleep held in his arms, safe and loved, and for the first time in my life, I believe it. To be loved. It’s kind of nice.

We ended up in the hotel for almost a week until Dante and I grew restless enough to piss them all off enough to take us back home.

The wounds on my abdomen are still bandaged, needing cleaning and cream put on them at the end of each day.

Oddly, when I look at them now, it makes all the times I used to do it to myself seem pretty stupid.

I’ll work through that in therapy, I guess. When I go. Which I probably should.

Dante is another story. The man likes to act like he’s a god himself, if he just walks off the bullet wounds, then he’ll be fine.

I’ve had to resort to bribery to keep him from overdoing himself which usually results in lazy blow jobs and dirty talk.

By the time we’re both healed enough to return to daily life, two weeks have passed by.

And I haven’t slept in my own bed in just that long.

I don’t know if I can sleep away from Dante anymore.

Don’t know if I can go back to normal life.

But it also doesn’t help that I’m not allowed to go anywhere alone anymore.

I’m getting dressed for school in Dante’s walk-in closet when Dante swaggers in, sweatpants low on his hips, bandages still covering the almost healed wounds on his side and thigh.

It’s kind of sexy in a devil-may-care sort of way.

But I’m afraid that everything about Dante is sexy to me. Even when he snores after a long day.

“I got you something,” Dante says with a sly little smile.

“I told you, I’m not wearing a collar.”

Dante stares blankly back at me. “We never discussed that.”

Sigh. “What is it?”

I shove my feet into my boots, staring down at the floor as I do so, but glance up when Dante stays quiet.

In the palm of his hand is a very obvious red velvet box.

My heart thumps heavily in my chest, vision going a little blurry.

But Dante’s grin is warm as usual, even just a little mean, no doubt enjoying my terrified reaction to the box.

“Calm down,” Dante teases. He opens the box to reveal a sleek black ring. Grabbing my hand, he slides the ring onto my middle finger, and that’s when I notice light-blue-looking gemstones blinking up at me. “It’s a tracker. In case you lose your phone. ”

I squint my eyes at him. “What about you? If you get to track me, then?—”

“Already done,” Dante interrupts me, lifting up his hand to show a matching ring on his own middle finger. “Quid pro quo.”

“Oh, you feel fancy now that you know that saying but I was using it in the context of sex, which was a little more fun.”

“Being able to track my every movement isn’t fun?”

I flush a little because yes it is, but well… “The hunt was fun too.”

Dante’s grin warms me to the core, and my insides squirm when he leans down a little to be close to my face. “We can still play cat and mouse sometimes, pretend like we can’t track each other.”

“Okay,” I whisper excitedly.

Dante looks pleased just before dipping down to kiss me soft and slow.

Tangling my fingers in his shirt, I tug him closer, careful of his still healing wounds.

We haven’t fucked for ages and I miss it, but an hour before class isn’t the time.

Dante’s hands drift down to my ass, squeeze hard, then go to lift in the telltale sign of him wanting to pick me up.

I slap his chest and pull away from his mouth. “Nope. You’re not going to open those stitches up because you want to fuck me against the wall. Save it.”

Dante groans in obvious annoyance, but doesn’t argue.

He goes back to lie on the bed, leaned back on his elbows, eyes heavy as he watches me finish getting dressed.

I stop by the bed, fitting myself between his splayed thighs, and lean down to kiss him with my eyes open.

He lifts his hand to curl his fingers around my ear, quickly angling my head so that he can lick into my mouth at exactly the angle he wants .

When I pull away to straighten my clothes and jacket, Dante squints his eyes at me critically.

“Are you going to dye your hair soon?” Dante asks.

I smile down at him. “Maybe I’ll do something different.”

Dante thumps back down on the bed. “Sexy no matter what.”

“I know.”

When I walk into the kitchen, Hayden is at the table with his laptop while Jacob cooks breakfast. I slide into the chair across from Hayden with a soft clearing of my throat.

A moment later, a plate of food appears before me like I’ve summoned it through magic.

I blink my eyes coyly up at Jacob and he flicks my cheek with his finger, making me scowl at his back as he fixes Hayden a plate.

Hayden spins his computer around and shoves it toward me. “Help me with this line of code, please.”

I pick at the protein waffles as I peck at the keys on Hayden’s computer. It’s a simple fix, and when I slide the computer back toward him, he grunts in acceptance of my greater knowledge. Dante slips down in the chair beside me, then leans over to press a kiss to my cheek.

The sound of the front door slamming open has me looking over my shoulder to find Parker wandering in.

“Snowing!” Parker calls out while taking off his shoes.

“Fuck, I have class in fifteen minutes,” Jacob whines.

Hayden stands and makes his way to the kitchen, hip-checks Jacob away from the sink. “I’ll do the dishes for you.”

“You do the dishes badly ,” Jacob points out, but doesn’t move to stop Hayden. They have some wordless exchange until Jacob huffs, then disappears toward the front door to leave for class.

The house is warm, my stomach is full, and Dante’s hand is a brand on my thigh under the table. I lean my elbow against the table, softly putting my chin in the palm of my hand to watch Dante eat.

He chews on his waffle while turning to face me. “What?”

I didn’t expect to find an odd sort of little family when I stalked Dante all those months ago. Didn’t expect to fall into this Avengers type of plot either. But it’s nice to have something like a family for once, people that choose me, people that keep an eye out for me.

“I think I’ll move in permanently,” I tell Dante, grinning when his eyes bug out.

“Really?”

“Yeah, why not?”

“What about Mason?” Dante asks, eyebrows furrowed.

I glance over toward Parker in the living room where he’s standing still, distractedly removing his scarf from around his neck. He stares down at his phone with a shy little smile on his face, and somehow I know exactly why he’s smiling, and who exactly put that smile there.

“I’m not worried about Mason at all anymore.”