Page 25 of Pack’s Pledge
She couldn’t be, not while I had a pack, and she wasn’t a part of it.
But if she were…
My heart stirred in my chest.
There was a rustle of sheets, and she sat up on one elbow to look questioningly at me. I’d been lost in my own worries for too long. I opened my mouth and the words that came out were unexpected, even to myself.
“That’s between you and Beau. You’d have to ask him.”
She hummed, curling back into my side, so that I couldn’t see her as she asked, “And Adrian?”
“Yes,” I found myself saying.
“Okay,” she said, and I was surprised to feel a heavy feeling of calm settle over my limbs. I let it drag me down into sleep.
CHAPTERTWENTY
Adrian
She smelled like Conall.
When Conall and I had agreed to claim Beau, to form a pack, I’d known that theoretically we were giving something up. That by using our strange powers to bond with each other, instead of our true fucking mates or whatever, we were settling, in some way, for convenience over romance.
It hadn’t seemed like much of a loss at the time. I was getting two best friends out of the deal, and one of them was a sexy-as-hell omega who wanted me—no,beggedme—to fuck him as much as our horny, twenty-something libidos could handle. True love was low on my list of priorities.
Our pack was unusual, but I was happy with the way we were together. I had companionship, and sex, and when I wanted more than that, I could always find a woman happy to spend a night or two or three or a month with an alpha who had his own car (several, in fact,) and a fat wallet and a sizable package not of the “retirement benefits” variety.
And when she tired of me, or I of her, I still had Conall’s manly, awkward shoulder pats and Beau’s bedroom eyes to come home to at the end of the day.
And that had been enough.
But I’d never had to sit next to a woman at the breakfast table with Conall’s scent pouring off her skin.
Should I apologize?I thought, my cock stiff in my pants.Had it been like this for Conall, all those times my own sleepover guests had stayed a little too long and been subjected to an awkward early-morning meeting with the pack?
But no—Conall was about as easy-to-read as a phonics book (and therefore a shit poker player, a fact which had made me several thousands of dollars over the life of our friendship), and I’d never sensed any jealousy or arousal or eveninterestin the various and sundry women I’d brought home over the years.
Was it me, then,I wondered,since Conall wasn’t the type to bring flings home with him?
Even as I thought it, I knew that wasn’t right, either.
No, it was her. Britt.
Beau confirmed my suspicions one morning, turning to me with his eyes narrowed, opening his mouth even as the door was swinging shut behind the two of them. He was driving her home, because of course he was.
“It’s not just me, right?” he said, turning to me. “My heat isn’t for weeks,” he added, counting on his fingers in the way I knew he did when tracking his body’s cycle. “It’s not just me?”
“It’s not just you,” I confirmed. “That was…”
“Really hot,” he concluded. “Fuck, the way he looks at her…”
I groaned. “I thought you were talking about Britt, man, not Conall.”
“Iam,” he corrected. “Or at least—the two of them together. The way she smells—”
“Is it weird that it’s sexy that she smells like alpha?” I blurted out, and Beau’s eyebrows raised.
“You’re asking the wrong guy,” he said, and I laughed. “But no, it’s not weird, even for you. I think,” he said, trailing off, pursing his soft lips. Maybe we would have time for a quickie before Conall got back. Beau’s scent was sweet with sleep and arousal, even if his face was scruffy and slightly puffed from the beers we’d had last night.