Page 89 of Nesting With My Three Alphas
"This is really mine?" I asked, running my fingers along the built-in shelving.
"This is really yours," Jonah confirmed.
"Ours," Reed corrected. "Everything here is ours."
I stood in the center of my new studio, surrounded by my three alphas and our daughter, and felt something settle deep in my chest. Something that had been restless and searching for as long as I could remember.
"I love you," I said suddenly, looking around at all of them. "I love you all so much it scares me sometimes."
"Good scared or bad scared?" Charlie asked.
"Good scared," I said, crouching down to her level. "The kind of scared you get when something is so perfect you're afraid it might disappear."
"It won't disappear," Charlie said seriously. "We signed papers. It's official."
"She's right," Micah said softly. "This is real, Kit. This is ours. You're ours, and we're yours, and this house is where we're going to build our forever."
"Forever," I repeated, letting the word settle on my tongue like something sacred.
"Forever," they echoed back.
And standing in the golden light of my new studio, surrounded by my chosen family in our chosen home, I finally believed it might be true.
Chapter 29
Reed
The sound of hammering echoed across our property at seven in the morning, and I grinned as I heard Kit's voice carry from the house to the old barn. "Reed Thornton, if you wake up Charlie with that racket, you're sleeping in the workshop tonight!"
Six weeks in, and I still got a kick out of the fact that this was our place. Our house, with the old barn that we'd discovered had perfect bones for renovation, and Kit's art studio that caught the morning light just right, and Charlie's room with the built-in bookshelves that she'd already filled with dinosaur encyclopedias and chapter books.
"Sorry!" I called back across the yard, though I kept hammering. The gallery wall Kit wanted for the community art show wasn't going to hang itself, and we had exactly three days before the entire town descended on our place for what Charlie had dubbed "the fanciest party Hollow Haven has ever seen."
It had all started when Mrs. Parker cornered Kit after her second week at the advanced art class at the community center.
"You know, dear," she'd said in that way that meant she'd been thinking about something for a while, "there are a lot of folks in town who'd love to try art but are too intimidated to jump into our group."
Mrs. Parker had been right, of course. The existing art class was full of people who'd been painting and drawing for years. They met every Tuesday afternoon to work on their projects and critique each other's techniques. Wonderful for experienced artists, but hardly welcoming to complete beginners.
So Kit had proposed a solution. A beginner's class that met Thursday evenings, open to anyone regardless of designation or experience level. "Art for Absolute Beginners" had seemed like a modest goal.
What it had become was something closer to a community movement.
"How's it coming out there?" Jonah's voice carried from the kitchen, where he was working his way through a breakfast that would fuel a construction crew. Moving day had been three weeks ago, but we were still in the process of settling in, making the space truly ours. That included the ambitious barn conversion project.
"Almost done with the main wall," I called back across the yard. "Though someone keeps changing their mind about the arrangement."
"I heard that!" Kit's voice was closer now, probably on the back porch. "And I'm not changing my mind, I'm optimizing the visual flow!"
"Is that what we're calling it?"
Kit appeared in the barn doorway, her hair pulled back in a messy bun and already wearing one of my old flannel shirts overher jeans. Six weeks of living together, and she still reached for our clothes like they were comfort items.
Which, knowing Kit's relationship with scent and security, they probably were.
"It looks incredible," she said, examining my handiwork with the critical eye of someone who'd spent years in marketing and knew the difference between good enough and actually good. "I can't believe this is the same space that was full of old hay and rusted farm equipment six weeks ago."
The barn transformation had been my pet project since we'd moved in. What had started as a dusty storage space was now a bright, open gallery with exposed beams, polished concrete floors, and enough wall space to showcase serious artwork. The big sliding doors could open completely to connect the interior space with the yard outside.
