Chapter 86: The Venue Hunt
The key clicked in the lock with a sound louder than the entire drive home. Aurora pushed the front door open, the warm, cinnamon-and-leather scent of home rushing over her, and her heart just about hammered its way out of her chest. She dropped her bag on the floor, not caring where it landed.
“Rhys?”
The living room was empty, the late afternoon sun painting long, lazy rectangles across the worn floorboards. From the back of the house, she heard the muffled, rhythmic thump of the dryer in the laundry room.
She followed the sound, her soft-soled shoes silent on the hardwood. He was there, his back to her, folding a pile of her sweaters into a neat stack on the washing machine. The sight of him, of his broad shoulders curved in a simple, domestic task, of his big hands gently smoothing the fabric, unlocked something in her. All the contained excitement from the garden, the buzzing certainty, the sheer joy, just… erupted.She didn’t walk. She took two running steps and launched herself at his back.
He caught her—of course he did—a sharp, surprised grunt leaving him as her arms wrapped around his neck, her legs locking around his waist. He staggered one step forward, bracing a hand on the machine, the other coming up automatically to secure her thighs.
“Whoa—”
“We found it!” she gasped into his shoulder, her voice muffled against the soft cotton of his t-shirt.“Rhys, we found it.It’s the one. It’s the place.”
His surprise melted into a low rumble of laughter that vibrated through her whole body. He turned, carefully, not to dislodge her, and leaned back against the washing machine, holding her up effortlessly. The warm, clean smell of dryer sheets and him enveloped her.“The bench,” he said, his cheek resting against the top of her head.
“The bench,” she confirmed, squeezing him tighter. “The moss, and the hydrangeas, and the light—you saw it, you felt it, right?”
“I felt you,” he murmured. His hand moved from her thigh to cradle the back of her head, fingers tangling in her hair. “In the pictures.You looked… settled. Like you’d just walked into a room you’d been searching for your whole life.”
Tears, hot and sudden, pressed against her closed eyelids. That was it exactly.She nodded against his chest, incapable of speech for a moment. The dryer clicked off, plunging the room into a sudden, profound quiet.He just held her. Let her cling. His breath was steady against her temple, his heartbeat a slow, reassuring drum under her ear.
After a long while, she loosened her stranglehold, sliding down his body until her feet touched the floor. She didn’t step back, just pressed her forehead into his chest, her hands fisting in his shirt.“Rina drove me insane all the way home. Played this awful pop playlist and sang at the top of her lungs.”
“Her bill just went up to two expensive beers,” Rhys said, his tone dry. He tilted her chin up with a knuckle.Her eyes were wet, her cheeks flushed.He wiped a thumb under her lashes. “Happy tears, little one?”
“Overflowing happy tears,” she corrected, her voice watery. She inhaled a shaky breath.“It’s real now.It has a… a location. A spot on a map.”
“It’s always been real,” he said softly. He leaned down and kissed her, not with deep passion, but with a profound, lingering certainty that sank into her bones. It tasted like home, and promise, and a future so close she could almost touch its sun-warmed stone.When he pulled back, he kept his forehead resting against hers. “Coordinator already called my phone. You were busy assaulting your alpha in the laundry room.”
Aurora giggled, the sound hiccuping out of her. “I did not assault.”
“Felt like a very welcome ambush.” He finally smiled properly, the crinkles at the corners of his eyes deepening.“We have a meeting Friday at ten.To sign things, talk dates.”
Friday. Three days.She nodded, swallowing the last of the emotion that clogged her throat. The practical next step made it even more solid.
He went back to folding, and she leaned against the doorframe, watching him. The simple normalcy of it—the hum of the house, the rustle of fabric, the way his brow furrowed slightly in concentration—grounded the soaring joy into something sustainable.This was their life. The wedding would be a beautiful, profound day, but it was a door. This, here, the laundry and the quiet, was the room on the other side.“Rina asked me something,” Aurora said, after a moment.“At the garden. She asked if it felt like Aurora and Rhys, or just Aurora in a pretty dress.”
Rhys paused, a pair of her socks in his hand. He didn’t look at her, but she saw the muscle in his jaw tighten minutely. “And?”
“And I realized the first place, the wisteria gazebo, was just a picture. A pretty Omega bride picture.” She pushed off the doorframe and walked to him, taking the socks from his hand and folding them herself, their fingers brushing.“The bench… the bench is an anchor.It’s for us. It’s where I come to you. Not where I just… appear.”
He was silent for a beat, watching her small, deliberate movements. Then his hand came up, his fingers circling her wrist, not tight, but firm.A claim.An acknowledgement. “Good.”
He pulled her in, not for a kiss, but to tuck her under his arm, her side pressed against his. He resumed folding with his free hand. She rested her head against his shoulder, folding the next towel he handed her.They finished the laundry in a comfortable silence, carrying the warm stacks to their bedroom. As they put clothes away in drawers still fragrant with cedar, the world outside their window darkened to indigo.
Later, curled on the couch with her head in his lap and a documentary murmuring on the TV she wasn’t watching, a different kind of warmth began to bloom low in her belly. It was a slow, unfurling thing, a deep-seated pulse that had nothing to do with wedding venues. It was the proximity of him, the weight of his hand resting on her hip, his thumb stroking absent circles through the fabric of her leggings.
She nuzzled into the hard muscle of his thigh, inhaling his scent. The bond mark on her neck throbbed softly, a phantom echo of the building heat between her legs.She’d read about this. The slow, pre-heat simmer that could last for days, a growing sensitivity, a hungry ache.Her first one.It was coming.His hand stilled. His breathing, which had been deep and even, hitched. He’d caught the shift in her scent, the subtle, sweetening note of ripe peach cutting through the cinnamon and clean cotton.
“Aurora?” His voice was a low, careful rumble.
“Mmm?” She kept her eyes closed, feigning sleepiness, but pressed her body more insistently against his hand.He didn’t move away. His thumb resumed its circling, a fraction firmer. “Nothing,” he said, after a charged moment.But his own scent deepened, warmed with a protective, alpha intensity that made her shiver. “Just checking.”
The documentary droned on.The clock ticked. And inside her, the future yawned open, vast and terrifying and glorious, marked not just by a stone bench in a secret glade, but by the gathering storm of her own awakening body, and the steady, waiting presence of the man who held her.