Page 15 of Nesting With My Three Alphas (Hollow Haven #1)

The simple domesticity of it, Micah looking out for us while we worked, made something warm settle in my chest. Like this was how mornings were supposed to go: surrounded by people who cared enough to notice when you might need coffee and carbohydrates.

"Kit?" Charlie said eventually. "Can I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"Are you planning to stay? In Hollow Haven, I mean. For real?"

The question I'd been avoiding, asked with the directness only children could manage.

I looked around the garden at the neat rows of buried hope, at Jonah's patient hands teaching his daughter to tend growing things, at the house that was beginning to feel more like home than anywhere I'd lived in years.

"I don't know," I said honestly. "I hope so."

"Me too," Charlie said seriously. "Because I think you need us. And we definitely need you."

We need you. Not 'want' or 'like having you around,' but 'need.' Like I was already an essential part of something I'd barely begun to understand.

"Why do you think that?" I asked, genuinely curious about her seven-year-old perspective.

"Because Dad smiles different when you're here.

Real smiles, not just polite ones. And Micah hums when he's baking for you, which he only does when he's really happy.

And Reed fixed our front door yesterday even though we didn't ask him to, because he said the lock was 'inadequate for protecting important people. '"

Each observation was a small gift, evidence that my presence mattered in ways I was only beginning to recognize. Important people. Was that what I was to them?

"Plus," Charlie continued, "you smell like you belong here. Like pack."

Pack. There was that word again, the one that made my omega instincts perk up with dangerous interest. Something primitive and satisfied stirred in my chest at being claimed this way, at being recognized as belonging to this small, fierce family.

"Charlie's got good instincts about people," Jonah said, his voice carefully neutral despite the intensity of his gaze. "Always has."

"Even about people who are kind of a mess?" I asked, trying to keep the question light.

"Especially about people who are kind of a mess," Jonah said firmly. "Those are the ones who need pack the most."

The certainty in his voice, the complete absence of judgment, made my throat tight with emotion I wasn't ready to examine.

"Speaking of pack," Charlie said, jumping up and brushing soil from her knees with dirty hands, "Reed and Micah are coming over for lunch. Reed's bringing his grill, and Micah's making his famous potato salad."

"They're what now?" I looked at Jonah in surprise.

"We usually do this on Sundays," Jonah explained with a slightly embarrassed smile, "but we shifted it to today. I meant to invite you yesterday, but with everything..."

"You should come!" Charlie said immediately. "Reed makes the best burgers, and Micah always brings way too much food, and we play games after lunch."

The invitation was tempting, maybe too tempting. The idea of spending another whole day surrounded by their warmth, their easy acceptance, felt both wonderful and terrifying.

"I don't want to intrude on your tradition..."

"Kit." Jonah's voice stopped my protest gently but firmly. "You're not intruding. You're... extending it."

Extending it. Like I wasn't disrupting something precious but helping it grow into something new.

Before I could respond, the sound of a truck in the driveway announced the arrival of Reed. Charlie raced toward the house, calling out greetings with the enthusiasm of someone whose world had just gotten significantly brighter.

"That kid has more energy than should be legally allowed," Reed's voice carried across the yard, warm with affection.

"It's the excitement of having Kit join our Sunday chaos," Micah replied, and I could hear the smile in his voice.

Jonah stood, offering me a hand up that I took without thinking. The brief contact sent a spark of awareness up my arm, and from the way his pupils dilated slightly, he felt it too. His scent intensified with the touch, wrapping around me like a warm embrace.

"Still want to run?" he asked quietly, his thumb brushing across my knuckles before he released my hand.

I looked around the garden we'd been tending together, at the bulbs full of sleeping potential, at the house where Charlie was already chattering excitedly about the morning's planting progress.

Hope buried in the dark, trusting in spring.

"No," I said, surprised by how much I meant it. "I think I want to see what blooms."

Jonah's smile was like sunrise, warm and full of promise. The way he looked at me in that moment, like I was something precious and worth waiting for, made my omega purr with satisfaction.

"Then let's go see what Micah brought for dessert," he said. "He's been experimenting with apple cinnamon something, and Charlie's been his willing taste tester all week."

As we walked toward the house together, I caught myself already planning what we might plant next fall. Already imagining the spring flowers we'd planted today blooming while I watched from the kitchen window, coffee in hand, surrounded by the scents and sounds of home.

Family.

The word didn't scare me as much as it should have.

Maybe that was the most dangerous thing of all.

The backyard was already transforming under Reed's efficient direction. He'd set up a portable grill with the practiced ease of someone who'd done this many times before, while Micah arranged containers of food on the picnic table with artistic precision.

"There she is," Reed said when he saw me, his grin warm and a little wolfish.

As he moved past me to adjust something on the grill, I caught his scent, pine and honest work, with an undertone of something that made my omega instincts perk up with interest. The brief proximity sent a flutter through my chest that I tried to ignore.

"How'd you like your first Hollow Haven gardening experience? "

"Educational," I said, settling onto one of the benches and trying to focus on something other than the way Reed's presence seemed to charge the air around him. "Charlie's very thorough with her research."

"Kid's gonna be a scientist someday," Reed said proudly. "Or a teacher. Or possibly both."

"What do you want to be when you grow up, Charlie?" I asked.

Charlie considered this seriously while helping Micah arrange napkins. "I think maybe a doctor for animals who also grows flowers. Is that a thing?"

"Veterinary botanist?" Micah suggested. "Sounds like a perfectly reasonable career goal to me."

"Veterinary botanist," Charlie repeated, clearly pleased with the official-sounding title. "Yeah, that's what I want to be."

The casual way they encouraged her dreams, the complete absence of adult cynicism about childhood ambitions, was yet another small example of how different this felt from the family dynamics I'd grown up with.

"What about you, Kit?" Reed asked, flipping what smelled like the most perfect burger in existence. "What did you want to be when you grew up?"

It was such a simple question, but it hit me harder than it should have. What had I wanted before I'd learned to want what was expected of me?

"An artist," I said, surprising myself with the honesty. "I used to draw constantly. Portraits, mostly. I loved trying to capture the emotions people thought they were hiding."

"Used to?" Micah asked gently, settling beside me with a plate that somehow contained perfectly balanced portions of everything. The warmth of his presence, the subtle scent of cinnamon and comfort that always seemed to surround him, made my shoulders relax.

"My parents thought it was impractical. And Marcus..." I trailed off, not sure how to explain how he'd gradually convinced me that my creative impulses were selfish indulgences.

"Marcus was an idiot," Reed said flatly, and the simple declarative statement somehow made me feel lighter.

"You should draw again," Charlie said matter-of-factly. "Drawing makes people happy. And you need more happy."

"Maybe I will," I said, and realized I might actually mean it.

Micah’s hand covering mine where it rested on the table, "If it’s something you’re interested in you should do it."

My omega hummed at the contact, the simple touch sending warmth spiraling through my chest. His hand was warm and callused from years of kneading dough, and something about the casual intimacy of it made me feel claimed in the best possible way.

"Was interested," I corrected automatically, then caught myself. "Am interested. I think. It's been a while."

"What kind of art?" Reed asked, leaning back in his chair with the relaxed confidence of someone completely comfortable in his own skin. "Painting? Sculpture? Interpretive dance?"

Despite myself, I laughed. "Drawing, mostly. Portraits. I used to be able to catch something about a person that they didn't even know they were showing."

"That's a gift," Jonah said quietly. "Being able to see people that clearly."

"Or a curse, depending on what you see," I said, thinking of all the times I'd drawn Marcus and somehow captured the coldness in his eyes that I'd trained myself not to notice in real life.

"What do you see when you look at us?" Charlie asked with the directness that only children could manage.

I studied them, really studied them, for the first time since arriving in Hollow Haven.

Jonah, solid and patient, with laugh lines that spoke of joy despite the loss he'd endured.

Reed, all sharp edges and hidden softness, the kind of man who'd give you his jacket in a snowstorm while claiming he wasn't cold.

Micah, whose gentle hands and knowing eyes suggested depths of compassion born from his own grief.

And Charlie, bright and curious and so full of love that it practically radiated from her small frame.

"Safety," I said finally. "I see safety."

The silence that followed was loaded with meaning I wasn't quite ready to unpack. These men who barely knew me, who owed me nothing, were making me feel more secure than I'd felt in years.

"Good," Reed said finally. "That's what we were going for."

Micah pulled out his phone and began scrolling through something. "You know, there's an art supply store about twenty minutes from here. Nothing fancy, but they have decent basics if you wanted to try drawing again."

"Oh, I couldn't..." I started automatically.

"Why not?" Charlie interrupted. "You just said you liked doing it. And you need a hobby."

"Do I need a hobby?"

"Everyone needs a hobby," Charlie said seriously. "Dad builds furniture when he's thinking hard about stuff. Reed fixes things that aren't even broken sometimes. And Micah bakes way too many cookies when he's happy."

"What do you do when you're thinking hard?" I asked Charlie.

"Read about dinosaurs. Or build nests." She grinned at me. "But you already helped me with that one."

The easy way she included me in her list of important activities made my chest warm. Like I was already woven into the fabric of her world.

"I haven't drawn anything in over two years," I admitted. "I might be terrible at it now."

"Impossible," Micah said firmly, his thumb stroking across my knuckles. "That kind of gift doesn't just disappear. It might be rusty, but it's still there."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Because I see the way you look at people," Micah said. "You notice things. The way Jonah's shoulders relax when Charlie laughs. How Reed's voice gets softer when he's worried about someone. The little things that make people who they are."

I blinked, surprised that he'd noticed me noticing. "I do that?"

"Constantly," Reed said with a grin. "It's actually kind of flattering, being seen that clearly."

"Most people don't like being seen," I said. "They prefer the versions of themselves they present to the world."

"Most people aren't us," Jonah said simply.

The weight of that statement settled between us. Most people aren't us . Like they were something different, something better. Something worth trusting with the parts of myself I'd learned to hide.

"After lunch," Micah said, apparently taking my participation as a given, "we could drive over to the art store. Just to look around. See if anything calls to you."

"We?" I repeated.

"Well, Charlie needs new colored pencils for her dinosaur diagrams," Micah said innocently. "And Reed mentioned wanting to see if they have any decent wood stain for his latest project."

"And I could use some sketch paper for work drawings," Jonah added, his eyes twinkling with barely suppressed mischief.

I looked around the table at their expectant faces, these three men and one precocious child who were conspiring to give me permission to want something for myself.

"You're all terrible liars," I said.

"We prefer 'creatively supportive,'" Reed said cheerfully.

"Fine," I said, trying to sound exasperated instead of deeply moved. "But I'm not promising to buy anything."

"Of course not," Micah said solemnly. "We're just... browsing."

Charlie clapped her hands together. "This is gonna be so fun! Kit's gonna draw again!"

Her excitement was infectious, and I found myself actually looking forward to walking through aisles of art supplies, to remembering what it felt like to create something beautiful just because I wanted to.

The rest of the afternoon unfolded like a warm dream.

We piled into Reed's truck, Charlie chattering excitedly about what I might draw while Jonah pointed out local landmarks and Reed hummed along to the radio.

The art store was exactly what Micah had promised, well-stocked with supplies that made my fingers itch to create.

By the time we left, I had enough supplies to stock a small studio, sketch pads and pencils, charcoal and pastels, even a small watercolor set that Micah had insisted I needed "for experimenting."

"This is too much," I protested as Reed loaded everything into his truck. "I can't let you all spend this much on me."

"Kit," Jonah said gently, "let us do this. Please."

"But why?"

"Because you matter," Charlie said simply, climbing into the truck with her new colored pencils. "And because making you happy makes us happy."

As we drove home through the golden afternoon light, my heart full of possibility and the truck full of art supplies, I realized that maybe I was finally learning what love was supposed to feel like.

And maybe, just maybe, I was brave enough to let myself have it.