Page 53 of Psycho Alphas: Part Two

Knox, however, was staring at Ace in shock. “I…” He was digging into a pocket, but his jaw was firmly clenched. “Shit.”

“He got the key off you?” I demanded. “How?”

“The…Fuck. The collar still keeps him in the house,” Knox growled. “He wasn’t going anywhere.” He looked pissed, though.

“He, uh… he can stay out though, right?” Thistle asked, ducking under my arm and inserting her whisper into the conversation. Her eyes were imploring as she looked at Knox.

“What?”Knox asked.

I opened my mouth to tell her what a shit idea that was, but she was already ducking away.

She’d turned back to Ace, and was reaching for her messy buns, patting them absently as she stared at the Alpha whodefinitelyknew she was in the room, and couldn’t be fucked to look up at her.

Through the bond, I could feel a sudden burst of tension.

Thistle edged closer to where Ace sat, absolutely honed in on him in real life and in the bond. She patted her dress nervously and made a few awkward steps toward him. Then she caught my eye, and gave me an anxious smile.

Damn.

Finally, when Ace still didn’t look up, she crossed the rest of the distance. Perching on the arm of the armchair he was seated in, she said, “Just got back from adate.”

It set me on edge, watching her that close to him. He was in a bond with me, but he was frighteningly silent in there.

Ace didn’t react, eyes still drifting along the writing on the page before him, and Thistle turned Bunny in her hands for a moment as if mulling over her options.

“Went to the fair,” she said. “Rogue won me a huge teddy.”

Still, Ace didn’t look up, and Thistle, darting a nervous glance back at me and Knox, slid down into the seat on her back—pushing the book almost right out of Ace’s hands as she lay on his lap, looking up at him.

Ace shut his eyes and took a deep, slow breath.

“But now he’s grouchy ‘cos Knox couldn’t stay away for ‘one fucking night’.” She dropped her voice and did a rubbish imitation of me, but she wasglowingas she said it.

Ace managed, somehow, to adjust the book beneath her shoulder, and continue reading. I realised Knox and I were frozen, watching the two of them as if they were aliens.

“I like the muzzle on you,” she said, poking it.

Ace struggled to turn a page.

Thistle was finding her momentum, though, and boldly ignored him ignoring her. “Good thing, too. After that date you gotta up your game, Bunny.”

He finally reacted, his hand closing around her throat. Knox and I flinched toward them, but Thistle hugged his arm, a broad grin on her face as he finally looked down at her.

“Idareyou to call me that again, Omega,” he said, voice barely a whisper. I saw the flicker of his eyes sliding to us as he said it, and I knew he was fully aware of how tense we were.

I felt the threat directed at us as much as it was at her.

At the sound of his voice, though, there was an unsettling explosion of happiness from Thistle in the bond. Her face twisted in a pout and she lifted Bunny, holding him up to Ace. “But he said he’d share.”

That was when I felt him, his grip on the bond slipping. He was gathering clouds on the edge of a lightning strike.

“Maverick.”Ace didn’t flinch as I called his name. “Dinner in an hour, you’re cooking.”

At my side, I saw Knox raise his eyebrows.

“Don’t you have people who cook for you?” he asked, not looking up from Thistle, a sneer in his voice.

I crossed the distance to them and grabbed him by the muzzle, dragging him to his feet while prying her from his grip. “That would be you,rat,” I said, steadying her at my side.