CHAPTER 432: CHAPTER 432: YOU DID NOT STOP AT ONE

The morning sun had fully claimed the nursery by the time Lucas finished changing Sebastian for the third time. He’d mastered the art of balance, holding a squirming four-month-old in one arm while adjusting his own robe with the other, trying not to wince every time he moved his legs.

Every. Single. Time.

"Are you proud of yourself?" he asked aloud, without looking behind him.

There was a pause.

Then, from the doorway, entirely unrepentant:

"Immensely."

Trevor leaned against the frame, arms crossed over his bare chest like sin incarnate. There was a towel slung over one shoulder, he hadn’t even bothered to fully dress, and a self-satisfied smile curled at the corner of his mouth that made Lucas want to throw something. Preferably soft. Or heavy.

Lucas turned, very slowly, and shifted Sebastian to his other hip with a grimace that could have written war treaties.

Trevor’s smile widened.

"I am never letting you near me without a calendar and an approved cooldown period again," Lucas said flatly.

"You said you wanted me," Trevor replied innocently. "Multiple times, if I recall."

"I also said ’don’t be careful,’ not ’break me like you’re trying to win a championship.’

"

Lucas narrowed his eyes. "You absolute golden retriever of a war criminal."

Sebastian let out a delighted gurgle, kicking his feet, blissfully unaware of the fact that his father could not sit down without considering structural support first.

Lucas sighed and pressed a kiss to the baby’s cheek, letting the infant’s happy babble distract him from the ache in his lower back. "At least one of you is still soft and innocent."

"Debatable," Trevor muttered, stepping inside with all the arrogance of a man who had been enthusiastically welcomed into bed twice more after round one.

Lucas turned just enough to eye him without moving his spine. "You’re not funny."

"I wasn’t trying to be. I’m just very pleased with my life choices."

Trevor stepped closer, brushing a hand down Lucas’s arm before letting it rest against the baby’s back. "You smell like me."

Lucas deadpanned, "And a medicinal balm for strained muscles. Don’t think I didn’t notice you added it to the nightstand."

"That was planning ahead. I’m a strategist."

"You’re a menace."

"And you kept asking for more."

Lucas looked like he was about to reply, then closed his mouth, shook his head once, and muttered, "I’m going to sit down and drink my tea like a person who still has dignity."

He marched, or better said, limped, to the armchair in the corner and sank into it with a hiss.

Trevor, not helping at all, crouched beside him and nuzzled the baby first, then Lucas’s shoulder. "You’re radiant when wrecked."

Lucas made a strangled noise. "We have a child now."

"I noticed," Trevor said, brushing his knuckles down Sebastian’s tiny back. "He clapped when I walked in. I think he approves."

"He clapped because he’s four months old and has no idea what shame is yet."

Trevor leaned in again, his voice a low murmur. "And you’ll remind me when he’s older that I need to behave. But right now? You’re glowing. And I want to memorize that."

Trevor had just stolen another kiss, this one gentler, pressed low beneath Lucas’s jaw, when the door creaked open with the kind of reverent caution that only one man in the household ever truly managed.

Windstone.

The butler appeared, stately and unhurried, as if his presence in the nursery was part of some long-established diplomatic agreement. He took in the scene, Lucas curled in the armchair with Sebastian, Trevor crouched at his side with the unmistakable aura of someone smug and recently victorious, and only raised a single brow.

Lucas stared at him. "If you say ’good morning’ with judgment in your tone, I will throw this child’s sock at you."

Windstone’s lips twitched. "Perish the thought, my lord. I merely came to inform you that Their Majesties have arrived."

Lucas blinked. "Their... wait. Dax and Chris are here?"

"They are downstairs," Windstone confirmed. "His Majesty King Dax was already asking after the morning pastries. His Consort suggested you be warned in advance. His exact words were: ’We don’t want Lucas to fall down the stairs again trying to flee."

Lucas closed his eyes briefly. "That was one time."

Trevor coughed suspiciously into his hand. "You broke a vase trying to avoid Chris’s baby shower invitations."

"They were color-coded," Lucas hissed.

"They were organized," Windstone corrected serenely, "by social rank, region, and number of times the guest has been publicly slapped at a gala."

Sebastian made a happy, gurgling noise that might’ve sounded like agreement if one was very tired and already emotionally compromised.

Lucas sighed and kissed the baby’s head. "We can’t keep them waiting."

Trevor stood slowly, stretching with a deep, satisfying groan that Lucas deliberately did not look at.

"I’ll dress," Lucas said, not moving.

Trevor glanced down at him with fond exasperation. "You say that like you’re capable of moving."

"...Shut up."

Trevor took the baby from his arms without another word, one hand sliding around Sebastian’s back as he settled him easily against his chest. The baby gurgled again, pleased with this development.

Lucas, now deprived of the baby and his last excuse for sitting still, glared up at both of them. "You’re in a conspiracy."

"Only a minor one," Trevor said. "The goal is getting you dressed without you breaking a rib from dramatic sighing."

Windstone cleared his throat delicately. "Shall I delay their Majesties by bringing them breakfast first?"

"Yes," Lucas and Trevor said in unison.

Windstone bowed with the weight of a man who had already dealt with Dax before coffee. "Very good. I shall begin tactical diversion measures at once."

He turned and exited without another sound.

Trevor grinned. "He’s terrifying."

"And irreplaceable," Lucas muttered, hauling himself to his feet with a barely concealed wince.

Trevor stepped closer, hand brushing his waist. "You okay?"

Lucas leveled him with a dry look. "I’ll survive. And then I’ll make you pay for every single step I have to take today."

Trevor bent and kissed the corner of his mouth. "Looking forward to it."

Lucas paused. Then muttered under his breath, "You really are."