Alex shook his head. "You were always going to get that welcome." Or almost always. To be fair, the last time had been a little complicated. But that had been... Fuck, almost four years ago. And Bass had been gone for almost two years if you only counted the time in the city. And even when he hadn't gotten the kiss as a welcome, there had definitely been feelings. Complicated, messy feelings, but feelings that never went away.

"Yeah, when I first got here, I wouldn't have known any of that. But now I remember that and months after that. Max ends up being fine. Isobel turns into a sword-wielding badass. There's a lot I can tell you. About Max's evil twin. But..." He looked around at the party and shook his head.

"Probably not the best place to do it."