Page 144 of Omega's Flight

"Not any more," Raleigh said through a fierce grin. "I've spent too much time with you." He made another grab for Cas's t-shirt. "Come back here so I can spank you."

Cas stopped abruptly, letting Raleigh run into him. "Well, if that's what you had in mind, all you had to do was ask," he said mildly, and chuckled at the bright red flush that rose up in Raleigh's cheeks.

"That's not what I meant, and you know it!" Raleigh slapped Cas's shoulder, then wound his arm around Cas's and led them off down the pathway again.

"Mac's old place is in the second group, the ones with the blue paint." Cas pointed them out. “Jason’s dad is living there now with his girlfriend and one of her daughters. The daughter lost her mate to a blood cancer and didn't want to move back into bachelor quarters. It's worked out well for them."

"That's so sad," Raleigh said quietly and Cas felt him lean a little closer to Cas's body.

"It was a few years ago, back when I was in undergrad. I think she's okay now, but Mac says they all get along, so there's been no push to move her out and put her mom and Jason's dad into the senior housing."

"I'm glad."

They stopped in front of the townhouse. Cas watched Raleigh's expression as he took it all in—two stories, snuggled up against the next house, with it's large window on the bottom floor and the smaller one above. "What do you think?" he asked.

"What's it like inside?" Raleigh took a tentative step toward it, then stopped. "Are the new ones like these?"

"A bit bigger, I think. More bedrooms, which is why I thought you might like them better. If we took one here, the pups would all have to sleep in the same bedroom."

Raleigh made a face, then shook his head. "I think I'm spoiled. When I came here, it seemed like such a luxury to have a bedroom for the girls and one for Henry and I was so grateful for it. Now, I can't imagine putting them all in the same room again."

Cas wrapped his arms around Raleigh's waist from behind and rested his chin on top of Raleigh's head. "Do you want me to knock so you can see what they're like inside? Or walk around and see if there's one of the new ones finished enough to take a tour?"

After a moment, Raleigh asked, "Could we go see the other ones? I hate to disturb anyone, especially if it's not going to be anything like the ones you're thinking about."

"All right," Cas said, and then his phone rang. He dug it out, to find Holland's name gleaming on the screen. "Hi."

"Hi, are you with Raleigh? He's not answering his phone." Something in his tone of voice raised the hackles on Cas's neck.

"I am," Cas said slowly. "What's up?"

"You two have time to come up to the apartment? Or I can come to you, whatever."

"We're down by the townhouses. We can come up. What's going on?"

The fatigue in Holland's words came through the phone's tiny signal as clear as if he were standing right by them. "We've heard back from Jackson-Jellystone."

Raleigh had turned in his arms and was staring up at him through all this, as if he could read the information in Cas's eyes. "We'll be right up," Cas said, his eyes locked firmly on Raleigh's.

"He's not coming back, is he?" Raleigh said tonelessly.

"We don't know that," Cas told him and turned them back toward the main pack building. "Holland's asked us to meet him at his place."

Raleigh let out a shaky breath and came with him, and refused to say another word all the way back to Holland's.

C H A P T E R 1 0 0

H olland handed me a mug of tea then, with an assessing look at my expression, reached into the cupboard above the refrigerator and pulled out a tall bottle filled with amber liquid. "Here, put some of this in it."

"What is it?" I asked, putting my hand over top of the mug before he could follow through.

"Bourbon," he said. "It'll take the edge off while we decide what to do."

"I'd rather not be drunk," I said and held my mug farther away. I could smell the change in his scent, richer and wilder, and in the back of my mind I plotted how long it would be before he was in full heat. Briefly, I wondered if Cas could smell it and what he was thinking, and then I wondered why I was even thinking about this while my ex-alpha mate was trying to steal my pups from me.

Though it wasn't really stealing under pack law, was it?

"If you're sure," Holland said and put the bottle away. I could hear the effort it took him to keep his tone mild and I wondered if he was one of those omegas that got snappish as they moved into heat. High-blooded, my mother used to call it, the ones who were driven by their hormones. It might just have been my situation, though, with the Blood Moon celebration coming up in less than a week and everything to get organized for that on top of it.