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16

JULIAN

“Fuck this fucking shit!” Cam yelled, ripping his tie off again. “How come every time I do this it looks like a fucking child tied it?”

I shrugged, gesturing to my shirt. “This is why I’m not bothering with one. I don’t think Marlowe is going to care.”

He growled, then restarted the YouTube tutorial he must have watched half a dozen times already.

“Okay folks, first thing you gotta do is…”

I chuckled and headed back downstairs to find Nolan vacuuming. Aside from Lowe’s living room nest which Cam had slept in every night since she’d been gone, he’d insisted Nolan and I clean the rest of the house from top to bottom in preparation for her return.

Cam had even bought a bouquet of flowers and put them in a vase on the table, along with boxes of chocolates and her favorite ice cream. He’d frowned the whole time shopping at the store that afternoon, but I knew it was just nerves.

For what though, I had no clue. Not that I didn’t also want to spoil our omega, but she wasn’t the type who needed to be impressed like that.

A loud roar indicated he’d failed again, and he stormed into the living room and stood in front of Nolan, pointing at his neck. “You do it!” he barked.

Nolan bit back a laugh and turned off the vacuum. “How old are you again? Pretty sure I knew how to tie a knot before my Designation Ceremony.”

Designation Ceremonies were when twelve to thirteen-year-old shifter pups would head off to the temple and have the priestesses declare whether they were alpha, beta, or omega. We’d get dressed up and have a big party with friends and family afterwards.

I thought back to the look of pride on my parents’ faces on my Designation Day, and shook away the sadness at having lost them both.

Tonight was about Marlowe.

Cam had been the most vocal about her absence, and being the newest and youngest member of the pack, I found it difficult to chime in with my own misery. I let Cam complain to me, I listened and nodded, and then I took my frustrations out at the gym.

I looked down at my phone, opening the last text she sent me. A selfie at a gas station outside of Madison, two red licorice ropes hanging out of her lips like walrus tusks with the caption “SOON.”

She had asked me a couple of days ago where I would want to go if we went on a trip somewhere, and the first place that popped into my mind was Alaska. A shifter family from Anchorage had moved to my town when I was in first grade, and I remembered the kid talking about all the wildlife he’d seen up there, from bears to seals, whales to walruses… it just had always stuck with me, and

I’d promised myself that as soon as I’d made it and could afford to go on a real vacation, I was going to Alaska.

Having Marlowe in my life now, as well as a good job and a pack I respected? Yeah, I’d definitely made it.

Once Nolan had finished making Cam look presentable, we grabbed our coats and headed out the door. “Give our omega a big hug and a kiss from me,” he called out.

Cam grumbled under his breath as he climbed into the cab of his truck. He checked his phone again before pulling out. “She says she’ll be there in an hour,” he said roughly.

The look on his face made it clear he thought that was still too long, and I worried that his current mood would sour even worse at the party. Things were already a little weird at the office ever since Cam nearly beat the CFO to death with his bare fists. He’d always been a bit of a loose canon—rough around the edges, quick to yelling, that sort of thing.

But he’d never fully attacked anyone before.

Not that I could blame him. When I’d heard what they’d all been saying about Marlowe, I nearly drove straight to the hospital to finish the job he’d started.

That evening he and Nolan shifted again for the first timesince the attack in order to blow off some steam, and it had become a nightly routine for them. I wanted nothing more than to join them, and Cam even offered to give me some of his blood so that I could get some magical juice that would allow me to access my own wolf.

But I wanted to tap that shit straight from my omega source. I still hadn’t bonded with Marlowe yet, and it felt weirdly like cheating if I went through Cam instead.

Despite all the midnight adventures, though, Cam was still on the edge, and looked like he was ready to lash out the second someone looked at him funny. So I tried to get his mind off things.

“What’s the grand prize for the raffle again this year?”

“What?” Cam snapped back.

“The grand prize,” I repeated in a calm, measured tone.