Page 137 of The Sterling Acquisition

“Yeah,” he said, surprised by how true it was. “I really am.”

“Good,” Orion said, squeezing his hand. “Because I’ve been thinking.”

“Always dangerous.”

“I want to learn to cook,” Orion announced. “Properly cook, not just heat things up. Lilac says there’s someone in the southern settlement who teaches traditional techniques, and I want to try it.”

Dante smiled. It was such a normal desire—wanting to learn a skill, to create something with your hands, to feed the people you cared about. The kind of simple aspiration that corporate life made impossible.

“We could visit,” he said. “Make a week of it. I’ve been curious about their agricultural innovations anyway.”

“A week away from the collective,” Orion said thoughtfully. “Just the two of us, traveling like normal people. When’s the last time either of us did something that normal?”

“Never,” Dante admitted. “But I’m willing to learn.”

“Good,” Orion said, then paused. “Though I should probably warn you that I’ll be insufferable if I turn out to be naturally talented at cooking.”

“You’re already insufferable,” Dante pointed out. “At least this way you’d be insufferable and useful.”

Orion’s elbow caught him in the ribs with practiced precision. “Bastard.”

Dante caught the arm and used it to pull Orion against him, spinning them so Orion’s back hit their front door. “Your bastard,” he said.

“Always,” Orion said softly, and the sudden sincerity in his voice made Dante’s chest tight in the best possible way.

They’d reached their porch, the house waiting for them with warm light spilling from the windows. Home, in every sense that mattered.

“Any regrets?” Orion asked, echoing the question he asked that first night.

Dante looked around—at the collective settling into evening quiet, at the man beside him who turned his entire world upside down, at the life they built together from nothing but stubborn determination and impossible hope.

“Just one,” he said.

Orion raised an eyebrow.

“I regret that it took me so long to figure out what I wanted,” Dante said softly. “I could have saved us both a lot of trouble if I’d been smarter about it from the beginning.”

Orion laughed, bright and genuine in the evening air. “Where’s the fun in that? Besides, I like our story the way it happened.”

“Even the part where you spent weeks plotting my death?”

“Especially that part,” Orion said, standing on his toes to kiss him. “It makes the ending so much better.”

Dante pulled him closer, still marveling at the simple miracle of being allowed to do this. No corporate schedules. No handlers monitoring their interactions. No missions pulling them apart.

Just this: a life they chose, in a place they belonged, with each other.

It was, he thought, the best possible ending to the worst possible beginning.

And tomorrow, they’d wake up and do it all over again.