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I watched them work, sitting on the couch in Peter’s arms with a growing sense of unreality.

I’d had friends twittering on about imposter’s syndrome on social media as war was waging at home, something I’d discarded quickly.

Cute cat videos were about all I was up for at the time, something, anything to make me feel better, if even for a second.

But now, that feeling of achieving something through pure luck and circumstances rather than hard work rode me hard.

I was living my dream, but I was terrified of waking up.

No hard work? What was all that nattering about with the alpha if not hard work? my Tirian asked. And all those many, many mental exercises?

Sometimes, my beast sounded like a cranky old lady, which made me snort. She saw all my human foibles and rolled her eyes.

Monkey brains are chaotic and needlessly busy , she replied. Why must today’s bounty be measured by its longevity? I vetted the two of them for you to meet that need.

So you’re saying they’ll stick around?

Yes , she said with a sigh. The new one, him I don’t know. He may be just heat fever.

Sen. His name was a hiss in my mind.

Yes, Sen.

We sat down at the big table outside and ate breakfast. The weather was perfect—a bright sunny day with a light breeze, and not too hot.

“So, Flick, tell us a little about you,” Smokey said.

“Smokes…” Renee said.

“What? We know nothing about the girl. I’m just making conversation.”

“You’re putting Flick on the spot, is what you’re doing,” Vin said. “Don’t worry about Smokey,” he told me. “Has to know everything.”

“We’ve got a long time to get to know each other. You should join us for our famous Sunday lunches. We cook up a big roast with all the sides,” Cooper said.

“Dad, we’re still trying to find our feet here,” Aidan said.

“We’d like that,” I said politely, but some part of me wondered if I would indeed like it.

My family had been like this once, but then Mum had died and everyone had slowly drifted away.

I didn’t call them. How could I tell them what was going on?

And so they stopped calling me. “Just tell us what you’d like us to bring. ”

“Oh, just yourselves,” Renee said with a pleased wave of her hand. “We always cook way too much food.” She shot Aidan a triumphant smile.

“I grew up in the city, Smokey Went to university and studied business, but never really did anything with it. I met my ex-husband, Rick, at one of the pubs, and we got together not long afterwards. He…” I glanced at Kade. “I didn’t do anything with my degree, just moved with Rick to Melville.”

“Melville?” Aidan’s family looked at each other. “That’s where Jules is from. Did you ever run into her?”

“I…” I pushed my bacon around on my plate. “I didn’t really go anywhere.”

“Enough of this,” Aidan said with a low growl. “You’re putting her off her food. Dad, if you really wanna know what’s going on, I’ll meet you at the pub and fill you in. Now, let's eat.”

“How’re you doing?” Peter asked sometime later as we stacked the dishwasher. Aidan was outside with his family, saying an extended goodbye, something that had his eyes rolling.

“You’ll be back here in a few hours to do the set up for the party,” he’d complained when they asked him to see them off.

“And we haven’t really had time to catch up,” Cooper said, steering his son outside. “Humour your mother.”

We already had, seriously. Kade was playing oh so happily with some of the new Star Wars LEGO sets he’d been given.

We’d forced her to keep back some of the parcels for later, but he’d been more than delighted with what he’d been given, giving Renee a kiss on the cheek and a hug.

He’d even called her Nana Renee in that completely mercenary way kids seem to when toys are on the table.

“I’m fine. My head is spinning a bit, but it’s fine. They all seem really nice, though I think I’m gonna have to put some hours in to get Smokey on side.”

“Smokey’s known for being a bit of a grumpy c—” Peter smiled when he caught himself, eyes flicking to the lounge room.

“Prick. A bit of a grumpy prick. He’d fight anyone to protect his family, including his own family.

There was a bit of fuss when he and Renee got together.

The other guys took a bit of time to warm to him. ”

“So people don’t always find their mates at the same time?”

“Not normally. Often, they come from the pool of your first heat. That's what it's for, to bring people together. But you’ve still got to work through the relationship and the feelings. That happens at different times for each person.”

“So you’re gonna be cool with me…working things out with…” Sen, say Sen , my body said, remembering how he’d felt. “Whoever I feel drawn to.”

“Of course, love,” he said, leaning forward and kissing my forehead. “We’re here with you on whatever journey you’re on. Now, since you’ve met Renee and the guys and Kade seems to be warming to them, what do you think about them being caretakers when the heat hits?”

His tone was calm and even, but I watched his lips form the ‘h’ word and felt something hot and liquid shoot through me.

He froze at that, then took a deep breath and smiled, slow and sexy.

He shoved the plate he had in his hand into the rack and then stepped in close, pulling me against him and kissing me deeply.

“You smell so fucking hot.”

“What?” I pushed at him, because Kade was in the lounge room, because the promise of his body was one I enthusiastically wanted to explore and now was not the right time, and because they were always doing this—smelling me. “What is that?”

“What’s what, love?” he asked, trying to get closer.

“Why do you…?” I turned to check that Kade was still playing happily. “Why do you keep smelling me?” I hissed. “Do I stink or something?”

“Not stink,” he said, pulling back with a smile. “When you’re horny, you give off a receptive scent. Doesn’t mean anything, everyone knows that, it just tells us when you’re into it or not. In the end, it's always your choice.”

“You what…?” My mouth hung open, and then my brain quickly catalogued all the time I’d checked the two of them out. “So you…?” He nodded. “Every time…?” Another nod. “Oh god.”

“Don’t stress about it, Flick. We were flattered you found us attractive. We knew we couldn’t do anything about it until you were feeling up to it, but…” He watched my horrified expression with amusement. “It gave us some hope as we waited, that maybe someday, you might accept us.”

I punched him on the arm, which felt a bit like pummelling a brick wall.

“Why didn’t you tell me?!” I whispered hoarsely.

“Because…” His eyes flicked to the lounge room as Kade got to his feet, then came back to me when he settled back down.

“Because it means nothing. You might have smelt the same way when you met Mick or Shaun. They’d be flattered, but know it was not something they could pursue unless you gave them the go ahead. Women find us attractive all the time.”

“They do? You’ve…smelled them getting hot and bothered around you?” I said with a growl.

That earned me an even bigger smile as he pushed me back against the bench, his body wedged against mine.

“Are you getting jealous?”

“Protective,” I snapped. “No woman should be…” I waved a hand. “Around my mates.”

“It’s OK. I like you being…protective.” He kissed me, once, twice, each kiss becoming deeper.

“Mm…what did I miss? Mum and the dads just would not get in the goddamn car and go.”

We turned to see a smirking Aidan standing in the kitchen.

“I’ve just found out you’ve been smelling me this whole time. And you knew…” I lowered my voice. “And you knew when I was turned on!”

“Why’d you tell her that? Rookie move, Pete,” he replied with an exaggerated shake of his head.

“Man, did that make getting to sleep a bloody mission. Like, Kade and any other child of ours is always welcome in our bed, but damn was I glad when he decided to start sleeping on his own. It’s gotten to the point where I get hard every time I chuck our sleep shorts in the wash. ”

He chuckled when I glared at him.

“It was damn flattering. Every time we took off our shirts…” He moved in close and ran his nose along my jaw.

“This hot perfume would fill the room, teasing us with everything, promising us nothing.” He kissed me quickly and pulled away as I snapped my teeth at him.

“That’s what’s gonna bring all the boys to your yard when you go into heat.

It’s already started. You’ll be able to do a few shifts at the mess hall, but not much more than that or you’ll have a riot on your hands.

When you shift, the scent will flood the whole town, leave the single guys aching and attendance at the sex club will be off the charts. ”

“Sex club!?” I hissed.

“Good one,” Peter rumbled. “Who’s the rookie now?”

“Kade,” I called out, “I’m just going outside with the guys to set up for tonight. Are you good?”

“Yeah, Mum. Nana Renee got me this most amazing LEGO set. It has Han Solo and Obi Wan Kenobi?—”

“That’s awesome, champ,” I said, walking into the living room. “We’ve just got to do a few things, and then you can tell us all about it.”

“OK,” he said, not even looking up from his toys.

I jerked my head to the sliding door and walked out into the back yard.

“What the hell is a sex club, and why is it in Sanctuary?” I asked as soon as the door was closed. I kept my voice pitched low to make sure no sound got through the glass door to Kade, but they could see I meant business. “Do you guys like…wife swap or something?”

“What? No!” Aidan said. “Look, Flick, I guess one thing no one’s told you is that Sanctuary has way more men than women.

It’s why it's such a big deal when a woman comes to town. If you decided to have any more kids, the chances of having a daughter is much lower, though that has changed a bit lately. So when a woman goes into heat, she floods the whole town with pheromones that make the whole single population of the town go mad with lust, and a lot of them are guys…”

His voice trailed away as it occurred to me what he meant.

My fevered imagining of being expected to toss my keys into a bowl was replaced with something else altogether.

Instead, there was wall after wall of hot male flesh, all rubbing up against each other, helpless in its twitching, throbbing licentiousness.

“Something about that appeal to you, love?” Aidan asked, quirking an eyebrow.

He sat down in one of the chairs, his fingers steepled in his lap.

“Is that where you went when…?” I asked, not sure if I wanted that answer.

He shook his head. “Doesn’t work for me, unfortunately. I just rubbed one out over and over, like a lot of the other poor saps.”

“I have.”

Peter didn’t sound happy about his confession, but there it was—bold as brass. He shot me a sidelong look, then dragged out a chair and flopped down into it, letting out a long sigh.

I felt…I wasn’t sure. Neither of them had come to me virgins, and I hadn’t expected that, but this? I frowned and then took a deep breath.

“OK. Tell me about it.”

His fingers rubbed the edge of the table for a few seconds before dropping to his lap. He swivelled around and looked me clear in the eye. “I…I went with the boys.”

“Those guys at the mess hall?”

“Darren and Brett? Yeah. They wanted… They wanted to get off obviously, and no woman would look twice at them. I tagged along, because that’s what I did. No, that’s not right. Flick, I wanted to see what it was like, if I could…” His eyes dropped to his crotch.

“You wanted to see if you could fuck someone without hurting them,” I said. “And did you?”

He nodded.

For a minute, I could see it—his big burly body pushing its way into another guy’s, both of them panting as he struggled to take him.

The feelings that came after were confusing.

Possessiveness and jealousy, some inadequacy and fear, but mainly it was this—some faceless guy, maybe one of the dudes at the mess, had taken something from him that I hadn’t.

“You know I’m going to want to try…to take you.”

“Flick—”

“I said try. I’m never going to know— we’re never going to know if we don’t try. We’ll just take it easy. You’re not going to turn into some kind of ravening beast the minute you put the tip in. There’s plenty of women taking bigger than that.” He snorted. “Seriously, just Google it.”

“Done some ‘research,’ love?” Aidan said.

“If you call looking at porn way before I met you guys ‘research,’ then yeah.”

He groaned in response, rubbing the heel of his hand down the front of his jeans. “We need to get the hell off this topic. We’ve got a long night ahead of us, and not the good kind. Mum’ll be back soon enough, and she’s bringing yours too, Pete.”

The man went stock still at that, only looking up at Aidan after minutes had passed.

“I’m sorry, mate. Mum’s a stickler for the old rules. I know you didn’t want her involved.”

I sighed, rubbing at my face. This was going to be one of those days where a whole lot of the stuff the guys had neglected to share with me was gonna come up. I sat up straight and said, “Fill me in on why you don’t want your mum here.”