Ch. I Refuse to Be Your Luna 145 I Refuse to Be Your Luna 145

Chapter 145 Familiar

Lady Flourish’s POV

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The sales associate spotted Damian the second we crossed the threshold.

Finished

It never failed to amuse me, how fast a room recalibrated around him, not just the obvious wealth in the way he carried himself, but something underneath it, some low frequency only wolves picked up on, the kind of presence that made ordinary humans stand up a little straighter without knowing why.

“Good afternoon, sir, ma’am. Looking for a bed? If you can tell me the size you need, I’d be glad to walk you through our options.”

“The biggest one you carry,” Damian said, without a beat of hesitation. “Softest, too. Something built to actually sleep on.”

I nearly choked on nothing at all.

“Our largest standard size runs six feet,” she offered smoothly, well trained enough not to blink at the request. “If you’d like something custom, we can build up to eight feet.”

Damian turned to me, entirely serious. “Eight feet – that’s still small, isn’t it?”

I stared at him, genuinely lost. “I think eight feet is plenty.”

One person. Presumably one person sleeping in this bed. And he thinks eight feet barely counts as generous.

Then again, I thought, watching the easy, unbothered set of his shoulders, my wolf sitting up with sudden, pointed interest, maybe he wasn’t picturing just one person at all.

“Do you have anything already made up?” he asked.

The associate’s whole demeanor brightened, recognizing exactly the kind of customer worth chasing across three floors. “Right this

way, sir.”

She led us to a frame that, admittedly, was beautiful, pale, honey-toned wood with legs tucked so far beneath it the whole thing seemed to float.

“The headboard’s finished in full-grain leather, treated to resist scent absorption and shedding, which our pack clientele tend to appreciate.” A little smile. “And the mattress is the real centerpiece – hand-packed with certified highland wool, reinforced along every seam to hold up under, ah, more energetic use than a standard frame. We only produce eighty a year.”

Damian sat, testing it without ceremony, then glanced up at me. “Want to try it?”

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Finished

“I’ll pass,” I said, my voice coming out far steadier than I actually felt.

“We’ll take it,” he said, already pulling a black card from his wallet before I’d finished processing the number the associate quoted, a figure so large I made her repeat it twice, entirely certain I’d misheard.

I had not misheard.

Two point eight million, all told, frame and mattress together, with a silk bedding set thrown in like that made any of it reasonable. I wanted, very badly, to say something about that number.

I said nothing. It was his money. His house. His absurd, reinforced, custom-built bed, apparently built to withstand considerably more than sleep.

“Have it delivered within the month,” Damian told the associate. “No excuses.”

I didn’t ask why the timeline mattered so much. I had a fairly uncomfortable guess.

We were still bickering, quietly, about the sheer indulgence of it as we crossed toward the escalator to the second floor and that was exactly when I heard my own name.

“Phina, isn’t that Flourish?”

I froze mid-step. Selene’s voice was unmistakable even from a distance, pitched with the particular, gleeful sharpness she only used when she thought she’d stumbled onto something useful.

A few displays away, Selene had a death grip on the arm of a woman I recognized instantly. Phina, Rowan’s widow, soon to be Harold’s bride, here picking out furniture for a home that wasn’t mine to be curious about.

Phina’s brow furrowed, studying us from a distance with a faint, unplaceable frown. “That’s her, isn’t it. Who’s the man?”

Selene already had her phone up, snapping a photo before either of us noticed. “No idea. Some new sugar daddy, probably. Looks married, if you ask me, married men always have that exact walk.”

Finally, proof. Something to actually bring home to Dad.

“Don’t let the shoulders fool you, Phina,” Selene added, entirely too pleased with herself. “Backs lie. Wait till you see the front, he’s older than he looks, trust me.”

Phina didn’t answer right away. Something in her expression had gone strange, distant, her nose tipping very slightly upward the way a wolf does when a scent catches on air she can’t quite place.

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My own wolf pricked up at that, wary, some old instinct recognizing another wolf testing the wind for something familiar.

“Come on,” Selene said, already tugging her toward the bed displays. “You wanted to look at frames anyway.”

Phina let herself be pulled along, though she glanced back once more before rounding the corner and for just a moment, her expression looked far less like idle curiosity and considerably more like recognition she hadn’t quite finished placing yet.

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tRefuse To Be Your Luna

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