HOME!!?

Bo's tears were still fresh on his cheeks, clinging to his skin like grief refusing to let go. Though the sobs had stopped, the weight of his sorrow lingered like a soaked coat draped over his soul. Heavy. Cold. Inescapable.

His breathing slowed, but every inhale still trembled through his body like broken glass being swept off tile. The mansion, no matter how beautiful, felt less like a dream and more like a trap gilded, soft, too perfect to be trusted. A place where even the warmth carried warning.

And Elio saw it.

She saw the slope of his shoulders folding inward, the bruised red around his eyes, the hollowness behind his gaze. He wasn't just mourning love. He was mourning himself.

He wouldn't let go of the past.

So Elio, desperate for something to shift, changed her tactic. She moved closer, a glimmer of silk and shadows, her steps that same hypnotic rhythm she used to tear kingdoms down. She placed a hand beneath his chin, coaxed his gaze upward.

"You're torturing yourself," she said, voice velvet and smoke. "You keep holding onto the knife even after it's buried deep. Why?"

He blinked at her, lost.

She leaned in, lips nearly brushing his. "The best way to get over someone... is to get under someone else."

It was a final attempt to flip the script. To drag him into the old cycle the one where pleasure dulled pain, if only for a while.

Her fingers grazed his thigh, and the others followed her lead.

They came like waves.

Alani was the first, her presence soft as mist, her touch barely there on his shoulder. Her hunger had long since faded into something else a craving not for flesh, but for feeling. She leaned in close, aching to stir something real in him, something raw. But as her fingers brushed him, she only felt the tremble of his exhaustion, the quiet thunder of his heart fighting to stay whole.

Tiara followed, silk in motion. Her fingers danced up his arm, her charm flowing like honey but Bo didn't melt. Her centuries of practiced seduction met a man whose wounds were too deep to be lured with pleasure. His silence stripped her mask away, revealing the girl she once was underneath. Each refusal from Bo forced her to remember the dignity she'd buried long ago.

Then came Sanaa wild, untamed, all heat and blaze. Her breath burned against his neck, her eyes glowing with passion and power. But when she inhaled his grief the scent of salt and pain it cooled her fire. He didn't rage like most men did. His fight was quiet. Deep. Focused. His silence wasn't surrender; it was rebellion against despair itself. And somehow, that made her back away with respect, not defeat.

Noelani touched him last. Her hands were unsure, no longer confident in their seduction. She wasn't hungry anymore. She was listening. Bo's sadness mirrored something buried inside her the desperate hope for peace, for rest. She closed her eyes as if by touching him, she might remember how to want something pure.

Even Amaya, who stood apart with her arms crossed, felt it. Her power was in patience, in the waiting. And in the stillness, she saw it unfolding. Bo's resistance wasn't defiance. It was preservation. He wasn't afraid of desire. He was afraid of forgetting himself in it. That made him dangerous. That made him sacred.

They had surrounded him, one after the other, pulling at his soul like tides wearing down a cliff. A man made of cracks and callouses, of grief held together by resolve.

And still, he stood.

Chest heaving, fists clenched at his sides, sweat beading at his brow not from pleasure, but from restraint. From holding the line. From choosing, again and again, to stay true to himself when the entire world was willing to devour him.

Leilani, quiet, had watched it all.

And now she stepped forward not as a temptress, not as a succubus, but as a witness. Her lips parted, her voice caught in her throat. Because she didn't see a man anymore.

She saw defiance carved into flesh and soul.

A storm that would not break.

His pain didn't beg to be comforted. It demanded to be understood.

And in his restraint his refusal to surrender even as every force worked to unmake him she saw something she had never known.

Not power. Not seduction.

Purpose.

And it humbled her.

When Bo finally pulled back from Elio's touch when he said, "Please... don't," with a voice like cracked stone it shattered the illusion completely.

"I'm not a hole to be filled," he said, looking at her, tears drying into resolve. "I'm not a craving. I'm not ready."

The silence that followed wasn't awkward.

It was sacred.

The women stilled. The hunger dissolved. The mansion seemed to hold its breath.

Then-Leilani moved.

She stepped forward, calm and sure. Her eyes flicked to Elio... then to Bo.

And she raised her hand.

"I vote he undergo the Trial."

Gasps rippled through the space. Not dramatic but sharp. Felt.

Even Elio turned with a jolt, like someone had struck her.

"Leilani," she whispered, a warning laced in disbelief.

But Leilani stood her ground. "He wants peace," she said. "He wants freedom from pain. So do we. And if anyone has a chance of lasting the Trial... it's him. Because he's not running from us he's running from what's broken inside."

Elio blinked, caught between rage and sorrow.

Then Tiara stepped forward.

"I vote yes too," she said. "Not because he's strong, but because he's tired of pretending to be."

Sanaa lifted her hand next, no hesitation. "He won't play our games. That means he might be the one who breaks them."

Alani raised hers. "He's not here to win. He's here to survive. That's enough for me."

Noelani's voice was small, but steady. "I vote yes... because he reminds me what it's like to hope."

And finally, Amaya.

She didn't speak. She just lifted her hand, her eyes locked on Bo.

Elio stared at them all, breathing hard. Her chest rose with something caught between panic and heartbreak.

Then she turned to Bo.

And the fear in her eyes wasn't for what he might do.

It was for what he might become.

She stepped toward him slowly, lowering herself until they were eye to eye. She reached out hesitantly and brushed the back of his hand with her fingertips.

"You don't have to say yes," she said, her voice no longer teasing, no longer wrapped in silk. "But if you do... everything changes."

Bo stood at the edge of something—he didn't know what. The idea of a "Trial" hung in the air like a challenge wrapped in mystery, and all he had were scraps of understanding and a heart still aching from loss.

His eyes bounced from one woman to the next, each of them seemingly waiting for him to speak, to accept or reject something he didn't even understand.

Sensing the pressure swelling in his chest, Sanaa stepped forward.

She didn't move like someone trying to seduce anymore. She moved like a soldier stepping into truth.

"Before you decide," she said, voice steady, sharp-edged but not unkind, "you should know what the Trial really is."

"On the surface it's one month vow not to have sex with any of us...."

"Lielani but we must live with you!" The rest of the women nod in tandem of agreement.

Bo looked at them, uncertain, guarded.

She met his gaze without flinching. "It's not just about keeping your hands to yourself. It's not just about denying temptation. The Trial is a test of the soul. Of restraint. Of will."

She took another step, her arms crossed now, body squared with his.

"We're not like anything you know. We were cursed long before you arrived. Bound to desire. To hunger. We feed on the energy of longing, of want… and we've learned to live on the edge of that craving. But it's never enough. Not really."

Bo didn't interrupt. He couldn't.

Sanaa continued, eyes locked on his. "The Trial is simple in design, but brutal in execution. For thirty days, we will be linked to you, And we will not stop being who we are. We'll crave. We'll pull. We'll test you. Not to destroy you—but to find out what's left when everything inside you screams yes… and you still say no."

Her voice softened just slightly, but her eyes remained fierce.

"If you make it to the end, you don't just win a wish. You win clarity. Power. Peace."

She paused, then added, "That's why we want to know if you're strong enough, Bo. Because you're the first in a long time who didn't try to own us. You just… resisted."

The room was quiet again. But this time, the silence didn't choke.

It listened.

Then came Noelani.

She stepped forward slowly, delicate as moonlight, and reached for his hand—not to pull him, not to tempt—but just to hold it.

Her fingers were cool and calming.

"You don't have to be perfect," she whispered. "You don't even have to be sure. Just honest."

Bo's throat tightened.

"You're allowed to want peace, Bo," she said, her voice like water over stone. "We all do."

She gave his hand a light squeeze. "And if you decide to stay… you won't be alone in it. Not really."

There it was.

The truth.

And the grace to walk toward it.

Now, it was up to him.

Bo stood still, his arms loosely at his sides, fingers twitching like they were still trying to hold onto something that had already slipped through. His mind was a maze no start, no exit. Just endless turns, dark corners, and the soft, maddening echo of everything he had just lost.

He wasn't crying anymore. That part of him had dried up. He was past the storm. Now came the stillness the part where everything was wrecked and quiet, and all you could do was stare at the damage.

A trial.

A month.

No sex.

Two wishes.

It sounded like the plot to some cruel joke or a fairy tale rewritten by someone with a twisted sense of humor. But no one was laughing. Not the women. Not Bo.

Certainly not the part of him still grieving the reality that he no longer had a place to call home.

He looked at each of them-these women, these creatures of surreal beauty and silent power and for the first time, they weren't trying to seduce him. They weren't reaching out, pulling him in. They were simply waiting.

Like the universe itself had taken a breath and was watching him hold it.

Bo's thoughts churned behind his tired eyes.

Why a month?

Why no sex?

Why not just ask me to do something impossible instead?

Because this-this-didn't feel impossible. Not yet. Just confusing. Unnatural.

But what did he know of nature anymore? He walked into a tent behind two dumpsters. Now he stood in a mansion lined with velvet and moonlight. The floor gleamed beneath his feet. The air smelled of orchids and fire. The ceiling rose so high it felt like sky.

And somewhere in all this, there was the promise of magic. Of wishes.

Bo didn't believe in much these days. But even the cynical parts of him the parts held together by stubbornness and the remains of a broken heart couldn't deny this wasn't normal. This place breathed. It shimmered when no one moved. It pulsed, like it felt him. Like it was alive.

And yet, for all its wonder, he still didn't understand why. Why this was the price. Why his body was the battleground.

His ex hadn't just broken up with him-she'd shattered him. He caught her cheating, lost his job, and his apartment within the same spiraling week. Now his car was the closest thing he had to a roof. And even that was losing warmth, fading into bitter nights filled with cheap blankets and colder thoughts.

So yeah... a mansion, even if it was hidden in the folds of an enchanted tent behind a dumpster, sounded better than the street. Better than the backseat where he'd cried himself to sleep. Better than gas station coffee and lies to himself that tomorrow might be better.

His pride wanted to resist. It wanted to ask more questions. Demand more answers.

But his reality?

It whispered that this was the best deal he was going to get.

Bo clenched his jaw, the weight of everything pressing against him like gravity doubling down. The silence grew louder. He could feel their eyes on him like the entire house waited to exhale.

And finally, he spoke.

His voice didn't thunder. It didn't rise with defiance or flair.

It barely rose at all.

"...Fine."

Seven heads tilted, eyes sharpening.

He cleared his throat, steadier this time. "I'll do it. One month. No touching. You keep your hands to yourselves, I keep mine to myself... and I get my two wishes."

His gaze landed on Elio last.

"Deal."

There was no applause. No triumphant music. No magic swirling through the air.

Just stillness.

A heavy, knowing stillness.

And Elio, no longer draped in her usual armor of seduction, nodded once. Slow. Almost reluctant. Her dark eyes held something new now-not desire.

But worry.

Admiration.

And maybe even guilt.

"So be it," she whispered.

And with those three simple words, the trial began.