Lachlan's creature shifted.
It was small enough that most people would have missed it, but Sera had spent too much of her life watching for the moment someone decided to move.
His stance adjusted, one foot sliding back half a step as his knees unlocked and his weight redistributed. The muscles along his forearms tightened, then eased, like he had started to act on instinct and then caught himself before it turned into a mistake.
His attention stayed fixed on Psycho's hand under her shirt with a level of focus that made Sera's mouth twitch. Psycho was not gentle. Psycho never had been. But he was also not careless with what belonged to her, no matter what he pretended.
She didn't bother to speak. She simply lifted her gaze and held his eyes, steady and unblinking, letting the moment stretch until the tension in his shoulders tightened by a fraction.
The change in him was immediate and practiced, like a switch being flipped into a formal setting.
