Page 17 of Wanted by the Wolves (The Last Shifters #2)
Chapter 16
Gage
T he omega huffs at me, prancing impatiently and glancing at the door. I can practically see the woman inside telling me about myself.
As if I don’t already know.
The first storm has arrived, and the snow is already sticking to the ground. It isn’t dangerous yet, but the howling wind outside makes her nervous.
I grind the mix until it’s got a powdery consistency, then pour the contents of the bowl into a pouch. I grow what I use for healing and spell work. For the last few days, I’ve been restoring my reserves. With an omega in the house and ferals at the border, I need to be prepared.
The stubborn omega nips at the hem of my jeans. The black wolf with that little star of white on her forehead is pretty, even when she’s close to taking a chunk out of my leg. I want to glare at her, but she’s too damn cute. I settle for a lifted brow.
“Nobody said you have to stay, little star,” I remind her.
She growls at me before she curls back up on the pillows I stacked under the counter.
Stubborn .
She’s been my shadow in the evenings while I work at the table tucked into the back of the greenhouse. For the last several nights, it’s been the same:Dex brings her. I work while she cozies up by my feet. She purrs me into a stupor better than any buzz I’ve ever chased. I pretend I’m not affected by her. She calls me on my shit by refusing to leave.
If I’m keeping score, the omega has me by a long shot. Maybe it’s futile to resist her, but giving in seems like a recipe for shattering the remaining scraps of my heart.
Alphas are drawn to omegas, but I thought my time as a healer had made me immune. I’ve spent my life around them and never been drawn to one like I am with this little wolf. It isn’t only her scent—though that’s basically a shot of pure lust chased by a desire to claim her neck.
What’s fascinating about her is how she seems to persist in a world like ours. She’s a fighter. Despite her size, designation, and fate, she’s still here. And even with all that, beneath the wildness, her natural inclination is to be sweet. The fact that she’s been purring for me is proof. It’s as astounding as it is undeserved.
I wish I could give her safety and a home. She needs mates who can protect her so she doesn’t always have to fight, but I’ve proven I can’t be that guy for her. My track record is zero for eight. Those aren’t odds I want to bet on for her.
I can hardly live with myself after the ones I’ve lost. If she were mine and I failed her? Fuck. I’m barely hanging on as it is. There is no way I could survive. Not losing her.
I was coping just fine until she arrived. Even if it wasn’t living, it was close enough. Now, all I see is how I can lose her and them… and all the ways I’ll never be enough.
I finish in my workshop, cleaning up the space and organizing the reserves into crates. It’s gonna take two crates to get this all back inside, but I won’t be able to make it out here easily until after the storm has cleared and we’ve shoveled the courtyard.
By the time everything is loaded, the snow is really coming down. I shift the crates to one hand and latch onto her fur with the other. I may not want the connection between us, but that doesn’t stop my protective instincts.
Dex is waiting for us on the porch with the look of a man about to deliver a punishment.
“Sorry I kept her out past curfew.” My tone is just mocking enough to goad Dex.
His eyes heat, and the look he gives me is difficult to decipher, but the result is all alpha. He doesn’t speak, but he doesn’t have to.
I roll my eyes. “She’s fine. It’s snow. No need to get your claws out for a walk in the yard.”
The little wolf nuzzles his crotch, distracting him long enough for me to dart inside.
I refuse to open the clinic, so I head to the kitchen. There isn’t enough room in the storm-stocked pantry, and I curse like a motherfucker as I shove shit onto shelves.
“What did those canned vegetables do to you?” Briggs pokes his head into the pantry.
“They’re on top of me.” I give up and leave the final crate on the floor. My hands find my hips, and I glare at him. “Like everything else in this house.”
The damn alpha doesn’t take the hint, his mouth pulling into a smug grin as he crowds himself into the doorway. “I seem to recall you like it when others are on top.”
There it is. There was no way he wasn’t gonna bring that up.
It was once during the full moon, but I would be lying if I said I haven’t thought about that night or him many times… or about how he’s the one to show up at my door with an omega who smells as if she could be mine— ours .
It’s common for alphas to satiate their ruts together during a full moon. Packs are typically polycules. The alpha mates are often lovers, joined together as partners in caring for their omega. My younger self couldn’t wait to find my mates and pack.
I’m not my younger self, and I hate that he brought her to me now.
“I like my solitude and my own hand just fine,” I grumble.
He steps toward me, and I back into the shelf, the glass jars clanging at the force. With one arm, he cages me, and I hate that I like the way it feels.Briggs is as handsome as he was a decade ago, and the light in his eyes is just as bright.
“I think you’re a liar.” He brushes his lips against my ear as he whispers, “But when you’re ready to face the truth, there’s room for you in our bed.”
For a moment, I almost cave. His scent spikes with a floral spice that erodes all my brain cells. His breath on my neck makes me shiver. It would be so easy to let him pull me with him, to join her nest and see how good we could be as a pack.
It would be explosive.
That little reminder brings reality crashing back down.
“It’s my bed,” I growl, pushing him away. “But since y’all commandeered it, I’ll keep sleeping in another room. Alone. ”I duck under his arm and out of the pantry in another hasty retreat.
“What was it you said about me being stubborn?” Briggs calls.
I haul ass to my new room, ignoring the fact that the three of them are everywhere I look.The urge to slam the door is strong, but instead I lean against it and light the joint from my pocket.
Here’s to hoping the scent will drown them out.
I stare at the bare white bedroom. It feels as if I’m looking at ghosts. There’s only a bed and empty furniture, but the memory of the former alpha who lived here lies atop the hollowness. I can almost smell the stench and see the mess. Darell’s feet were worse than running across a skunk, and the security guard left his socks everywhere.
He turned on a full moon and attacked the omega he’d been guarding for months.
After a few drags, I abandon staring at the storm outside the window and strip for bed. It isn’t that late, but the storm makes me restless. I try to get comfortable, but it’s impossible.
The deep sounds of Briggs and Dex talking and the little wolf’s barks and yips filter in from the hallway. It’s stupid how I listen for every word when I could just be out there. I wrap a pillow around my head to block it out, hating how it feels as if my only company is ghosts.
I’m lonely. Soul-tired, feel-it-in-my-bones lonely .
But what the fuck is the alternative? No matter how much I wish things were different, they aren’t. How am I supposed to let myself fall for her knowing she can only ever be mine temporarily? Or let myself get close to these men, devote myself to our omega and form a pack, knowing it will all be ripped apart?
I lie there in the dark, feeling sorry for myself and the world until the three of them go to bed. My eyes close, but my mind races. It’s been like this since they arrived. The nights are long when they’re spent half wishing for and half dreading the dawn.
The storm doesn’t help. I feel as though I can hear magic in the wind. It’s angry, rattling the bones of the cabin.
My door creaks open, and I lift the pillow. In the doorway stands the omega. She’s naked except for a sheet wrapped around her, and every bit of her is a woman, not a wolf. The light from the hallway leaks in, making her silhouette glow with hazy light.
She’s so fucking beautiful.
I swallow around the lump in my throat.