Page 87 of Knot the Last Chapter

She lifts her head just enough to glare at me—though the look is softened by her sleepy eyes and tousled hair.

“Rude,” she mutters, her voice still thick with sleep.

“True,” I reply, unable to stop the grin from widening.

She shifts, her hip brushing mine, and I suck in a breath. She's still hot to the touch. I ground myself in the sound of her breathing, the rise and fall of her chest.

“I really liked Scooby Doo. I meant it as a compliment.”

That pulls her the rest of the way awake. She blinks up at me, wary but not guarded. “Really?”

Her lips quirk, but there’s a sadness behind it.

“I feel really terrible I didn’t make that clearer. Like I robbed you, and the world, of your stories.”

She places a hand on my cheek, moves closer to me. “It was a throwaway line. A joke, maybe. But I was fourteen. An omega. Desperate to believe I could be more than what everyone expected.” She looks down at my chest, her finger tracing idle lines against my skin. “I let that moment redefine me. I stopped writing. Went to the city. Took the job. Told myself stories weren’t real life.”

Guilt is a sour stone in my gut.

“I wanted to compliment you,” I say, voice rough. “I just… gods, I liked you so much, and I didn’t know how to act. You were quiet and serious and so talented. And I was a dumb teenage alpha trying to act cool.”

She glances up. “You liked me? Back then?”

I nod. “From the moment I saw you. Even back then.”

She takes that in. A long silence stretches between us, and I wait. For rejection, maybe. For her to pull away.

But she nestles in again, pressing her forehead to my collarbone.

“I don’t regret the path I took,” she says quietly. “It led me here. And I don’t think I’d trade any of it.”

I close my eyes.

She adds, almost in a whisper, “Now I know better than to let anyone else write my ending for me.”

My heart stutters.

“I’d read anything you wrote,” I murmur into her hair.

She chuckles, low and quiet. “Well now that I know you love Scooby Doo, I don’t know how much credit I can give your opinion.”

“I have great taste!” I protest, relieved that we’re comfortable, glad that the air has completely cleared between us.

Her soft laughter vibrates through me, and I hold her tighter. My knot has eased enough now that I could slip free, but I don’t move. Neither does she.

We lie like that, a quiet tangle of bodies and breath, until the night seems to fold itself around us.

I want to say more. I want to ask her what comes next. If there’s space in her future for someone like me.

But not tonight.

Not while heat still burns under her skin and instinct clouds everything. Not while her body is still ruled by biology, no matter how fierce her mind and heart. She deserves to choose with her whole heart—not just her body.

But if she chose me? I’d never let her doubt herself again. Not for a second.

So instead, I simply whisper, “Sleep, plot bunny.”

She sighs contentedly, nuzzles in, and falls asleep in my arms.

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