Page 29 of Beautiful When He Breaks

“Twice,” Thorn says from where he’s half folded into the loveseat like a grumpy slab of muscle.

“It happened twice,” Killian confirms. “Case fucking closed.”

There’s a round of muttering and half-hearted insults, but nobody argues the actual point. That does something warm and strange to me all over again. Nobody here is treating my daughter like an inconvenience, they’re already adjusting the house around her. Already making room.

“She’s the size of a loaf of bread,” Thorn points out.

“She will not remain the size of a loaf of bread,” Killian counters.

Roman throws up both hands. “Bro, I don’t even know what childproofing means.”

“It means you’re about to learn,” Ryan says mildly.

Liam leans back on the sofa opposite us, grinning now despite the seriousness. “Honestly, I’d pay to watch Roman try to install outlet covers.”

“Fuck you.”

“Get in line,” Nate says.

Sage, sitting beside Luca with his knees tucked up and his eyes fixed on the baby, tilts his head a little and says, “Okay, but maybe Eli should actually name his child now so we can stop calling her ‘the baby.’”

A laugh moves through the room, low and tired and genuine. I open my mouth to deflect, because I honestly hadn’t planned to do this here, in front of everyone, under the glow of the stupid expensive chandelier, while Ryan’s sock is somehow still under the coffee table from last week.

But the second Sage says it, I realize the answer is already there. It’s been sitting in my chest all day, waiting for me to stop acting like choosing it would somehow be premature just because the paperwork lagged behind what I already felt.

My daughter squirms once in my arms, turning her face toward me, and I look down at her before I say it.

“Mila,” I answer.

The room goes still in a different way this time, as if everybody instinctually understands that some moments deserve a little reverence no matter how foul-mouthed the people in them are.

“Mila,” Sage repeats softly. “That’s perfect.”

Roman nods once. “Yeah, that’s a good name.”

Ryan immediately says, “¡Ya era hora carajo! We can finally stop saying ‘the baby’ like she crawled out of a horror movie.”

Killian gives him a look. “Congratulations on finding the worst possible sentence.”

But I barely hear any of them, because when I look up, Julian is already looking at me. I knew he would be.

He’s standing near the doorway with one shoulder against the wall, arms folded loosely, but everything about him has gone still. His hazel eyes are fixed on me in a way that makes the room around us blur.

I know why he’s looking at me that way, and why Mila’s name matters so much.

After the meeting breaks up, people drift off in loose clusters, still talking logistics. I stay in the living room longer than I mean to, mostly because Mila falls asleep halfway through a bottle, and I don’t have the heart to move her right away. Eventually, she stirs, fussing just enough to tell me she’s almost ready for a diaper change, so I stand and head for the stairs.

Before I can leave, Julian steps out of the kitchen and crosses toward me. “Need help?” he asks.

The answer is obviously yes, but I still hesitate for half a second because something about him tonight feels too close to my skin.

“Yeah,” I say finally, because pretending otherwise would be stupid.

He follows me upstairs to my room, and once the door shuts behind us, he’s already reaching for Mila before I can do anything else.

“Let me take her,” he says. “Your shoulders are trying to merge with your ears.”

That startles a laugh out of me. “That bad?”