Chapter 73: After the Bond

Astrid

I woke slowly, aware of warmth before I was aware of anything else, warmth pressed against me on either side, familiar in a way it hadn’t been before. I opened my eyes and found Reed and Xander beside me, both still asleep, both shirtless from the night before.

For a brief second, embarrassment flickered through me, memories of the previous night rising fast. I braced myself for the old panic, that familiar feeling of having made some terrible mistake.

It didn’t come.

Instead there was something entirely different settling over me. Peace, quiet and unfamiliar. I studied them both in the early light, Reed’s expression relaxed in sleep in a way I’d never seen from him awake, all his usual careful control smoothed away. Xander lay sprawled more carelessly beside him, nothing like the teasing prince everyone at the academy thought they knew.

I realized I could feel them even before either woke, their presence no longer something I simply saw or heard. It felt like warmth living beneath my own skin, a second sense I hadn’t had until now. I pressed a hand to my chest, confused by how different everything felt.

Reed woke first, his eyes finding mine immediately, something soft in his expression that I’d never seen him direct at me so openly before.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"Yes," I said, and meant it.

Xander woke soon after, ruining the quiet immediately with some teasing remark about how long I’d apparently been staring at them like a creep. I laughed, and then noticed something strange. When Reed reached for my hand, warmth spread through me. When Xander touched my shoulder a moment later, another pulse of warmth followed right behind it.

The bond had changed. Before, it had felt imposed on me, something forced into place without my consent. Now it felt like another sense entirely, something I could actually use. I could feel when they were close. I could almost read something of what they were feeling.

And the strangest part was that I didn’t want it to stop.

Xander announced they’d brought breakfast, and I was surprised I hadn’t even noticed either of them leaving the bed. Reed had made something simple, and Xander had clearly brought something he knew I’d actually enjoy, and we settled around the bed together with the food between us.

Their behavior felt unexpectedly domestic. Reed reminded me to eat properly. Xander stole something off my plate the second I looked away.

"That’s mine," I said.

"Consider it payment for room service," he said.

"You didn’t cook anything. Reed did."

They bickered over it while I watched, something warm settling in my chest. This didn’t feel forbidden or terrifying, didn’t feel like I was being dragged toward some destiny I hadn’t chosen.

It just felt like the three of us sharing breakfast. I caught myself smiling without meaning to.

Reed noticed me staring and asked what I was thinking. Xander immediately assumed I was embarrassed about breakfast, and I told him that wasn’t it.

"I like this," I finally said.

They both went quiet. I explained, haltingly, that I liked waking up with them, liked feeling them nearby, liked the warmth that hadn’t existed before last night.

"I think I want more of it," I added.

Reed’s expression softened immediately. Xander went unusually quiet, and I understood they both knew exactly what I meant. Not something purely physical. Something closer to wanting an actual life that included them.

Then I glanced at the time and my stomach dropped.

"We’re going to be late," I said, already scrambling for my clothes.

Neither of them moved.

"What?" I asked, suspicious.

"You’re not going," Reed said, calm as ever.

"Excuse me?"

"Good morning to you too," Xander said, grinning.

I demanded an explanation. Reed told me the bond was still settling, that I needed time to adjust properly.

"I have classes," I said.

"Already taken care of," Xander said.

"You did what?" I asked, looking between them.

Reed explained they’d already spoken with the academy and arranged for me to stay away for a few days. Irritation flared immediately, sharp and familiar. I didn’t like other people making decisions about my life without asking me first.

"You decided this without me?" I asked.

Reed caught the shift in my tone immediately. "We should have told you first."

That acknowledgment mattered, easing some of the irritation.

He explained further, that the first few days after a mating were significant, especially given how unusual our bond was, two alphas bonded to one person. They wanted to make sure I adjusted properly, and if I wanted to go back to classes anyway, they’d listen.

"So we’re stuck together," Xander said, entirely too pleased about it.

"You seem happy about that," I said.

"Very," he said.

I threw a pillow at him. He caught it easily, and Reed actually laughed, which made me laugh too, the whole mood settling into something warm and easy.

The rest of the morning gave me a chance to test whatever had shifted inside me. I sat with Reed while he read, and when Xander left the room briefly to grab something, I noticed the warmth I associated with him fading, thinning out like a signal losing strength.

I looked toward the door just as he walked back in, and the warmth returned instantly.

I froze. I could actually sense them.

I tested it carefully after that. Reed moved to the other side of the room, and I could still feel him clearly. Xander tried sneaking up behind me a few minutes later, and I turned before he’d gotten close enough to actually surprise me.

"How did you know?" he asked, impressed.

I didn’t know. I just had.

"Which one of us?" he asked, testing me further.

"Xander," I said.

"How?"

"I don’t know."

Reed suggested the bond might be giving me a heightened awareness of both of them. I turned the idea over in my head, and instead of feeling trapped by it, I found myself genuinely fascinated.

We spent the rest of the morning doing ordinary things, working briefly on the project, Xander distracting me constantly while Reed tried keeping us both focused. I noticed how easily I fit between them now, no longer forcing myself to stay close the way I had just days ago.

At one point I sat between them, Reed’s shoulder brushing mine, Xander’s arm resting behind me along the couch. The warmth returned, steady and familiar, and I closed my eyes for a moment, aware that I didn’t want to pull away from it.

Sitting there later, quieter, I looked down at my own hands. I remembered how desperately I’d once wanted the bond gone, how I’d begged them through a locked door to reject me, how terrified I’d been that choosing them meant losing myself entirely.

I looked at the two of them now, beside me, and understood something had changed.

Not just the bond.

Me.

I didn’t have an answer for what came next, what the academy would say, what happened once we returned to ordinary classes and ordinary lives. But for the first time since any of this started, I wasn’t searching for an exit.

What scared me most wasn’t that I’d become theirs.

It was how much I was beginning to want to be.