Page 147 of Nicky and the Night Owls, Part One

“Yours?! Yes!” Billie shouted. “Do you like it?”

My tears formed faster than my words. I caught their concerned expressions before the world wavered, and I gave over to the sobs.

They made me a room.

They wanted me tostay.

Why the hell couldn’t I stop crying?

The pack crowded around me in one giant hug.

“Do you hate it?” Billie asked, nuzzling my ear.

“I love it,” I choked out.

They waited until I had cried myself out, and then a bottle of water appeared in front of me. I gulped it down gratefully. Hana held up a box of tissues, and I used them to dry my eyes and blow my nose, tossing them into the tiny waste basket that Tony had fetched. Damn, they were efficient.

I took a few deep breaths. “I don’t know what to say except to babble ‘thank you’ until the end of time.”

“Can we give you a tour?” Billie asked.

I nodded, distrusting my voice again.

Billie hooked their arm through one of mine, and Tony held my other hand.

“We let Billie’s hurricane powers go wild,” said Tony. “What do you think, baby girl?”

“It’s beautiful.” The space was easily the size of my old apartment, open and airy and all mine. “I can’t believe you all did this for me.”

My own small collection of books was scattered among the shelves, and the rest looked to be the entire back catalogues of every author from my own collection and a ton of new releases I hadn’t gotten to yet. There were at least a dozen nooks and crannies set up for Spud, though it would appear that the cat tower was his favourite, so he could look out the window. The curtains were a soft velvet that were already decorated with cat fur.

The walk-in closet was mostly empty except for my very small new wardrobe.

“I’ll help you fill it up, if you want,” said Billie.

“You don’t have to do that. You’ve already done so much.”

Billie made a sound of protest. “Please. I have the money and I want to do this. I will yeet money at anything that makes you happy.”

That got me sniffly all over again. Tony pulled me into his arms, hand on the back of my neck, his purr rumbling in that perfect way that got me all melty. “You deserve all of this and more, baby girl.”

They shuffled me over to the en suite bathroom. It was pretty much identical in design to every other bathroom in the house—marble floors, a massive tub, and a glassed-in shower big enough for the whole pack. Tropical plants hung here and there, adding pops of colour to the white stone. A gorgeously fluffy set of purple towels was neatly stacked on some of the shelving, and all of my new toiletries were lined up like little sentinels along the sink.

“The bedroom door has a lock too,” said Hana, appearing in the mirror behind me. “In case you get sick of us.”

A weird half laugh, half cry sprang out of my mouth. “Literally no chance of that happening.”

Even so, it was nice to have the assurance.

I kissed each of them in turn. “Thank you so much. I love it. I love everything. I love y—”

Nope.

I wasn’t going to haul out that declaration quite this early.

It hung in the air anyway.

Billie nipped my earlobe, whispering, “Don’t think I didn’t notice.”

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