The puzzle arrived in a plain cardboard box.

Lucien had chosen it because the picture showed a forest, not a person. Two hundred pieces, large enough for unsteady fingers, with a black wolf standing beneath a bright moon.

He placed it on the living-room rug and waited.

Eli approached cautiously, clutching his sketchbook.

“Would you like to try?” Lucien asked.

Eli studied the picture on the lid. Then he sat at the edge of the rug.

Lucien sat across from him, leaving a generous distance.

For twenty minutes they worked without speaking. Eli turned each piece slowly, comparing colors and edges. Sometimes he held a piece for several minutes before placing it.

Lucien never hurried him.

Ronan appeared with coffee.

“What are you doing?”

Lucien held up a piece. “A puzzle.”

“I can see that.”

“Then why ask?”

Ronan grunted. He looked at Eli, who had gone still at the sound of his voice.

“Mind if I sit?” he asked.

Eli glanced at Lucien, then nodded.

Ronan lowered himself onto the rug with the awkward care of a man trying not to frighten a bird. His knees cracked audibly.

Lucien hid a smile.

Ronan picked up a piece and immediately put it in the wrong place.

Eli stared at it.

“What?” Ronan asked softly.

Eli pointed to the picture on the box, then to the piece.

Ronan compared them. “Oh. Right. That's sky, not water.”

He moved it.

Eli's mouth twitched.

Ronan pretended not to notice.

Cassian entered next, carrying a stack of documents.

“Adrian wants the northern border reports before—”

He stopped.

Two decorated generals and one of the Dominion's most respected military physicians were sitting cross-legged on the floor, arguing quietly about a cardboard moon.

Cassian stared.

Ronan looked up. “You going to help or just stand there looking expensive?”

Cassian set the reports aside. “I refuse to lose a contest of spatial reasoning to you.”

He sat down.

Eli watched him carefully.

Cassian chose a piece and offered it across the rug. “Would you like this one?”

Eli took it.

Their fingers did not touch.

Cassian's eyes flickered toward Eli's neck, then away. He had kept his promise. He hadn't approached the collar again.

Eli fitted the piece into place.

“Excellent,” Cassian said.

Eli ducked his head, but his shoulders remained relaxed.

Silas arrived without a sound. He took one look at the scene and settled beside the fireplace.

Ronan pointed at him. “No. You don't get to sit there looking mysterious. Come suffer with us.”

Silas glanced at Eli.

Eli patted the rug beside him.

Everyone froze.

Silas crossed the room slowly and sat where Eli had indicated.

Ronan looked personally betrayed.

“Unbelievable,” he muttered.

Eli covered his mouth with one hand.

A small, unmistakable laugh escaped.

It lasted less than a second.

The entire room fell silent.

Eli stiffened, immediately afraid he'd done something wrong.

Lucien calmly picked up another piece. “I think this belongs near the trees.”

Ronan cleared his throat. “Looks like a cloud to me.”

“It's green,” Cassian said.

“Clouds can be green.”

“Not healthy ones.”

Eli looked from one man to the other. Then he laughed again, a fragile breath of amusement.

This time nobody stared.

Adrian arrived ten minutes later.

He stopped at the doorway, taking in the abandoned reports, the scattered puzzle pieces, and five people on the floor.

“Is there a reason the northern border assessment is being delayed?”

Ronan raised a puzzle piece. “National security.”

Cassian snorted.

Adrian's mouth twitched. He loosened his tie, removed his jacket, and sat down beside the rug.

Eli watched with wide eyes.

The supreme commander of the Northern Dominion had sat on the floor to look for the missing corner of a cardboard forest.

“May I help?” Adrian asked him.

Eli hesitated, then pushed the box toward him.

Adrian accepted it as though he'd been handed a royal commission.

For the next hour, nobody mentioned the empire.

Ronan complained that Cassian was cheating by sorting pieces by shape. Cassian argued that Ronan was cheating by trying to force pieces together. Silas silently completed an entire section while they bickered.

Lucien watched Eli more than the puzzle.

The Omega was still wary of sudden movements. He still glanced at the exits whenever someone stood. But each time, he returned his attention to the picture.

He was staying.

When they finished the border of the puzzle, Eli leaned forward and placed the final corner piece himself.

Ronan lifted both hands in triumph. “We did it!”

Eli flinched at the volume.

Ronan immediately lowered his hands. “Sorry. Quiet victory.”

He held up one finger instead.

Eli looked at it, puzzled.

“A celebration,” Ronan whispered. “Very discreet.”

Eli raised one finger too.

Ronan's grin was so enormous that Cassian turned away to hide his own.

The following morning, Adrian found a completed corner of the puzzle waiting on his desk. Eli had carried it there himself, balanced carefully on a piece of cardboard. Beside it was a drawing of six small figures sitting beneath a moon. Adrian recognized the broad shoulders of Ronan and the unmistakably straight posture of Cassian. The smallest figure had silver hair. He placed the drawing inside the top drawer of his desk, where he kept the documents he could never afford to lose. Then he canceled an unnecessary meeting and went to breakfast.

At dinner, Eli sat on a cushion near the table instead of beside the wall. He ate half a bowl of soup and a piece of bread without hiding either.

No one commented.

After the others left, Lucien found Eli studying the empty puzzle box. The Omega traced the picture of the moon, then looked toward the hall where the generals had disappeared. Lucien offered him a choice between putting the pieces away and leaving the puzzle out for tomorrow. Eli chose tomorrow. It was a small decision, hardly worth mentioning to anyone else. To Lucien, it felt like the first brick in a house Eli was building for himself.

Later, Cassian found a small arrangement on the library windowsill: five objects placed in a careful row.

A black feather Silas had found in the garden. A wooden wolf Ronan had carved. A smooth stone from Adrian's desk. A pencil from Lucien's medical office. And Cassian's handwritten apology.

He stood looking at them for a long time.

Eli appeared in the doorway.

Cassian stepped back at once. “I wasn't going to touch anything.”

Eli approached the windowsill. He checked each object, then looked at Cassian.

For a moment he seemed to struggle with a decision.

Finally he picked up the note and held it against his chest.

Cassian's throat tightened.

“You can keep it,” he said.

Eli nodded.

Then he reached out and took Cassian's hand.

Only briefly. Only two fingers around his thumb.

But Cassian felt the contact all the way to his heart.

That night, Eli arranged the five objects beside his blanket nest. He looked toward the unused bed, then at the soft wool beneath him.

He still wasn't ready for the mattress.

But he was no longer sleeping in the bathroom.

Outside his door, five powerful wolves were learning that trust could not be commanded, purchased, or won in battle.

It had to be offered room to grow.

Eli tucked the apology beneath his pillow and closed his eyes.

For once, he wasn't counting the hours until morning.