THANE POV
There were four chairs at the kitchen table.
Four.
There had always been four chairs, I counted them twice anyway, as if a fifth might appear if I stared hard enough.
It did not.
Which meant Perse had to sit in someone’s lap.
Tragic.
Unavoidable.
A true logistical nightmare.
She chose mine.
I did not breathe for three full seconds when she settled over my thighs, careful of her ribs, one hand braced on my shoulder as if I was furniture she trusted not to break beneath her. Furniture had never been so close to dying from gratitude.
Keres noticed.
He sat across from us with his chin in his hand and the expression of a man watching a personal injustice unfold in real time.
Aiden took the chair beside him. “Don’t even start.”
“There were ways around it.”
“There were f
