Page 13 of Knot Their Safe Haven

"How could you possibly know that?"

"Your breathing changed. It always does when you're imagining things you shouldn't."

Observative…

"Bold of you to assume I'm imagining anything inappropriate."

"Aren't you?"

Yes. God, yes. Imagining what those hands would feel like now, whether her skin is still as warm, whether she still smells like saffron and a field of desert roses.

"Tell me about the movement," Adyani shifts topics smoothly, saving me from my own dangerous thoughts. "I heard there was significant anonymous backing."

"Fifty million. Harrison thinks it's suspicious."

"Harrison thinks everything is suspicious. It's why you pay him."

"True." I lean back in my chair, letting it spin slowly. "We're expanding operations. Three new Havens by year end, medical facilities in each, proper security protocols. Everything we've been planning for years is finally happening."

"And yet you sound exhausted rather than victorious."

Because victory feels hollow when you have no one to share it with.

"Just tired. It's been a long day. Long year. Long life."

"Velvet." The way she says my name, soft and concerned, makes my chest tight. "What aren't you telling me?"

"Astraea nearly broke today. Her mother is getting worse, and I watch her fracturing the same way I did at that age. Kamari still has nightmares about her wedding day. We have seventeen new refugees this week alone, all of them running from situations that make me want to burn the whole world down."

I pause, swallow hard.

"And I'm about to turn forty, Adyani. Forty. Do you know what that means for an unclaimed Omega? I might as well be dead in society's eyes. Past my prime, past my worth, past any hope of?—"

"Stop."

The command in her voice makes me freeze.

"You are not defined by their narrow definitions. You are Velvet Morclair, who built an empire of safety from nothing. You are Scarlett, who makes powerful men tremble. You are the woman I gave up a throne for, even if you won't let me claim you."

A throne.

An actual throne, and he walked away from it to become her true self..and I guess be with me.

"I couldn't be there." The words tumble out before I can stop them. "When you were going through everything—the surgery, the hormone treatments, the family disowning you—I couldn't leave. The Haven would have collapsed, the Omegas would have had nowhere to go, and I chose them over you. I chose strangers over?—"

"You chose to save hundreds over one. It's who you are. It's why I love you."

Love. Present tense. After everything.

"How can this work when we can't be there for each other when it matters? You needed me, and I was here. Knox's son—" I catch myself, even on a secure line some secrets stay buried,"Knox needed me during a situation last year, and you were dealing with assassination attempts. Malcolm had that medical license review, and none of us could testify on his behalf because it would have exposed too much. We're all so powerful in our own spheres, but we can't seem to?—"

"Come together?"

"Work as a unit. A real pack. It's like we're all planets orbiting the same sun but never aligning."

"Perhaps that's about to change."

Something in her voice makes me sit up straighter.