Page 26 of Knot Her Beta

“You’re not late,” Jared says, taking his coat. “Bread is still in the oven.”

“You should probably check the temp on that,” I call out as I add a fourth place setting. “Or you’ll be the one burning dinner.”

“Not my masterpiece!” Jared bolts past me into the kitchen.

Grady laughs as he moves to join me at the table, cane tapping a slow rhythm on the pine floor.

He peeks into the kitchen. “I thought that was Leif’s car parked outside.”

“Yeah, he decided to join us tonight.” I frown a little. “You didn’t know he was coming?”

Grady shakes his head, but doesn’t comment.

Does that mean Leif caught an earlier water taxi? Otherwise, the two men would have seen each other at the boat and could have carpooled here.

Jared appears in the doorway with the steaming loaf balanced on a wooden board. “Great news! My masterpiece survived.”

“Oh, that came out looking good,” Grady praises. “How did you convince Em to let you be the baker today?”

Jared waggles his eyebrows. “I’ll tell you later.”

Pink stains Grady’s cheeks while Leif coughs into his hand, and I throw a napkin at my young Alpha.

He laughs as he ducks and sets the bread in the middle of the table before disappearing back into the kitchen.

A moment later, he returns, carrying the Dutch oven, thick mitts protecting his hands.

“Hot,” he warns.

“I’ve got you.” Leif steps in beside Jared, lifting the lid while Jared settles the pot onto the trivet.

A cloud of fragrant steam billows upward, filling the dining room.

Grady draws a deep breath. “Your stew is always worth the trip from the island.”

“It better be,” I say, ladling stew into the waiting bowls. “I’ve been tending it since lunch.”

Leif slices the bread while Jared passes bowls around the table, the two of them falling into an easy rhythm, as though all those weeks of absence never happened, and a flutter rises, the bond reaching for its Omega. Leif pauses for a heartbeat, turning toward me, but I keep my head down as I fill the wine glasses from the bottle he brought.

Jared drops into the chair on my left, while Grady takes the one across from me, leaning his cane on the side of the table within easy reach.

Leif hesitates only a heartbeat before claiming the chair on my right, close enough that our elbows might brush, and the traitorous flutter comes again from behind my sternum.

“Bread?” Jared asks, holding out the cutting board with the loaf.

Grady reaches out to tear off the end. He juggles it between his fingers, steam rising from the center, before he dunks it into his stew.

Under the table, Leif’s knee bumps mine as he reaches for the bread next, and Jared’s feet tangle with mine.

I snatch up my wine glass and take a swallow, too big and too fast. It burns going down.

Jared tears off a hunk of bread, steam curling from the pale center before he drops it into his stew.

“So,” he says around his first bite, pointing his spoon toward Leif, “how’s life as Quinn’s favorite person?”

Leif snorts as he grabs the butter. “I’m not her favorite.”

“You absolutely are.”