"I shouldn't have opened my big mouth," Peter muttered to nobody in particular. Derek had been doing fine. He'd left the past behind and had settled down. He had a good job, a husband who loved him, and they had found a way to make their relationship work.

And then Peter had come along. He might have ruined it all for his nephew. Not intentionally, he hadn't known who the man was he'd met at the club and it had been a coincidence that one of Stiles' students had happened to be there as well but still.

He did breathe easier when an hour later Stiles told him that everything was fine and that they would talk over dinner.

Peter was tempted to pack up and just leave New York but in the end, curiosity won. Besides, he'd missed this, he'd missed his family. What little was left of it. And Derek came with the addition of Stiles who was not only sarcastic and able to stand up to Peter, he was also fantastic in bed.

"What have I gotten myself into?" Peter wondered aloud but got ready for dinner with Stiles and Derek.

"An Argent is one of your students?" Peter blurted out when Derek brought him up to date with the Isaac situation. Which apparently was not much of a situation any longer. Isaac had promised to keep his mouth shut. On both accounts. He had been reluctant to explain how he'd known Peter's name but in the end, he'd come clean.

"She's not one of our students," Stiles corrected. "But she was with him when you and Derek met over lunch. She recognized both of you."

"Allison wants to keep it low-key as well," Derek said.

"Yeah, I think Isaac only told us about her to prove that he doesn't have an interest in making it public. Her life would become hell as well."

Derek nodded to that with a dark expression, making Peter wonder how often he'd been through hell since the fire. He'd been teaching here for years now so it looked as if things were finally dying down.

"What about the other thing?" Peter asked, gesturing between himself and Stiles. "You sure he can keep it to himself?"

"We had to clear up some things but yes, I think he won't spread it around," Stiles said around a mouth full of mashed potatoes. He was the only one eating with gusto.

"He didn't say it but I think he's not straight either and that he has quite some queer friends," Derek said thoughtfully.

"He was at the Jungle," Peter reminded him to which Stiles nodded with his cheeks puffed out with more potatoes. He had gravy on his chin.

"He won't out us," Derek finished his thought.

"He was kind of fascinated by the fact that people older than him identify as gay and ace," Stiles added. "As if we're ancient. We're what? Fifteen years older than him? People have not been straight since forever, they just didn't use the words we use today." Stiles cleared his mouth with a sip of wine before he launched into a list of people known to not have been what people today called straight.

He must have done his research at some point because it was impressive what he could recite from the top of his head. His pet peeve were historians who took mental gymnastics to an extreme to press everything into modern heteronormative.

"Brothers!" Stiles almost swiped his glass off the table with his outraged gestures but Derek saved the glass without even looking up from his plate. "The whole narrative around them says that they lived as husband and wife but since they both had a dick, they can't possibly have been in a relationship. Or have been living anything but as manly men. They have to be brothers. Seriously? I have questions about those historians and their relationship with their siblings."

"That's why you went for math," Derek reminded him. "No room for interpretations. Two plus two always equals four. Doesn't matter if you have a dick or not."

He delivered the last line so dryly that Peter snorted into his meatloaf. They were only three people at the table but for a second Peter was back at the long table back in Beacon Hills. It was only for a second but he relished the feeling of family.

However, the line had a different effect on Stiles. For the next half an hour, Peter listened to him about what women had contributed to mathematics and science in general only to get their work stolen by men. So yeah, even in mathematics it made a difference if one had a dick or not.

Before Peter knew it, they were heading toward eleven in the evening. Which was not a problem for Peter, he could sleep in tomorrow, but it was the middle of the week and Stiles and Derek had work tomorrow.

"We text about Saturday?" Stiles asked when Peter got ready to leave.

"It still feels weird that you ask that with him standing right there." Peter shook his head.

Like an old married couple, Stiles and Derek were seeing him out. Stiles had his arm around Derek's middle while he asked about their sex date.

"It's weird that he asks you instead of going out to that club," Derek admitted to which Stiles tightened his hold on him, drawing him in even closer.

"But it's you I'm going to share a bed in a second here." Stiles ran his nose along Derek's neck, a clear gesture of possession.

"You're going to hog the blanket again." Derek made a suffering noise but he was not fooling anyone. He angled his head so that Stiles could rest his head on his shoulder.

"I'll leave before my teeth rot from your sweetness." Peter raised his hands in defense. "We text."

Peter intended to return to his hotel, it was getting late, but on a whim, he changed directions and went to a bar instead. Stiles and Derek would go to sleep in the same bed any second now but Peter had only an empty hotel room waiting for him. Usually, he didn't mind, he was not a big cuddler and Stiles did hog the blanket, he'd experienced that first hand, but tonight the empty room seemed daunting. Just a drink or two to unwind, he told himself.

He had been to this bar before, they had high-stake poker games going on in the backroom, but he wasn't here for that tonight. Peter took a stool at the bar and ordered whiskey. While he waited for his drink he had a look around. It was late on a Wednesday evening, there weren't many people around. A bit farther down the bar, a guy was sleeping with his head on the counter and there were some people at the pool tables.

The barkeeper sensed that he was not in the mood to chat so he left Peter alone once he'd placed his drink in front of him. Slowly sipping his whiskey, Peter let his mind drift. He would see Stiles on Saturday and he kind of had a standing invitation for dinner on Sunday with both of them. Derek had some things Laura had salvaged from the house, pictures and other personal things, he'd offered to go through them with Peter. Sometime next week, maybe. And Stiles still had that list of locations he wanted to show Peter.

When Peter had come to New York, he hadn't been sure how long he intended to stay. He hadn't known if Derek wanted to see him at all, for sure he'd not expected Derek and his husband to welcome him with open arms. They were acting as if he was a permanent fixture in their life now. In Stiles' case for totally unselfish reasons, of course.

It might be a good idea to start looking for an apartment, Peter mused. Even if things did not work out with Stiles and Derek, a place of his own in New York did sound nice. He would still need to travel quite a lot but he could make this his home base. Besides, he could do a lot with his phone and a computer.

Deep in thought, Peter swirled the amber liquid in his glass when somebody took the stool next to him.

"All alone here?" The woman asked. She was close, leaning into his personal space.

Peter couldn't help the smile playing on his lips, this was exactly how he'd met Stiles. Stiles had done it better, though.

"Sorry, not in the mood for company." He barely glanced at her before he knocked back his drink and motioned with the glass at the barkeeper for a refill.

"I'm not in the mood to talk either," she tried again, her voice low and sexy.

Her eyes were glassy and she had pink spots high on her cheeks, she was a few drinks ahead of him. There was hunger in her eyes and every other day Peter would have followed her outside to blow off some steam but today he just shook his head.

"I'm going to have this drink in peace." He picked up the glass the barkeeper had just placed in front of him. "And then I'm going home. Alone."

She made a disapproving noise but she got the hint and left. Looked as if she was part of the group at the pool table. She was welcomed back with laughter and loud voices but Peter tuned them out and turned back to his drink. He finished it quicker than the first one, he was not in the mood any longer, and then he returned to his hotel.

He hadn't really considered having sex with this woman but it did make him wonder. Were he and Stiles exclusive? Would it count as cheating on Stiles if he had sex with other people?

Peter made a mental note to bring this up when they would see each other on Saturday. If this turned out to be something long-term, they needed to talk about the rules. Stiles had been pretty clear with his rules right from the beginning but as he'd said, he didn't do rematches. So this was most likely new terrain for him as well.

Peter had planned for a few relaxed days but in the morning first Braeden and then Coach called. Peter was glad that Braeden had informed him in a calm, matter-of-factly voice about what had happened because it was hard to make sense out of the streak of expletives Coach was yelling at him the second Peter answered the call.

In the end, Peter drove out to the pawn shop to calm Coach down in person.

"Don't Coach me." Coach pointed his finger at him when Peter tried to get through to him by calling his name. "I'm going to kill her. I'm going smash her head with a baseball bat."

"You're not going to kill Braeden." Peter rolled his eyes at him but he was glad that Braeden was not here right now. He knew that Coach would never follow threw with his threats but he was not so sure about Braeden.

"She called me a liar." Coach's voice rose another octave. "Said I tried to fuck you over."

"She just said that what arrived at her end is not what I bought from you. At least not all of it," Peter corrected even if he doubted that Braeden had phrased it as diplomatically as him.

"Everything you bought went on that truck," Coach said still with a hectic flicker in his eyes but he'd calmed down a bit. "I oversaw it myself."

"Who was the driver?" Peter asked. He trusted Braeden. She would not steal some paintings and old furniture. They were not worth that much, at least not on the big scale, and it just wasn't her style.

She would, however, shoot him right in the face for the right price. Peter wasn't sure how high that price was but he had no intention of ever pissing off a big enough player to ever find out.

He didn't know Coach that well but he knew that he'd earned his reputation as somebody one could do business with and again, they were not talking about enough money to just shred that reputation in a single blow like this. Which left whoever had been driving the truck.

"One of Deucalion's guys," Coach answered. "Not sure if you know him, a guy called Ennis."