Page 80 of Break Me Knot

He fixed it. Not just the locket—the memory.

The proof that I was loved before grief turned me feral.

That I’m still worth loving.

My throat tightens. All this time, I thought he saw me as a burden, a problem to tolerate. But this—this is a confession. We’re bleeding the same blood.

Cole’s shadow still lingers under the door, his breath hitching like he’s waiting for a verdict.Stay,I want to say.Stay and prove you’re not the ghost you think you are. But another cramp twists low in my belly.

I grunt, doubling over, my body betraying me again. Slick pools between my thighs, nipples pebbling against my shirt, the ache in my clit so sharp it blurs my vision.

Pathetic, I curse myself. Weak. But Mom’s steady smile winks at me, bright and fresh in the restored photo. I swear I feel Mom’s fingers smoothing my hair—the way she did when nightmares yanked me awake as a kid.“You’re stronger than the dark, Mira.”

Dad’s voice hums beneath hers, warm and wry:Scars mean you showed up to the fight, kiddo. Even the scars you can’t see.

Cole’s scent sharpens—pine needles and alpha pheromones spiking as my own floods the room. “Mira?” Panic edges his voice. “Fuck, I know I’ve got no right to help you, but—fuck—let me call Adrian. Zane. Someone.”

I squeeze the heart pendant until its edges bite my palm. Mom and Dad not here. Of course they’re not. The bathroom tiles are still cold, the air still reeks of my own sweat and slick, and Cole’s still holding his breath on the other side of the door. But for the first time since their deaths, the memory of them doesn’t slice—it settles.

The desperation in his tone cracks something in me. Not pity. Recognition. We’re all mosaics of old wounds and bad choices, but Mom and Dad would tell me to stop punishing myself for needing glue.

Another cramp seizes me. Their words aren’t a memory—they’re a demand.

Mom and Dad didn’t want to leave me, and they wouldn’t have wanted me to stop living either. Mom’s delicate lavender perfume drifts past me, quickly followed by Cole’s desperate burnt resin.

The locket’s chain tangles in my fingers. Outside I hear Adrian’s urgent murmur and Zane’s heavy footfalls. Their scents flow under the door, smokycedar, sharp zest and smoldering pine pitch. They envelop me in a comforting embrace, grounding yet intoxicating. Their scents reach for me, embrace me, and I know exactly what they feel. What they think as certainly as I know my own thoughts and emotions. The knot of fear and uncertainty within me loosens its grip, unraveling as their scents weave through the room like a soft, protective cocoon. I don’t need to fear them.

“Adrian and Zane are here,” Cole says softly. “Can they please come in, Sweetness?”

Another cramp wracks my body, worse than before. The arousal is excruciating. This burning ache won’t be satisfied until I have their help. The itch under my skin is driving me insane. My thighs are covered with slick even as pain tears through me. My abdomen is a yawning hole throbbing to be filled and my clit throbs so painfully that an ache spreads from the top of my thighs to my backbone.

Want them. Want them so bad.

“Take the chance, Mira.”Mom’s voice whispers in my soul.“Not because it’s safe. Because it’syours.”

I press the locket to my lips.

With trembling hands, I reach up and unclip the lock. The door opens, and all three alphas look down at me—Adrian with his controlled concern, Zane with his open worry, and Cole with his haunted guilt. Their combined scents wash over me making my omega keen even as my body punishes me for wanting.

I must look a mess, sweating, trembling, curled against the bathroom wall. But there's no judgment in their eyes. Only acceptance.

Always acceptance.

Adrian kneels, his movements careful, controlled. He brushes my damp hair from my face with the gentlest of touches. His hazel eyes are dark with concern, but there's no pity there. “Do you need our help, Little One?” Even now, with me sprawled in pain and sweating on the floor, he gives me a choice.

They all do; it's who they are.

They can’t be any other way.

I manage to nod, and he lifts me like I weigh nothing. His smoked cedar envelops me, soothing even as my body burns. “Where do you want to go?”

“My nest,” I whisper.

“Okay.” There's no judgment, no suggestion that my ratty closet nest isn't good enough. No pressure to use the beautiful nest room they prepared. They accept it just like they accept me, broken pieces and all. My safe space in their world, and…and…

Adrian lays me down among my mixed collection of old and new blankets. “What do you need?”

The truth spills out before I can stop it, raw and desperate. Straight from the deepest place inside my heart, straight to my lips, and in that second, I see the whole truth of it. Speaking to Cole. Him telling me his darkest secret has unblocked mine. “Everything.”

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