Piece Us Together (Monstrous Survivors #3)

18. Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Eighteen

Hunter

I’ve never been much for lying. I’ve never found it particularly productive. The truth gets you a lot farther, in my experience. Then again, I never really did anything that made it necessary to lie. Secrets were never my thing. When I realized I was gay, I didn’t agonize or internalize or overthink. I realized I wanted to kiss Ronnie Parker more than I wanted to kiss the girl Ronnie Parker was busy kissing at the eighth-grade dance. My mom picked me up, and I informed her of this fact. She shrugged and said, “Just make sure Ronnie Parker is a good boy. And remember, consent . Don’t just go shocking him with a kiss. I’ll kick someone’s ass if they punch you for being a gay boy. I will not kick their ass if they punch you because you didn’t ask nicely first.”

That sounded reasonable. Two weeks later, I strolled right up to Ronnie Parker when he was waiting for a ride after basketball practice and told him I wanted to kiss him. He laughed. When I didn’t laugh, he said, “You fucking gay or what, man?”

And I said, “Yeah, man, I’m fucking gay.”

He’d stared at me. Then he’d said, “Well, I’m not.”

I shrugged and turned to walk away. Consent not given. On to the next crush, right?

And then he’d stopped me. “But my cousin is.”

Caleb Parker was my first kiss. He was my first boyfriend. He was the first boy to wrap a hand around my cock and make me melt into a puddle. He was the first boy whose cock I wrapped my own hand around, learning I really liked when boys panted and whimpered and then begged me to stop taking my hand away because he really, really, really wanted to please come.

If I had stuffed being gay down, if I hadn’t put all my cards on the table, I wouldn’t have had those experiences.

Granted, my affinity for being brutally honest has gotten me into a few bad situations, including a broken nose, a keyed car, some pretty significant threats from two different homophobes, and a lost friendship with a girl I really liked. Have I been lucky as fuck for not getting into anything worse? Yes. But the point still stands that the truth has always done me more good than harm. When I became a dom, that philosophy doubled. Tripled, even.

As I sit across a table from my newest friend, Travis, seven days after playing with his boyfriend’s brother’s boyfriend and his boyfriend’s brother, I think a lot about lying. In particular, I think about the subtle line between a lie and a secret. It seems to be about the same size as the line between Maison’s bravado and his fear.

“Hunter?” Travis asks with a smirk and a raised eyebrow. “You in or out?”

Well now, isn’t that the question of the evening?

I drop my cards and wave my hand. I haven’t been paying enough attention to be making any sort of bets. “I’m out.”

The round continues until it’s narrowed down between Travis and one of the other doms in our friend group, Booker.

It’s when they’re about to reveal their hands that I notice Wells watching me. I very pointedly do not look back at him. I look straight ahead at the deck of cards in the center of the table and do not think about how I know what Maison and Nolan look like when they come. Or think about how Wells knows that I know that information.

“Travis,” Wells says as a new hand is dealt by Booker. He lost to Travis. We all tend to. The man is like a human fucking lie detector while simultaneously pulling off the best poker face I’ve ever seen. He was obviously a fucking spy or something in a previous life. “How’s Carter?”

Travis grins like he always does whenever the man who is his boyfriend and submissive is ever brought up. He’s like a golden retriever when it comes to Carter. It’s shocking that he’s the one who holds the metaphorical leash in their relationship, to be honest, considering the way he seems to worship the ground Carter walks on. “He’s doing really fucking well. He’s loving college. Loving his job.”

“Jax has been meeting with him once a week for lunch. I have to say, my pet is loving having yours as a new friend.”

“Carter loves having him, too. He’s—well, he’s had a hard time of it, lately.” Travis fiddles with his cards, a furrow developing between his brows. He looks at them instead of us. The one thing Travis can never lie about is Carter. It’s like his love and concern for the boy outweighs all else, even the best of his defenses. “Jax—all of you, really, but Jax most of all—has given him something he really needed.”

“Can I ask what?” Wells asks softly. If there’s one thing all of us respect, it’s protecting our subs. He’d never hold it against Travis for not sharing.

Travis shares, though, and he does it with a smile. “Someone who is just like him. Or close enough to not feel so fucking alone.”

Now it’s my turn to frown at my cards, running my thumbnail along the edge of my ace. I was under the impression that Carter and Nolan were friends. I was also under the impression that Carter and Maison were close. Maison nearly shot me when he came to save him, after all. Even with Maison asking for discretion, I assumed Carter would at least be aware of Nolan’s submissiveness if nothing else. Do they not get along? Is it because of Maison?

“Hunter?” Travis asks.

“Hm?” I look up from my cards to find them all looking at me. “What?”

“I asked if you’ve got yourself a sub these days.”

One, sort of. Or maybe two.

Except they’re not actually mine at all, are they? They likely never will be.

“No.” I see Wells adjust in his seat. I can only imagine the thoughts going through his head. This is the moment where keeping the secret blends into a lie. This is the moment the line dissolves. I’ve never been much for lies, but here I am. With Maison’s sad blue eyes and Nolan’s relieved ones in mind, I look at my newest friend and say, “I haven’t played since the night we met.”

Travis whistles low. “Sorry. Hell of a way to start a dry spell.”

“Hell of a way,” Wells says in a wry voice that no one but me catches. “But at least you got some things out of that night, right, Hunter?”

I glare at him as Travis asks, “Oh yeah? What’s that?”

“A damn good friend,” I say with my glare still on Wells. Then I turn to Travis with a smile. “Two, if we count your boy.”

He winks at me. Laughs. Then he throws his cards down and says, “I fold. This goddamn hand is bullshit.”

“When do you leave for Florida?” Wells asks me, suspiciously changing the conversation.

“I’m not going this year, actually.”

“What’s in Florida?” Travis asks.

“My parents. We do Thanksgiving in Florida and Christmas about an hour from here, at my sister’s house. I can’t make it out there this year, though.”

Wells tsks. “I told you not to let those assholes stick you with another class this semester. You were already too busy last year as it was.”

“You don’t get tenure by turning the head of the department down,” I argue. “I’ll be fine. I’ll sit at home and eat pie and grade papers with drunk history re-runs on the TV.”

“For fuck’s sake—that’s pathetic, man.” Wells frowns at me, looking more concerned than he really needs to be. This won’t be my first holiday alone. College kicked my ass too hard for me to always make it home. “I feel bad that I don’t have a dinner to invite you to, unless you want to grade your papers on the car ride?”

I wrinkle my nose. I can already name three reasons why that’d be awful. First, I get sick if I read in the car. Second, it’s a seven-hour drive each way, if I’m remembering correctly. Third, Wells has awful taste in music. “I’ll be okay.”

“And Liam will be busy with the restaurant and Booker—you’re doing that thing with your sisters, right?”

Booker sighs, but none of us who truly know him buy the long-suffering act. He loves his sisters. They have him wrapped around their fingers. “Yes. Maggie has a new boyfriend. I’m going to scare the fucking shit out of him.”

We all laugh.

It’s not until Wells says, just a little too sadly to be genuine, “Man, I hate to think you’ll be home alone. I know you love Thanksgiving.”

I narrow my eyes at him as I realize there’s one person’s plans that haven’t been discussed yet. Wells is looking right at him, too. This fucking asshole.

He looks about to ask Travis what he will be doing.

I open my mouth to stop him.

Travis beats us both. “Why don’t you come with me and Carter to our Thanksgiving?”

Have you ever seen someone win something, and they’re just so fucking smug you want to punch them right in their smirking mouth? No? Take a fucking look at Wells then.

“That’s really not necessary,” I say as firmly as I can.

“Come on, it’ll be great. Our friends all just went in on a big house together, so it’s more like Friendsgiving, but we’re all practically family anyway. Not that it matters. The point is, the house is plenty big enough and the food will be fucking amazing because one of our friends is a great cook and we’d love to have you.” He pauses though, something passing over his face before disappearing behind an easy smile. “I’ll, uh—I’ll have to ask, of course. Make sure everyone is okay with it. But I’m sure it’ll be fine. It’d be nice to introduce you to our friend group. All of you, of course, but since everyone else is apparently too cool to stay here for Thanksgiving, starting with you works just fine.”

“I really wouldn’t want to bother anyone…”

“If it makes you feel better, I can send a text out to the group chat right now.”

I jump on this option. Surely Maison or Nolan will think of some reason why it isn’t okay, right? “If you wouldn’t mind. And make sure it’s clear that there would be absolutely no hard feelings at all. I get that holidays can be hard for people, you know? And—and I’m a stranger. I’d understand, really.”

Travis waves me off as he pulls out his phone. He doesn’t seem concerned.

I shoot a glare at Wells, who is smirking at his cards like he’s some evil mastermind.

He stops smirking when I kick him in the shin.

Travis’s friends say I’m more than welcome to come to the house. I want badly to ask if all of them said that. If Maison and Nolan said that, specifically. But I refrain.

I’m nervous when Maison and Nolan show up for our usual Saturday night rendezvous, my stomach twisted into knots like it hasn’t been since I defended my dissertation. I’ve spent the past few days reminding myself that it’s just a holiday dinner. I know that. It’s not like I’m going as their date. In fact, no one has to even know that we’ve met at all—apart from Maison almost shooting me. But despite all of that logic, I still feel like I’ve crossed the line somehow. We’re supposed to be together on Saturday nights and Sunday mornings, unless it snows like last week. We aren’t supposed to have holiday dinners with each other. If they wanted that, they would have invited me themselves when the topic came up before.

I let them in with a shaky smile and a far too-busy head. I’m not even sure if I say hello to them or just think it.

I’m never going to be able to run a fucking scene like this.

“It wasn’t my idea!” I suddenly blurt.

Nolan just freezes, halfway through unzipping his jacket. Maison tilts his head like looking at me from a different angle might make me seem less crazy. “The…dinner at our house?” he asks carefully. He doesn’t sound mad, at least.

“Yes. I tried to tell Travis—oh god, your house? I thought it was just a couple of their friends living together. Now I feel even worse. I tried to tell him no. Why didn’t you tell him no?”

Nolan ducks his head while Maison squares his shoulders and frowns at me. “What’s the problem? You don’t want to hang out with us on Thanksgiving?”

My stomach drops with the sudden realization that they may be nervous about the same kind of thing as me. I take a step back to reassess—Nolan looks like a kicked puppy and Maison looks ready to rip my head off, but I don’t think it’s because they don’t want me at Thanksgiving.

I think it’s because they do .

“I would love to spend Thanksgiving with the two of you,” I admit, deciding I should be the one to step out on a limb here. It was my best friend that got us into this mess, after all. I hope his shin is still bruised.

“Then what? You don’t want to see our friends?”

“No! I’d love to meet your friends. I just—it’s outside of the rules we agreed on and I thought—well, I just didn’t want the two of you to think I had manipulated my way into your lives or something. I didn’t want you guys to be uncomfortable. I know how excited you are for the holiday, Nolan. I didn’t want to ruin it.”

He blushes and shuffles his feet before mumbling, “I’d really like you to be there, sir. So I can show you all the food and—and so you can meet my friends.”

“As Travis and Carter’s friend,” Maison clarifies, now looking nervous instead of angry. “We can’t, you know, tell people about… this . Especially Carter. He—I don’t want him to know, okay?”

I try not to let that hurt me. I already knew this, even if it was unspoken. It’s why I lied at the poker game. It’s why I’ve been avoiding Travis and Carter as much as possible, actually.

It still stings though.

I pretend it doesn’t.

“I understand.”

“Good.” Maison looks at Nolan, his eyebrows moving as he asks a silent question. Nolan shrugs, then nods. They both look at me. “You can’t ask questions either. If something… strange happens, or if there’s a comment made, or—or anything, really. Just ignore it, alright?”

More secrets.

I don’t know if I feel better or worse that I’m just one of many for them.

“Alright.”

A young man with his hair pulled into a messy half-bun opens the door. He has the fattest cat I’ve ever seen in his arms. The orange monstrosity glares at me as the man openly sizes me up. “You must be Hunter.”

“Yes?”

The man arches an eyebrow at me. It’s rare that I feel myself bristling beneath another man’s gaze, but he manages it effortlessly. I get the strongest impression that this man is very dangerous and that I do not, under any circumstances, want to become his enemy.

“You don’t know if you’re Hunter?” he asks.

“Yes. I am. I’m Hunter. I’m sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing?”

“I…” I pause, frowning. Christ, what is this guy’s secret? Is he willing to teach me? Does it work on Maison? “I don’t know. It felt like I should?”

He smirks. “Good. Come in. Welcome to the land of crazy.”

I laugh.

Then a turtle goes by on what I fucking swear is a skateboard, a cat chasing after it.

If you see anything strange, don’t comment.

This is not what I had in mind.

Grumpy cat still in his arms, the young man—who I’m realizing never graced me with the privilege of his name—leads me through a house that looks even larger on the inside than the outside. It’s all open and airy, sunlight spilling in. I see two cats before we turn a corner and walk into a huge kitchen. Nolan, Maison, Carter, and another young man with darker skin and a wild set of curly hair are in there.

Nolan is currently lecturing Carter and the other man on the difference between fresh herbs and spices versus the jarred stuff.

Maison is perched on the counter, a beer in one hand as he watches the live show. There’s something about him that has my hackles rising. It’s not one thing that I can put my finger on. His lips are curved in a smile. His posture is relaxed. He’s dressed in dark jeans and a light gray cable-knit sweater that makes the blue of his eyes nearly insane in their brightness.

But he looks—he looks heavy . Weighed down. He looks like the man from the pub. The man from the alley. The man who asked me not to let him ruin things. The man who believes he ruins everything he touches.

He looks like he needs me, and I’m not allowed to go to him.

“Hey, Carter, your friend showed.”

Every gaze in the room snaps to me. Since I’m still looking at Maison, I get the opportunity to watch the weight of the world lift for a single moment as his eyes meet mine, before it comes crashing back down on him, possibly heavier than the first time around. He drops his chin, fingers starting to pick at the label of his beer.

“Hunter!” Carter wipes his hands on a dish towel and moves closer to me. “I’m glad you came. Trav!”

Travis pops up around the corner where I can hear a football game playing. He looks at Carter first, doing that thing he always does where he scans the man’s whole body as if he needs to check that he’s still there and fine. Then he looks at me and grins. “Man, hey, I’m glad you made it.”

I force a smile. “I’m just thankful for the invite. I brought wine.”

“Oh perfect!” Carter takes the bottle from me as more people filter into the kitchen. Despite the large size of the room, it quickly starts to feel crowded. How many people are they hiding in this place? And how many more cats? There’s another one on top of the fridge.

“Hunter, this is my huge-ass family,” Travis says as he gestures around the room, his eyes scanning all of the faces with sheer pride. I get the feeling this is a found family. I also get the feeling the finding wasn’t an easy road. A family that has decided to let me be included in their holiday dinner. I’m both honored and intimidated. Especially when I can feel the weight of both Maison’s and Nolan’s gazes on me. “Guys, this is Hunter.”

I let my eyes drift across the room as I smile for real this time. “It’s nice to meet you all. Thank you for having me.”

“We’ve met, actually.” I look over to find a man standing to the right of Travis, looking at me with an amused smirk. There’s something familiar about him. It clicks when he adds, “Sorry about the whole gun thing last time.”

Ah. The other man who came with Travis and Maison to pick up Carter the disastrous night I took him home. Great .

I fight to keep my smile in place. Not because of the gun thing, but because that was the night Maison came crashing into my world, and I swear I can feel his eyes on me like a physical touch and it’s killing me not to look at him, not to look at Nolan, not to smile at both of them and ask how they’re doing and admit that I’ve fucking missed them despite it only having been a few days since they stood beneath my roof.

“Nice to meet you again, without a gun,” I say. I offer him my hand since he’s close enough to take it. “Hunter.”

He grips my hand, firm and strong, but not purposely intimidating. “Jake. No guns this time, promise.”

“Well,” another man says with a sly grin. He’s lingering the farthest away from the rest of the group, almost like he’s an outsider too. “No guns being pulled out, at least.”

“Don’t scare him off, Keats,” Travis chides.

“So many guns,” another man says with a laugh. He’s on the other side of who I assume is Jake’s boyfriend, from the way he has his body tucked against Jake’s side. The man is older than everyone else. A father of one of them, maybe. He grins at me. “If it makes you feel any better, that one had a gun on me just the other day. It seems to be their love language.”

I follow his finger to Maison. My first instinct is to demand to know why the hell he was pointing guns at someone. Then I meet his eyes, the blue full of guilt and fear, and all I want to do is put a hand to his cheek and promise him that whatever happened, it’s alright. His chest heaves with a shaky breath.

Oh, Maison, it’s okay.

“He’s pulled a gun on Hunter too,” Travis jokes, like pulling guns is common in this family. Perhaps it is. I wouldn’t know much about them, after all. Maison and Nolan are a very tight-lipped duo. “Hunter, you probably recognize him. This is Maison, Carter’s brother.”

I nod, hoping like hell my expression isn’t giving anything away. “Nice to see you again.”

His eyes flash a dozen emotions before going distant, almost cold. He’s a different person when he speaks. A person I’ve worked so hard to free him of these past weeks. Not the defeated man from the alley, but the defensive man who pulled that gun on me, the man who told me he’d kill me if I hurt Nolan, the man who glared at me in the snow and told me I couldn’t keep him there.

“Meridian,” he says with zero inflection.

It hurts.

It hurts very much.

I try not to let it show. I realize my smile has fallen, so I hurry to shove it back into place.

“We like him now, remember, Mais?” Travis teases. “Stop glaring at the poor guy.”

“I’m not glaring,” Maison mutters, dropping his gaze to the drink in his hands. I get the feeling he’s wishing for something much stronger. Or maybe wishing he had told me not to come after all.

“Ignore him. He’s a grump,” Carter says with a roll of his eyes. On the surface, it sounds teasing like Travis, but there’s something biting beneath it. A tension. I see it echoed in the way Maison’s shoulders tense, in the way his jaw ticks, in the way he lowers his head further.

I can’t help it, then. I look at Nolan. I can feel the pleading in my gaze. He gives me a shaky smile and scoots closer to his boyfriend until his hip is pressed against Maison’s knee. Maison immediately grabs at him, desperate for comfort.

“He’s not a grump,” Nolan defends. “You scared him that night.”

It breaks my heart as I watch Nolan step into shoes I know he doesn’t like. Shoes I should be filling. He looks so convincing, squaring his shoulders and speaking with authority. Do any of them even know how badly he needs to submit? Do any of them know that Maison seems to be hanging by a fucking thread at any given moment?

“No brotherly fighting,” the man who let me into the house snaps. His cat has ditched us, leaving orange hairs on the front of his black shirt. He glares at Maison and Carter, putting any of Maison’s glares to shame. “For one night, get along. It’s Thanksgiving.”

That startles me, but I try not to let it show. Do Maison and Carter not get along? More than just some attitude about that night? Is that part of Maison’s sadness?

“Subject change,” Jake says in a tone that I recognize, giving everyone a chastising look. He and Booker would get along great, if the guy is even aware that he’s definitely got some daddy-dom in him. The warning look is gone by the time his attention is back on me. “Who is your team?”

I blink at him. “Team?”

“Football team,” Travis explains. I don’t know if it was the tension between the brothers, the fact that my introduction is finished, or the topic of football, but three of the men leave the kitchen without looking back. “You a football fan?”

“Not particularly. I’ve gone to a few games and I’ll watch if it’s on TV, but I don’t have any allegiance.”

“Oh man, it has to be—” Jake says at the same time Travis says, “Well, in my opinion—” and Keats says, “Can’t go wrong with—”

“The Packers,” Maison says over everyone else, his eyes right on me. There’s an intensity in his gaze that I’m fairly certain has nothing to do with football. “You gotta like the Packers.”

Something calms in me at the less-than-hostile interaction. If this man wants me to cheer on the Packers, I will gladly cheer on the Packers. I will be the Packers’ biggest fucking fan. “Sounds like I’m rooting for the Packers today.”

Most of the room groans, Travis shaking his head, Jake putting a hand to his forehead, and Keats abandoning us entirely.

“I don’t want to hear it,” my original greeter says sharply. The men immediately drop their attitudes. When he points his finger at the hall, they’re already moving in that direction. “Go watch your damn football.”

I have got to get him to teach me how he does that.

I eye the remaining members of the room, taking stock. I’ve been left with Maison, who is back to staring at his beer bottle, Nolan, who looks like he wants to go in a corner and hide from everything, Carter, who has sidled up to Travis at this point, Travis, who looks utterly obsessed with Carter and has possibly forgotten I’m here, and the young man that was here when I first walked in.

“We should go watch football before we get in trouble,” Travis says.

Carter rolls his eyes. “Since when do you need an excuse to watch football?”

“Since you won’t come in and watch with me.”

“Don’t pout. I’ll come.” Carter turns to me before his jaw drops. “Oh crap, I’m so sorry! We didn’t even show you where you could put your jacket or anything. Let me—”

“I’ll show him,” Nolan nearly shouts. He hunches his shoulders when everyone’s attention falls on him. His cheeks are pink. “I can show him. You guys—you can go watch football.”

Carter looks unsure, but this is my sub, even if we aren’t under my roof, even if it isn’t a Saturday, and he wants me to himself. I try to reassure Carter, fixing him with a warm smile. “I’d like that. There are a lot of you, after all. I think getting to know you guys in bite-sized pieces might be less overwhelming.”

“That’s fair. Okay.” Carter hitches his thumb over his shoulder. “We’ll be just around the corner when you’re ready to come. Help yourself to any food that’s on that table over there—only that table, unless you want Nolan to kill you—and any drinks in the fridge.”

Once they’re gone, I’m left in the kitchen with Nolan, Maison, and the man I’ve yet to properly meet. The kitchen suddenly feels way too big. There’s a small ache building in me to just go straight to them. If we were at my house, I’d run fingers through Nolan’s hair and ask him what he’s making and steal a bite just to see him get flustered and angry at me. I want to press my side against Maison and pretend I don’t notice how flushed he gets and speak low to him until he does that shivery thing that makes me want to lay him out and take him apart.

Even if the other man wasn’t here, I don’t think they’d appreciate me doing any of that, though. They said they want me here, but it was pretty obvious they meant it in an abstract way. They want me here as Carter and Travis’s friend. They don’t want me here as someone who can touch them.

“I’ll take your coat, s—um— Hunter .” Nolan flushes darker pink as he hurries over to me. I try not to smirk as he comes to stop in front of me and realizes my scarf is in the way. He peers up at me through his lashes, fingers hovering. “May I?”

“Go ahead.”

He carefully unravels my scarf before moving to the buttons on the front of my jacket and working it off my shoulders. I watch him disappear toward the front door before looking back at Maison. He’s not looking at me, instead directing his frown at the other man. They’re speaking in sign language. Why is that so fucking endearing?

After the man signs something that makes Maison’s frown lift into a surprising grin, the man scurries out of the room without looking in my direction. I carefully approach the large island where Nolan was working when I first walked in. Maison watches me like I’m the one armed with a gun—and one of us surely is, especially with all the earlier comments made. I have a feeling most of these men are, actually.

“Happy Thanksgiving,” I say softly.

He darts his eyes in the direction where everyone went to watch football before settling them back on me. His expression is twisted up, anger and fear openly at war, his eyes reflecting the need deep inside of him. The need he’s fucking drowning in as he looks right at me.

His voice is low and gravelly as he says, “Happy Thanksgiving.”

“Is our boy in panic mode yet?”

I didn’t mean to say our boy , my breath catching with the mistake. But Maison smiles, his shoulders softening. “Not yet, but he’s determined to make my ma’s apple pie recipe and he’s putting way too much weight on it. It better fucking come out good.”

“Or what? You’ll kick the oven’s ass?”

“Do you doubt I could?” he asks with a surprising flirtation to his tone.

I chuckle. “No. If anyone could kick the ass of an inanimate object and win, it’d be you.”

“I appreciate that.” He puffs up a little before hiding his smirk behind his bottle. I watch his throat bob as he swallows, trying not to think dirty thoughts. When he settles the bottle back down to his lap, his bottom lip is slick. Fuck me.

“Listen. Uh. Before, the way I talked to you and, you know, glared or whatever…” When I look at his whole face instead of his lips, I realize his expression has changed in the short time I was distracted. He closes his eyes the moment mine meet them, almost like he’s trying to hide. I swear I can see the weight pressing down on him, a visible thing ready to suffocate an already drowning man. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, Maison. Hey, look at me.” He hesitates, but then he does. I give him the smile that has worked to calm both him and Nolan down more than once before. He seems to melt under it, his breath leaving him in a whoosh as he settles back against the cabinets behind him. I take a risk, placing a hand on his knee. His eyes fall to it. He swallows hard enough for me to hear. “Whatever you need tonight, do it. It’s okay.”

He sucks in a breath like he might say something before suddenly stiffening. I release his knee and take a step back, just in time for someone to come around the corner. I relax when it’s just Nolan. He doesn’t.

Nolan smiles, his cheeks flushed as he hurries over to stand beside me. “Happy Thanksgiving, sir.”

I glance at Maison for a moment, wondering if he’ll point out that I’m not technically sir today.

He looks away, mouth shut.

I turn to Nolan, taking in his messy hair and flushed cheeks. He looks adorably frazzled. There’s flour on his jeans and something orange on the shoulder of his sweater. Christ, these two are unfairly beautiful. “Happy Thanksgiving, darling.”

“Is that who you are today?” Maison asks suddenly, his voice rough and quiet. “Sir?”

Something stutters inside of me. He doesn’t sound angry. Nor is he forcing an act of anger with glares and growls. He’s just looking at me with big eyes, honestly asking—am I the Hunter that can take the weight of the world off his shoulders right now or am I just an acquaintance attending dinner at his house?

“I’d like to be. I know it’s not in the rules we made, but in my own head, I belong to the two of you all the time.”

Maison sucks in a breath, shaking his head. “Just him. You’re just—you’re his . Not mine.”

The words hurt, but I don’t let it show.

“Just because you don’t want me doesn’t mean I’m not yours, Maison. Both of yours. Whether you’ll have me or not, that’s up to you. Whether you can turn it on and off depending on location, that’s up to you too.” I give him a long look before turning it on Nolan. “I never stop thinking about the two of you. I never stop worrying and planning and reminiscing. I never stop being your sir. I meant it when I said you could call anytime. Text anytime. Hell, come over anytime.”

“We didn’t ask you for any of that,” Maison whispers.

“You didn’t have to.” I step back from them, needing space to breathe. They’re going to break my heart. This is going to hurt so fucking badly. Why can’t I get myself to stop? Where the fuck is my self-preservation? “Cards on the table, boys. I’ll take whatever scraps you give me, but I’m all in. I’ve been all in. I’m yours.”

Maison heaves himself off the counter, shaking his head. “You can’t—you can’t just fucking say things like that.”

“Why not?”

“Because you—because we—” He looks at Nolan, something wild in his eyes. Nolan looks back with wide eyes and a perplexed shake of his head. Maison laughs roughly, bringing a hand up to his face before swiping it down. “You can’t say things like that.”

“Okay.” I give them both a smile. The one I use when I praise them. The one that makes Nolan melt and Maison shiver every goddamn time. Nolan exhales shakily. Maison takes a step back like he can escape what I do to him. He’s starting to lose that battle, I think. I wonder how much longer until he finally stops fighting.

I think he’s going to run.

Nolan distracts him by saying, “We were about to make Maison’s mom’s pie. Apple pie. Do you want to help, sir?”

My heart aches as my gaze immediately goes to Maison. He’s looking down, but he must sense my attention on him because he looks through his lashes at me.

“I don’t want to intrude,” I say carefully, putting the ball in his court.

He releases a shaky breath.

Then, “How are you at peeling apples?”

As I step up to the counter to settle between the two of them, it feels like there’s a monumental shift, like the world reshapes itself around us. It’s one of Maison’s walls crumbling. It’s one step closer to something more. It’s a road opening up to a happy ending.

It’s terrifying and exhilarating. It’s being handed a bomb and being told as long as you don’t breathe, it won’t go off.

Hope is a dangerous, dangerous thing, and I’m suddenly flooded with it. I don’t care that it’s stupid. I don’t care that it’s almost a sure way for me to get my heart broken.

I don’t care because giving up on the idea of us together, three pieces slotting perfectly, would be worse than anything else.

The dinner is even more chaotic than my arrival. I don’t know how many of them actually live here, but the dining table easily fits all of us with room for a few more. I try not to notice the fact that there aren’t chairs at the head and foot of the table. It’s probably meaningless, anyway. It does make me wonder whose house this technically is, though. It makes me wonder, not for the first time today, which of these men live here apart from Nolan and Maison. It also makes me wonder why so many grown men are living in a house together in the first place, when none of them seem to be college students or anything.

I force myself to stop wondering. It’s not my place. Even if most of the wondering seems to be connected to Maison and Nolan. They’ve made it clear where the boundaries are and their lives outside of our dynamic are off-limits. Just because they’ve been giving me little pieces lately doesn’t mean I can get greedy.

I’m thankful I at least get to be here, to see the bright look on Nolan’s face as everyone rains praise down on him throughout the meal, to hear Maison’s deep laughter when his friends draw it out of him.

Sure, there’s some tension. Some blank spaces that leave me sitting in awkward, confused silence as they all whirl around me. There’s a man who arrived last minute, no one introducing him to me, who seems to find me fascinating, if how often I find him watching me is any indication. There are inside jokes I don’t understand and pointed looks that make it clear I’m missing details and—in one instance—a sharp kick to someone else’s shin before they can finish the sentence that started with, “Considering that last Thanksgiving we were—” in response to the man with the half-bun, who I now know is named Bryce – the emergency contact from their kink packets, which means he knows who I am to them, which means he's suddenly ten times more terrifying – saying, “This is the best Thanksgiving I can remember.”

There are also a few moments that are Nolan and Maison specific that have me reminding myself repeatedly that it’s not my place to worry or wonder or ask questions, even if they have all of the alarms going off in my mind. It only gets harder as the night continues.

Why would Nolan cower when he turns to find himself face-to-face with Travis? Why would Maison flinch away from Jake’s reaching hand? Why does Carter huff a mean sort of laugh when Maison says to him, “I’m thankful you’re okay,” when everyone else is tossing out louder reasons to be thankful.

Why do Maison, Nolan, Carter, and Travis all tense when Casey’s father asks about the recipe for the apple pie?

Why does everyone go quiet when Keats stops Maison from following everyone into the living room for the next football game and asks, “Can we talk?”

Why does Nolan look worried? Why does Maison suddenly look like someone I don’t even recognize, his whole persona shifting before he follows the man?

And the biggest question of all— Why does this house, his home, full of his family and friends, seem to be a place where the weight of his world is the heaviest?

And the only one I have any sort of control in having an answer for— How soon can I take him home?