Bound by the Mark of Lies (BL)

The croissants were gone. The gossip had been thoroughly dissected, dramatized, and weaponized. And now, with the distinct grace of people who’d overstayed just enough to prove affection without risking eviction, the entourage began to rise.

Alexandra kissed Arik’s forehead and warned him not to grow teeth until she returned. Irina gave Gabriel a careful smile and a little wave, still pink in the ears from the teasing. Max lingered longest; he always did, hovering near the door like he wanted to throw one more bomb of sarcasm, then sighed and saluted with the remains of his coffee.

"If I don’t survive the week," he said, half to Damian and half to Arik, "name your next child after me. Preferably something dignified. Like Maximus the Second."

"You’re not dying," Gabriel said dryly. "You’re being domesticated."

"Same thing," Max muttered, and disappeared with the flair of someone already late to a meeting he had no intention of attending.

The door shut behind them with the soft, automatic click of imperial wards reactivating.

And silence fell.

Gabriel exhaled, his body easing slowly into the cushions as if only now remembering how to rest. His tablet dimmed to standby beside him. Damian, still standing a few feet away with Arik against his chest, didn’t speak. He just... looked.

At Gabriel.

At the way his mate’s robe had slipped open at the collarbone, exposing the faintest trace of the mark on his nape.

At the sleep-laced shadows still under his eyes and the tenderness in the hand curled idly in his lap, the one that had stroked their child’s hair a hundred times without thinking.

"I missed this," Damian said softly.