Page 109 of Pack Plus One

“Early stages,” he repeats flatly. “You followed her through the city during her heat, spent three days holed up with her, and now you’re stalking her apartment building because she’s avoiding you. Those aren’t ‘early stages.’ That’s a restraining order waiting to happen.”

He slams the door in our faces before I can come up with a suitably witty retort.

“He has a point,” Mason says quietly as we retreat to the SUV. “This is bordering on stalking.”

“She thinks we rejected her,” Caleb says, his voice rough. “Because of a conversation she overheard without context. We need to find her and explain that we were saying the exact opposite of what she thought she heard.”

“Fine,” Liam says decisively. “But we need to be smart about this. Split up, cover more ground. She can’t have gone far.”

We divide and conquer, each taking a different part of the city where Leah might reasonably be found.

My Mission: Bribe every barista in a three-mile radius.

“Free beer for life if you’ve seen a gorgeous, grumpy omega with a sweet tooth,” I announce to the first café, sliding a business card for the brewery across the counter.

The barista, a beta with a nose ring and a sleeve of tattoos, blinks at me, then at the card. “You mean Leah?”

I nearly leap over the counter in excitement. “Yes! Leah! About this tall, has a bakery, looks like she might stab you but you’d thank her for it?”

“She was here an hour ago,” the barista confirms, looking slightly concerned at my intensity. “Bought a blueberry muffin and looked like she wanted to murder someone. More than usual, I mean.”

“Did she say where she was going? Was anyone with her? Did she seem okay?” The questions tumble out of me in a rush.

The barista takes a step back. “Dude, chill. She bought a muffin, not my life story. She didn’t say anything, but she took the bus that stops outside.”

I text the group immediately:

LEAD. BLUEBERRY MUFFIN SIGHTING AT COFFEE CORNER. TOOK BUS OUTSIDE.

Liam responds within seconds:

Bus #14 goes downtown from there. On it.

Mason sends a photo of her closed bakery, the “Sorry, We’re Closed” sign clearly visible in the window.No luck here.

Caleb doesn’t reply. Probably too busy terrorizing innocent civilians with his alpha scowl and waves of possessive pheromones.

I spend the next three hours visiting every café, bakery, and pastry shop in my designated sector of the city. I learn way more than I ever wanted to know about the difference between croissants and Danish pastries, collect seven phone numbers from interested baristas (which I immediately throw away, because contrary to popular belief, I do have some standards), and consume so much caffeine that I can practically feel colors.

But no more Leah sightings.

By late afternoon, my phone buzzes with a message from Mason:

Regrouping at that cafe she’d snuck off to the first time. 5 PM.

Ah. The site of our dramatic confrontation with Leah’s ex, the place where we found her during pre-heat, looking beautiful and stubborn and absolutely infuriating in her determination to handle everything alone.

The memory makes my chest hurt in a way I’m not entirely comfortable examining.

I arrive to find the others already there, expressions ranging from grim (Liam) to defeated (Mason) to murderous (Caleb). We claim a table in the corner, four males radiating enough frustrated alpha energy to make nearby patrons shift uncomfortably in their seats.

“Nothing?” I ask, though the answer is written clearly on their faces.

Liam shakes his head. “The bus took me downtown, but I didn’t spot her anywhere. Searched some shops, the mall, even just waited at the bus stop for a while.”

“The bakery doesn’t look like she’s been there,” Mason reports. “According to the beta who owns the shop beside it, she hasn’t stopped by. He hasn’t seen her.”

We all turn to Caleb, who’s been silent since we arrived. He’s staring out the window, his jaw clenched so tight I’m surprised his teeth haven’t shattered.