Page 216 of Knot Baked Out For This
“If someone wrote our story, what would they even call it?”
He’s asking for trouble.
I twist, grinning, and the first thing out of my mouth is.
“Knot Baked Out for This.”
There’s a beat of silence, then actual groaning from the twins.
“Hazel, no,” Levi wheezes, but he’s giggling, too. “That’s the worst.”
“It’s exactly right,” Rowan argues, not even hiding his pride. “She’s got the pun market cornered.”
Luca props himself on one elbow. “She’s totally baked out for us. If you need evidence, look at the current cuddle pile. That’s the result.”
I try to muster a comeback, but I’m distracted by the way his hand curls lazy on my thigh, thumb tracing idle designs. There’s nothing sexual in it this time.
Just… belonging.
I yawn, my head hitting the pillow with zero coordination.
“I’m keeping it. Knot Baked Out for This: The Quest for Three Alphas and a Cozy Omega.”
“Is it a trilogy?” Levi mumbles, already half-asleep.
“At least,” Rowan says. “Spinoffs, sequels, full snack product lines.”
We’re all breathless with it, the kind of laughter that puts you back together instead of taking you apart.
Somewhere in the background, the rain trickles off. The barn’s lit by the last few candles, and the only thing louder than the crinkle of fading Heat is the mass exhale as my pack settles.
Muffin stretches, purring, choosing to sleep at Rowan’s feet —traitor.
“Knot Baked Out For This,” Luca repeats softly, and the words echo through the haze of afterglow like the punchline toa running joke only we would ever get. He says it with a lazy reverence, like the title of a story he intends to write on my skin, one chapter at a time. “Yet our Hazel was most certainly baked for us.”
There’s a chorus of agreement, but not in words—Levi’s hand tightens around my waist in a possessive, buttery squeeze;Rowan’s arm crosses the tangle of our bodies to rest heavy and protective over my hips; even Muffin gives a rumbling, approving sigh at the foot of the nest, kneading her claws into the top blanket like she’s staking her claim as the footnote in this Omega’s saga.
The air is so dense with the scent of us—sugar, salt, cedar, honeycomb, the faint whiff of burnt pumpkin, and the ozone snap of autumn rain—that if I could bottle it, I would wear it for the rest of my life.
Maybe I will.
I float in the cocoon of my pack, boneless and sated, and for the first time ever, I don’t mind the ache in my thighs or the warm stickiness clinging to my skin and curling in my hair.
I just want to hold still and exist—nothing to fix, nothing to prove, nothing to run from. I think of all the times I daydreamed about a night like this.
The reality is so much messier, knottier, and infinitely better than any story I could have baked up.
My last waking thought teases my mind.
This is my forever pack.
I sigh, smile, and let myself drift.
Happily, knottedly ever after.
Epilogue: Welcome To Oakridge
~HAZEL~
