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Chapter Thirteen

SHARPEN YOUR TEETH

Bramley

T he sensor over the door goes off, lighting up the alarm in front of me, the light flashing, chiming that stupid melody to let me know someone walked in. I look up from the mixer and wait, pausing the machine long enough to listen for the bell at the counter but when I don’t hear anything but the sound of heavy boots against the tile, I roll my eyes.

“I don’t have time for your bullshit right now.”

Nash marches through the doorway, pissed off and looking for a fight. “Make time.”

“Go to hell.”

“We’ve been living in the seventh circle, asshole.” He walks right up to me and yanks the bowl of seasoning from my hands, slamming it down on the table behind us in a cloud of herbs and spices. “And it isn’t just affecting you anymore.”

Shaking my head, I go for the minced garlic and celery so I don’t lose this fucking batch thanks to his tantrum. “According to Clay, I’m the only one who’s seemingly unfazed by everything going on.”

Which is so far from the truth it borders on delusional, but I’m not about to say that.

“Yeah, well, I can smell that bullshit from a mile away.”

Especially if Nash is going to say it for me. “You’re fucking cracked.”

“And for someone with hobbies like yours, you’re a shitty goddamn liar.”

Clenching my jaw, I keep feeding the filler into the mixer, then turn my head to use my shoulder to push my mask up.

I can’t lie to him.

I’ve never been able to lie to Nash or Clay, and it was one of the ways I knew in my gut that they were mine.

The only people who can see through my bullshit are the people I genuinely care about, the ones who care back, and know me just as well as I know myself. Which is a huge part of why the last few months have been so fucking hard.

Putting up this front, keeping myself in line, it’s taxing, and it’s starting to take a toll.

I thought she’d be gone by now.

I assumed that if I put enough space between us, if I stayed busy and out of the house while she recovered, everyone would get over the stupid conclusions they’ve drawn, and we could go back to the way it was before I lost my goddamn mind and brought a frozen omega home.

That isn’t how this has played out at all.

If anything, the longer she’s here, the more everyone wants her to stay, and that can’t fucking happen. Not if I want to hang onto the last threads of my sanity.

“You’re such a fucking baby.”

My head swings in Nash’s direction, eyes narrowed on his scowling face. “What the fuck did you say?”

He postures up to me, bracing himself for the fight he knows is coming. “I know how you are but this is bad, even for you. Treating me and Clay like this, going from raging lunatic to the fucking iceman of Obsidian Falls, yeah, it’s worse than I’ve seen you in almost twenty fucking years, but we’re used to a version of that. We could fucking deal after some silent treatment and a lot of yelling, but this is different and you know exactly why.”

Refusing to acknowledge anything he just said, I dump in the rest of the minced mix then add the eggs and rice, not really giving a shit that he’s completely thrown off my process and could ultimately compromise this batch of sausage.

“She saw your text message, asshole.”

My chest goes tight at his words, and I have to use every ounce of my willpower not to show him what that sentence does to me.

And that’s without knowing which text he’s referencing because none of the ones I’ve sent since she’s been here have been very pleasant.

“Here’s the thing, dickhead.” I clench my jaw as I briefly glance at Nash, who obviously doesn’t give a shit about what he can feel through our bond right now. “And you better listen because I don’t plan on saying this again. If I have to…” he shakes his head. “Clay and I, we’re trying real goddamn hard to keep things even, to find the balance between how we feel about you, and how we feel about Indy—which comes from how you feel whether you want to acknowledge that or not. But this isn’t how shit is supposed to go, it’s not how things are supposed to be, and you fucking know it. Lucky for you, wherever she came from has her leery as hell about strangers, and it’s slowed things down, but it’s a matter of time before that all changes.”

Nash stares at the side of my face, something I can feel right along with the conflict he’s describing while it pulses through the very same bond he’s talking about. It’s the worst I’ve experienced with him, the turmoil eating away my alpha and how it really is taking a toll. I can feel the severity, the weight of this situation baring down on him, and the anxiety chaser isn’t helping, either.

But my stubborn ass isn’t going to cave.

Not now, and not ever if I can help it.

“She doesn’t know why, not entirely, but Indy is drawn to us. She’s coming around, she actually wants to see us, and we can’t help the way we’re running with it because of you.” He sighs, his anger subsiding briefly as my alpha rubs his eyes under his glasses. “You and her, you’re fucking scent matches, Bramley, and?—“

“You don’t fucking know that,” I snap, spinning to the grab the rest of the spices before dumping the entire thing into the mixer and hoping the machine fixes the problem I’m about to have. “No one fucking knows that?—“

“Except you!” Nash snaps back. “You know, you’re just too goddamn stubborn, too fucking scared to handle it, and while I understand why, it doesn’t justify treating our omega like some kind of leper. She doesn’t deserve that, Clayton and I don’t deserve to be put in this bullshit situation, and even though you’re acting like a baby, neither do you.”

Growling like an asshole, I shut the machine off because the fucking batch of sausage I was trying to make from the bastard who’s hanging in my freezer is a lost cause. “You’re talking out of your ass.”

He laughs, the sound hollow and angry. “Give me a fucking break. You aren’t even in denial, you’re just being a dick, and I’m beginning to think you might be getting some sick enjoyment out of the way it’s fucking with everyone.”

“Right.” I pull my gloves off with a snap, toss them in the trash then aggressively take off my apron. “I get a real fucking thrill from upending our relationship over some worthless female none of us need.”

“Say that again.”

I pause, the bite in his tone, the genuine rage I can hear in Nash’s words, it has me hesitating.

The lies are bitter on my tongue, and they fucking hurt, but they’re necessary. I’m just starting to worry that my alpha and beta aren’t ever going to see it that way.

Which is why I turn to look him in the eye and speak slowly. “That female is nothing to me, she means nothing to me, and the sooner you can see that she isn’t worth throwing away seventeen years together, the?—“

Nash doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t fucking think, he just reacts by charging at me full force before slamming me into the wall.

“The only reason I’m not beating your ass right now is because I know you don’t believe that.” He narrows his eyes as he leans in, his chest heaving against mine. “You can’t lie to me, Bramley, no more than you can lie to yourself, and that’s your saving fucking grace. Indy is ours, she’s our omega whether you say the words out loud or not, and nothing is going to change that, so the sooner you get your head out of your ass, the better. The damage you’re doing, it isn’t irreparable, not yet.”

Fighting every single one of my instincts to put him in his place for his behavior, I look Nash dead in the eye and try to keep the last shreds of peace between us. “Back the fuck off, Nash.”

“Or else what?”

“Don’t.”

He ignores my warning and presses harder against me. “Don’t. What?”

I just stare at him, those green eyes full of a fire I haven’t seen before, the toll our situation is taking on my alpha so goddamn clear I can’t deny it, and just when something inside me wants to soften to him, Nash sets off a bomb.

“That’s what I fucking thought.” He pushes off of me, shoving me before he starts backing away. “You know this is fucked, and you’re not willing to do anything about it, not even for me and Clay.” Nash shakes his head, and the hurt he’s feeling slices through me as if it were my own. “You’re going to lose everything, Bramley.”

Pushing my shoulders back, I try to act unfazed even though I know he’s right. “That a threat?”

“It’s a fact.”

“That so?”

Nash nods. “If you don’t change how you’re handling this, yeah, it is.”

“Noted.” My stomach bottoms out over the truth in his words, but I still can’t seem to let this fucking go. “Thanks for spelling it out.”

“We aren’t going to stop spending time with her.” I watch him swallow hard, visibly pulling from some reserve of strength before delivering another blow. “And when it happens, if she lets me…” Nash takes a deep breath. “I’m going to help Indy through her heat, we both are. Nan has been trying to prep us for how to handle it since we’ve never had to before, because it’s going to happen at some point and she doesn’t want us to hurt her or anything. Nan’s doing extra because she knows I’ve never been with anyone but you and Clay, and because…”

The saying seeing red never made sense until right now.

It actually feels like the room is taking on a red glow, and the way everything inside me drops and lurches at the same time, it’s making me sick.

They’re going to help her when she goes into heat? And my fucking grandmother is teaching them about what they’re supposed to do when that happens?

I don’t know if I’ve ever felt so goddamn betrayed. Betrayed in so many ways but the most prominent of them is the feeling like everyone who belongs to me is slipping through my fingers while they conspire against me.

Clayton, Nash. Fucking Indigo Rae. Because she’s as much mine as they are, and she’s the piece that will connect us in a deeper way than we already are, but I can’t accept that.

I refuse to accept that.

Which is why I need to leave. I need to get the fuck out of here and stay away. Long term. No more breaks, just a straight up me or her kind of thing. They’re backing me into a corner, and they’re forcing me to make them choose.

But I need to hear him say it.

“Because, why?” My palms start to sweat as my hands begin to shake, something akin to fear starting to creep up my neck over the scenario playing out. “Nan is helping because why, Nash?”

He clears his throat and ignores the way I can see his eyes well with tears. “Because it should be you, Bramley. She’s teaching me because it should be you showing me how to do this, and you won’t.” Nash looks away quickly before meeting my stare. “When the time comes, we should be helping Indy through her heat together, we should be figuring this out as a pack, but you won’t let that happen, so this is my only choice.”

“Your only choice?” I growl. “Your only fucking choice? You can’t seriously believe that.”

“I’m not the only one who does.”

Pulling my mask down so he can see every inch of my face when I do this, I take one step toward my alpha, and take a sledgehammer to the final nail in my fucking coffin. “It’s not your only choice. You have one more to make.” My eyes narrow as his panic starts to physically manifest in front of me. “Me, or her.”

“What?” Nash frowns before my meaning sinks in. “You don’t mean that. No matter what else you’re feeling, you don’t really mean that.”

“Me. Or. Her.”

“You seriously expect me to choose?”

I keep staring, my jaw clenched as I crack my neck.

My heart is racing right now, beating so hard it might pound out of my chest. I can see that he’s made his decision, and even though deep down I know why, it doesn’t feel like anything but getting stabbed in the back with a fucking machete.

That’s why he doesn’t respond.

Nash doesn’t say anything at all, just holds my stare and shows me what we both know he’s thinking by the look on his face.

He loves me, he’s angry with me, and he’s all but begging me to love Indy the way they do; the way I love Nash and Clayton.

He doesn’t need to say any of that because I’ve always been able to read him like a book, but it still hurts. It hurts us both, and I don’t need to stand here and wallow in that pain.

“Lock up when you leave,” I grunt as I turn on my heel. “Then give the key to Nan.”

I blow through the back of my shop, sick to my stomach and fighting everything inside of me telling me to turn around and go to him, to fall on my knees in front of Nash and beg him to forgive me. To plead with him to still love me, then help me do what I should have done the second I realized Indigo was my match.

But I don’t.

I move quickly and efficiently, entering my office and shutting everything down before I slam my phone on the desk, and pick up my keys and wallet. I’m out the back door before Nash makes it all the way down the hall, and by the time he’s in the doorway, I’m already taking off through the parking lot.

Fuck this.

Fuck all of this matching bullshit, this mating shit that everyone has always put so much importance on.

I don’t need any of it.

I take a deep breath as my hand lands on the knob, the door for the tattoo shop looming in front of me like some bad fucking omen.

How am I supposed to tell Clayton what just happened? That I fucked up our relationship with Bramley by handling him while I was so goddamn mad I could cry? How do I tell him I ruined everything we’ve had for almost two decades by being honest with our alpha about…

The way we’re going to betray him.

I know that’s what Bram was thinking, just like I know why he’s refusing to accept Indy.

But I didn’t think it would come down to this.

He’s been worse than ever; it was getting bad right after Clayton’s accident but these last few months, it’s been unbearable for all of us, and I just pushed Bramley to his breaking point. A point I don’t know if he’ll come back from.

I should have waited like Clay said.

Give him the chance to be around Indy, let Bram warm up to her some, to see that this isn’t the same as what happened all those years ago. He needed to see for himself that he wasn’t going to bond with her, to bond the four of us, then lose Indy the way his dads lost his mother.

If I would have waited, it might not have been this bad.

I didn’t, though, and now I don’t have a fucking clue about what happens next.

“Nash, look!” Indy gets up from the chair she was sitting on as soon as I walk in, quickly making her way to me with a breathtaking smile on her face. “Clay gave me a tattoo.”

“Oh?” I arch a brow as I hang up my coat, trying not to let this stupid fucking self-caused pain show. “Did he now?”

She nods her head and holds her hand out to me, specifically her middle finger, before our bond becomes a bigger issue than it just was. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” I lean down a little, sighing when I see the tiny heart in between the second and third knuckles.

“You’re lying.”

Straightening to my full height, I look down at our omega, my heart pinching over the conflicting feelings I anticipate won’t go away for a long time. “Everything’s fine.”

“It’s him, isn’t it?”

I frown, then ask like I genuinely have no idea. “Who?”

“The one I haven’t met, the one who…” She pauses and looks over her shoulder as Clay joins us by the door. “Who doesn’t like me.”

He loves you, we all do . “Don’t worry about him, ok?”

Indy searches my face, my cheeks growing hot from how much braver she seems to be, from the way she scrutinizes every feature as if she can read the truth the exact same way Bramley does. “You’re worried about him.”

Not a question, and it has me looking over her shoulder at Clayton.

Who shrugs and makes this moment his. “We’re always worried about him, he makes it hard not to be, but that asshole can wait. I promised you could try to tattoo me before we went to see the horses, and I’m sure Nash would love it if you tattooed him, too. Just not on the ass,” he says with a worried grin as he motions toward the back. “We have to work our way up to ass tattoos, they aren’t for the faint of heart.”

Indy giggles a little as they make their way to the curtain, and I can’t help but smile a little as I watch.

This would be perfect if Bramley was here, but he’s not, and I’m worried he might never come home again.