Page 36

Della

“Sleeping with her was a mistake.”

I yank my face away from my closed bedroom door and stumble back, tightening my grip on the sheet around me as it slips, tripping me.

The sound of Xavier and Levi’s footsteps moves down the hallway.

I wait until I hear their steps hit the staircase before turning to face the bed with rumpled sheets. Levi stayed here all night. I went to sleep with a silly smile on my face and his arms wrapped snug around me.

Now, it hurts to look at it. To know we had sex, I fell asleep in his arms, and then I woke up alone, to the sound of him telling Xavier it was all a mistake.

My eyes prick with tears, and I order myself not to cry. He made me feel so beautiful and so loved. Not just before sex, but after.

I woke in the middle of the night, still wrapped up in his arms, and he slid into me again.

It was all so fucking perfect .

I should have known better than to believe that last night meant anything.

The burn at the back of my eyelids intensifies. I stomp into my bathroom, shoving my sheet to the floor before my bare feet hit the cool tile. It takes everything I have not to slam the door behind me.

Anger is good.

Tears?

Hurt?

Please and no thank you.

In the shower, as hot water pelts my skin from the rainforest showerhead, my mind wanders to how tender Levi was and how he made me feel so wanted.

It was all a lie. I was just too blind to see it.

A tear rolls down my cheek. I wipe it away and lift my head, hoping the water will erase all evidence of my pain.

Sniffling back more tears, I grab the washcloth and scrub myself clean, muttering under my breath, “Just forget it, Della. He already has.”

Still feeling dirty, I flick off the water and quickly dry myself.

And I stop.

“Pity sex,” I mutter as the thought snakes itself into my mind, tainting everything good from last night. “That’s all it was. That’s all I was.”

Nothing more.

I dress in sweats and a T-shirt before heading downstairs.

Levi and Xavier sit in the living room, the TV blaring as they sip whiskey from crystal tumblers on the couch.

It’s a bit early for whiskey, but I guess last night was that fucking terrible for Levi that he needs to wash all memories of it away with a large serving of liquor.

No part of me wants to walk into that room, but the old Della would never shy away from something that hurt her. She shows no fear. Since I’m trying to be her again, I stiffen my spine, hide my pain, and walk inside.

Both turn to face me as I step into the room. Levi is still wearing the same gray sweats and black T-shirt from last night. Seeing him hurts, so I focus on Xavier.

“Hey, Della.” Xavier smiles.

If Levi is smiling, I have no clue.

They must have been talking about me, cranking the TV up loud so I wouldn’t hear them laughing at me.

I can sit next to Levi on the couch or in the armchair across the room. It's a no-brainer.

Out of the corner of my eye, Levi is smiling as he says, “Della. You can sit?—”

“No thanks,” I say coolly, walking past him to take the seat in the armchair. “Were you talking about the investigation?”

Xavier mutes the television. “Kind of.”

Laughing at me then. That’s okay, I know how to pretend.

I cross my legs and try to look indifferent. “I think we should focus on Mr.—”

Xavier sets his glass down on the coffee table. “That isn’t what we were talking about. We were talking about you.”

Levi gives him a warning look, clearly trying to shut him up.

My smile is brittle as I gesture for them to continue. “By all means, don’t stop on my account. I’d like to know what you thought.”

Was I shit in bed or so boring that Levi has already forgotten what I look like naked?

Xavier shifts his gaze between us, then rises to his feet. “I need a hand with something, Della. Do you mind?”

I frown at him. “What is it?”

He scratches his beard. “This thing. It’s itchy as fuck and it’s time I got rid of it. It’s served its purpose.”

“And its purpose was?” Curious what he looks like under that beard, I get to my feet.

“Disguise.”

I hum. “I thought you were using it to store snacks while you worked. It’s bushy enough.”

“Woman, you cut me deep.” He chuckles, wrapping his arm around me and squeezing slightly.

I breathe in his salted caramel and pumpkin scent, and ask myself how it can feel so good to be snuggled up against him.

I feel Levi’s stare burning a hole into my back, but he doesn’t follow along or say a word.

Xavier leads me upstairs to the third door down the hallway from mine and into a light gray room, likely his, given the men’s clothes messily folded on top of a dresser and the scent that permeates the room.

We walk past his unmade king-size bed on the way to a white and gray stone bathroom.

He points his bearded chin at the gray stone counter. “Sit.”

I arch an eyebrow, and I don’t move.

“I should’ve known.” He grins boyishly at me. “Don’t mind my caveman ways. It’s the beard. Please sit and help a man out. Maybe with it gone, I’ll be a little more civilized.”

I snort, suppressing my smile. “I wouldn’t hold out hope for that.”

I jump onto the counter while he searches through a drawer, retrieves a pair of short, sharp metal scissors, and hands them to me. “Here.”

I take the scissors with a raised eyebrow. “You want me to hack it off? Don’t you have an electric shaver?”

“I do. But this is too thick to start with a razor. I need most of it off or I’ll be up here for hours and wind up with more cuts than chin at the end of it.”

“If you trust me not to cut your nose off, the least I can do is try not to.”

Xavier chuckles and steps closer. I prepare to snip, but at the last second, he retreats. “Ah, one thing.”

He grips the bottom of his shirt and pulls it off, tossing the white material on the floor. Suddenly I have a more interesting view than I had a moment a go.

He may be a shit gardener, but he doesn’t laze around in the gym with the muscles he’s packing.

I pretend to be disinterested in his hot body. “Was that really necessary?”

“Just saving on the laundry.”

His thick beard hides it well, but the guy is honest to god smirking under that thing. If I’m not careful, he might have brought me up here for nefarious purposes.

“Come on. Let's get this over with.” I keep my eyes on his face instead of the rock-solid pecs just inches away. He smells so good it’s hard to focus.

He bends his taller, bigger frame and rests his palms on the counter on either side of me, caging me in. I feel him watching me as I trim the thick beard away, and occasionally my knees press against the front of his muscled thighs.

“I gather you’re pissed at Levi,” he says.

“Ah. The true reason for dragging me up here. Gossiping.” I trim a bit more of his dark brown beard, grip his chin, and angle his head slightly to the left. “I should cut your nose off for tricking me.”

He snorts. “I don’t think a bit of deception calls for losing my nose. And that wasn’t the only reason I brought you up here.”

“Quit flirting. If the trip to Paris didn’t work, that certainly won’t. Lift your head. I need to see under your chin.”

He lifts his head.

Despite him bringing me up here to talk, he’s quiet for the next couple of minutes as I hack away at the thick beard, but always, I feel him watching me.

“You think he used you.”

I blink up at him. “What?”

“There’s only one reason I can think of for a woman to freeze a guy out the way you just did.”

“Really?” I pretend ignorance.

“ Really .” He waits until I’ve snipped a little more, then turns to look at the mirror behind me. “That should be good enough. Thanks.”

I brush the hair off my legs, but as I prepare to make my escape, he speaks.

“Levi doesn’t sleep around.” He pulls an electric razor and a can of shaving cream from the top drawer of the counter I was sitting on, setting both down next to the sink along with a small white towel.

I’m not only curious about this conversation; I’m also curious about what he looks like underneath all that hair.

His strong jaw is more visible, giving him a rugged charm, but his short, dark beard obscures the lower half of his face.

I thought he was striking, even with a thick beard I don’t like.

I’m almost scared to see him without a beard.

He meets my gaze in the mirror and smiles as he rubs a hand over his cheek. “Be honest. Was this monstrosity the reason the offer to take you to Paris didn’t work? Levi says I look like a bear leaving a cave after hibernation.”

I snort. “More like a lost hiker who stumbled onto the road after wandering the forest for six months.”

“ Six ? Ouch. You cruel, cruel woman.” I can’t have offended him too badly from the wide grin he flashes me.

I sniff. “A big, strong alpha like you can take it.”

He applies shaving cream to his beard while I watch, resting my hip against the bathroom counter. I’ve never seen a man shave outside of those ridiculous commercials where the guy starts off smooth-shaven to begin with, so this is an interesting experience.

I watch him work in smooth, careful strokes as the buzz of the electric razor reduces his beard to scraggly, short bits of hair in the sink. It’s strangely hypnotic.

He rinses out the shaver with his face half-smooth. “Levi thinks he took advantage of you.”

I blink at him. “He thinks what ?”

Warm gray eyes flick up to me, briefly holding my gaze. “That’s what he didn’t want me to tell you downstairs. He was scared you’d agree.”

“What?”

All traces of amusement vanish from his expression. “He doesn’t let many people close. I don’t know if he told you why…”

“His uncle. He said…” I start getting angry enough I want to kick something. Not just anything. Levi’s uncle for being such an evil prick. “He said some really fucked up things.”

The corners of his eyes pull in a half-smile. “He’s let you in and he’s afraid you’re going to do some damage on the way out.”

I stare at him, struggling to believe what I’m hearing.

Xavier shaves a little more of his beard and continues, “So he’s bracing himself for it. And I think maybe you’re doing the same thing.”

“He told you that?”

“He didn’t need to tell me. I know Levi. And I saw the way you were downstairs. Self-preservation was kicking in. I’m guessing you overheard something?”

When I don’t respond, he nods. “Whatever you heard was only a brief part of a much longer conversation. Hence the whiskey for breakfast and the loud TV.”

He dries the razor with a towel. “Levi doesn’t open up about his past to anyone but us. And us, he trusts.”

I twist my lips into a smile. “He doesn’t trust me.”

“He does or he wouldn’t have told you about something that gutted him.” He swipes a towel over his jaw and tosses it aside, turning to face me dramatically. “How’d I look?”

Fucking hot is how you look. Like temptation personified.

I feign indifference as I give him a once-over. “You snicked yourself. You’re bleeding.”

“Where?”

On a jawline as hard as sin that I want to kiss.

I point. “There.”

He glances at the mirror, curses, then reaches into a drawer, takes out a plaster, and offers it to me. “Care to do the honors?”

I raise an eyebrow. “A plaster? Really ?”

“You have steadier hands. Not a scratch with those scissors. See the damage I do to myself when left unchecked? You’re looking at a war wound.” His chest puffs up.

I can’t help but laugh. “Give it here.”

I take the plaster from him, and he dips his head so I can stick the completely unnecessary plaster on his war wound. “There. All done.”

He looks down at me, eyes hooded. “Didn’t feel a thing.”

“It’s a plaster, not an axe attack. I'd better go.” I put my hands on his chest and push. But I don’t want to let go.

“Chicken,” he whispers.

“I don’t know what you mean.” I take my hands off his six-pack.

He lowers his head a little more, one corner of his mouth lifting in a crooked smile. “You know exactly what I mean.”

Tension simmers between us. And I’m tempted.

Don’t think I’m not tempted. But I’m not sure I can believe what Xavier said about Levi, and I have no intention of being used and discarded by anyone.

Especially not an alpha. Three hurt me so badly I’m still healing from an experience that I’m not sure I’ll ever fully recover from.

If anyone is doing the using, I want it to be me.

“Move, please.”

He steps aside, and I duck around him.

He’s smiling slightly as he clears the mess he made on the counter. “You know where to find me.”

“And why would I need to find you?”

He raises his head, meeting my gaze in the mirror. “This isn’t a game, Della. Maybe it started as one in Haven, but I’m not playing. Neither is Levi, nor is Vince.”

I turn to leave. “What you want is playtime with a beta until your perfect omega comes along. How about you skip the trampling over me to get to the woman you want, huh?”

I’m stepping out of the bathroom when I jump as a large, tanned arm wraps around my middle and draws my body back to his. My breathing slows, then races because it’s clear Levi isn’t the only alpha under this roof who wants me.

He speaks directly into my ear, sending a shiver down my spine. “You want us as much as we all want you.”

“Your brother doesn’t want me,” I whisper.

Vincent asked if I had a boyfriend, and I convinced myself it meant nothing.

Xavier is saying it means something.

“If you’re too blind to see it, ask him. He’ll tell you. If not in the things he says, then in what he doesn’t. And in the things he does.”

What is that supposed to mean?

His arm falls away, releasing me. But I just stand there, breathing in and out, staring at his unmade bed with the memory of his touch haunting me. I want him to pull me back into his arms. It had felt so warm and safe for the few seconds I was in it.

“Della?” A husky note edges into his voice, and his breath stirs the hair on the back of my neck.

Curling my fingers into fists so I can’t touch him again, I bolt because he was right.

I do want him.

I want all of them.