Three Fridays later, Raph drove into Meadowfall again. He’d been chatting with Wyatt through text, visiting him and Hazel on the weekends.

It was early June, and the days were growing longer. The sky was still a bright blue when he pulled into his parents’ curving driveway. By the time he stepped out of the car, his grandmother was at the front door, her wrinkled face brightening when she saw him.

His stomach turned. He hadn’t wanted to see her.

At eighty-four, Elizabeth Fleming was the matriarch of the Fleming family. She swept down the grand staircase in her shimmering gown and seventy rings, her white hair coiffed atop her head. Raph shut his car door, locked it, and tried to smile. It probably showed as a grimace.

“Raphael,” Grandma said, smiling down her pointed nose at him. She was short. But he always felt like he was ten years old again, in front of her. “How have you been?”

Not like he hadn’t just seen her at the office in Highton.

“Fine, thanks. What about you?” Raph strode up the driveway and stairs, to cut short the time he had to walk with her. The sooner he got to his parents, the better.

“Very well, thank you. Your supervisor has informed me of your excellent work,” Grandma said, her eyes gleaming, her painted lips wrinkled. Her rings glittered like a mummy’s cursed treasure. She held out her hand as he approached; Raph was forced to accept it, accompany her up the stairs so she didn’t fall. Her bony fingers dug into his palm.

All he could think about was the way she’d looked years ago, back when he’d kissed Wyatt in the piano room. She’d shrieked, and sworn at Wyatt, cursing him to hell and back. Raph had tried to step between them. It didn’t undo the years of hurt she’d laid into Wyatt, the whispers that Wyatt wasn’t good enough, that he was an embarrassment to the Fleming family.

Wyatt had fled. And Grandma had smiled like she’d intended it all along.

Raph swallowed the bile in his throat, walking her through the wide front doors. He’d thrown fits at her when he was younger. But his parents had pleaded for him to stop, and he’d backed down in his fury.

Grandma owned the mansion. When Raph’s biological mom had died of cancer, Dad and Raph had moved in with Grandma, riddled with debt. They hadn’t much say, back then. Raph had grown up learning to yield to Grandma’s word—one wrong move, and he and Dad would be homeless.

It had been stifling. When Dad married a second wife, Raph had perked up. He suddenly had two new siblings—Wyatt and Penny—people he could spend time with, aside from Grandma. Grandma had taken an immediate liking to Penny. Not so much with Wyatt. So Raph had liked Wyatt right away, in quiet rebellion against his Grandma.

“...told the gardener I wanted two rows of lavender by the driveway,” Grandma said. “The neighbors have mentioned how stunning it looks.”

Raph nodded. Had Mom and Dad saved enough to afford their own home? He didn’t know. And so he couldn’t risk getting them thrown out, by telling Grandma about him and Wyatt.

Would be nice to be out of debt, for once.

“You smell different,” Grandma said as they crossed the great hall, with its thick brocade rugs and ancient chaises. She narrowed her eyes, sniffing. Raph’s heart thudded. “That scent is... atrocious.”

And Raph knew she’d detected the traces of Wyatt’s scent, the magnolia that had stayed when he’d kissed Wyatt’s scent gland last week.

He shrugged, keeping his expression nonchalant. “I met someone new.”

“Oh?” Grandma fixed her gaze on him, piercing and judgmental. And Raph smiled like he did with the stubborn people he managed at work, hoping they’d remove themselves from his personal space. Grandma gripped his hand. “I hope it isn’t anyone unsavory, Raphael.”

“It’s someone very savory,” he said. And Wyatt was, too, with that impish smile of his when he’d kissed Raph goodbye at his apartment.

Grandma huffed, satisfied for now.

They stepped into the dining room, where Raph’s parents sat on one side of the sprawling dining table. Mom and Dad smiled. Raph breathed in deep. He was with his parents now. He didn’t have to answer to only Grandma.

On the opposite side of the table, Penny waved, grinning. She raised her eyebrows, shook her phone. The charity event. Raph winced; he hadn’t given her a reply yet.

“Raph,” Tanya Fleming said, standing. She had Wyatt’s blond hair, too—Raph had always noticed that. Tanya might not have been his biological mom, but after twenty-four years, Raph saw her as his own mother—different from his first mom, but no less important.

Tanya glanced warily at Grandma, then kissed Raph on the cheek. “Doing okay?”

“Fine,” he said, shrugging. Maybe in the future, he’d talk to her about Wyatt. Not right now, though. Not in front of Grandma.

With his other hand still in Grandma’s grip, Raph hugged his mom, breathing in her familiar chrysanthemum scent. It was nothing like Grandma’s sharp lemon scent, and Raph held on to his mom for a little longer, wishing he could ask what she thought about his brother. About their baby.

When they pulled away, Mom raised her eyebrows. “Have you seen W—”

“Briefly,” Raph said, his heart kicking. She’d have followed it up with You smell like him, and he didn’t need anyone else’s attention on that. “I’ve been busy with work. Have you heard about the ATM scandals in Highton? I’ve been working with my managers to reassure our clients. It doesn’t directly affect Alpha Associates, of course, but I just wanted you to know.”

Mom’s face lit up. And Grandma began to frown.

So Raph said, “My marketing team proposed a couple of promising campaigns, Grandma—it’ll help expand Alpha Associates into the Midwest. We could potentially see a twenty-percent growth in the region. I’ll pass along the details on Monday.”

Grandma cracked a smile, and Raph relaxed.

No one knew about Wyatt. After all these years, everyone no longer expected Wyatt to show up along with Raph. He wondered how long this assumption would last, whether Wyatt would want Raph around, when he introduced the new baby to their parents.

As he sat down to dinner, Wyatt’s absence felt like a void he couldn’t ignore.

Raph looked around the elaborate dining room—the floor-length curtains by the tall glass windows, the intricate table settings prepared for five, the chandelier hanging above them all, like a sword waiting to fall. The finery wasn’t important. And the people who were present—Mom, Dad, Penny, Grandma—they had grown used to Wyatt not being here.

Despite spending the last three weekends with Wyatt, Raph missed him. He always had, through the years. But that had been a slow, lingering burn. Now that he knew Wyatt’s laugh again, and now that Wyatt had pressed himself to Raph’s chest, all vulnerable and soft, Raph missed him like a phantom limb. Was this what having a bondmate felt like?

And maybe that bonding had been for real. Maybe he’d somehow fallen in love with Wyatt, and he hadn’t realized it until now.

“Hey, Dad,” Raph said. Part of him wanted to add, What does it feel like to be a dad? Because I’m going to be one. “I watched your interview on TV—you mentioned us.”

Stan Fleming brightened, a smile spreading across his weathered face. As the police chief, he frequently stopped on the streets to chat with the townsfolk, but he also led his teams with a steady hand. He’d been on TV maybe five times, now. To Raph, he was still Dad. “You watched the interview, son?”

“Yeah, Penny called and told me about it. You weren’t serious about the auditions, were you?”

Dad laughed sheepishly. “You know, I did sign you all up for an audition. I missed seeing you kids play.”

Raph froze. And glanced at Penny. She was staring at Dad, her mouth open. “An actual audition? You could’ve told us earlier, Dad!”

“I wanted it to be a surprise!” Chief Fleming said, chuckling. “I just figured... With all those children in the orphanages, you wouldn’t mind playing for them, would you?”

“Wyatt isn’t even here,” Penny said, frowning. “He’s busy, you know.”

Dad’s smile faded. He glanced around the table at the empty seats, wistful. And maybe Raph wasn’t the only one who missed his stepbrother. “I wish he were free in the evenings. Or even if he dropped off Hazel—that would be nice.”

“We’re doing very well here.” Grandma wrinkled her nose, disdain flashing through her eyes. “He can visit when he decides to.”

“I wish he hadn’t left when he was eighteen.” Mom sipped from her water glass, her shoulders sagging. “We’ve missed so many years with him. Hazel is such a dear—Wyatt said he had her by accident, didn’t he? You’d want to be careful, Penny, in case you’re just as fertile as he is.”

Penny blushed. And a ferocious heat surged through Raph’s chest. Wyatt had told his parents that Hazel was an accident? Because she wasn’t.

In the months after Wyatt left, Raph had searched for him through all of Meadowfall. Wyatt had been hiding away in the kitchens of small restaurants, washing dishes, and later prepping food as a line cook. Raph had tried to contact him. When he’d found out the news about Max, Raph had been too ashamed to face Wyatt as an alpha.

Max had told Wyatt that he was sick, that he needed to fuck an omega every night, or he’d get his balls twisted up. And Wyatt had listened, somehow. Then he’d discovered the pregnancy, and Max had taken all of Wyatt’s cash, and thrown Wyatt out his door.

And Wyatt’s parents acted like Hazel’s birth was some damn miracle.

Raph looked at the roast chicken on the table, the fluffy mashed potatoes. His appetite had vanished. Wyatt’s story wasn’t his to tell. He wasn’t going to mention it in front of Grandma; she didn’t have the right to gloat over Wyatt’s trauma.

He should correct his Mom and Dad, tell them the sort of shit Wyatt had been through. But Raph was the one who had driven him to that point; if he’d never kissed Wyatt, Grandma would never have found them. Raph was older. He should’ve known better. And yet... he hadn’t.

“Penny’s a right example of a proper omega,” Grandma said. Penny blushed more.

Raph stood, his stomach twisting, his pulse hammering in his ears. No such thing as proper or improper. Don’t you fucking dare judge Wy for that.

“Raph?” Mom asked.

Grandma looked at him shrewdly. Raph forced his lips into a smile; he was still paying the loans on his education. He owed Grandma so damn much, and he was tired of it. Tired of playing as her pawn.

“I just remembered I had some unfinished work,” he said, glancing at his phone. “Sorry. I’ll be back next week.”

“But the auditions,” Penny said.

Raph paused at the doorway, glancing between Penny, and Dad’s hopeful face. “Fine,” he said, relenting. “Pick a song.”

Then he left, and the night air had never felt so sweet on his face.