Chapter Three – Noelle
Holy crap. They’re here. They’re here and they’re looking just as sexy as ever. Matteo, Felix, and Nico. It’s like every time I’m away from them I forget just how attractive they are. The muscles. The square jawlines. The intense looks. The freaking smolder.
God, the smolder.
I stood there a few seconds too long after wandering out of my room in search of some food—woke up early and couldn’t fall back asleep.
My stomach would not stop growling, so I gave up and stepped out only to find the scent of three delicious alphas in the air, and when I made it to the railing that overlooks the main living room, I spotted them sitting on the couch, as if they’ve been here the whole time.
And then, I don’t know, I just froze. I froze as it dawned on me. It’s like the world itself stopped. Turning around and racing back to my room seemed like the only smart option—who knows what would’ve happened if I would have remained there, ogling them like a lovestruck girl.
For a moment, I thought I heard one of them chase after me, but as I stand there with my back against the bedroom door, I don’t hear anything. Maybe it’s in my head. Maybe I only wanted them to chase me. How messed up is that?
What’s even sadder is that my heart is racing, just like that, the blood pumping so fast in my body I feel ten degrees too hot, like I want to claw off all of my clothes. Jeez. Why does Miranda have to have three ridiculously hot brothers? It’s really not fair.
A few minutes pass, and I finally am able to peel myself off the door and start pacing the length of the room.
I know I need to calm myself down, but it’s so unbelievably hard to get my body under control.
Anytime I see those three, it’s like I lose all sense of self in the blink of an eye.
It’s sad. It’s shameful. It’s… exactly what happens to omegas when they find their mates.
But that can’t be. I mean, I’ve always had a crush on those guys, sure.
Any girl with eyes would. It used to be easier to ignore them, to pretend their presence didn’t bother me to my core.
The depth of my feelings must be because I’m nearing my first heat.
It’s less than six months away now, which means I really need to find myself a pack.
Why does the thought of finding another pack other than the one downstairs fill me with such unease?
I debate on messaging or calling Miranda, but I know how much she loves sleeping in, so I decide against it. I learned years ago that, if she’s woken up too early, she’ll be in a bad mood the rest of the day.
My stomach rumbles, killing the silence of my bedroom. The sound is accompanied by jolts of pain my gut, telling me I am beyond hungry. I’m freaking starving. I need to eat something, and I can’t wait for Miranda to get up to brave the rest of the house. I need to go out there and face the music.
And by music, I mean three insanely hot alphas.
Should be easy, right?
I move to the mirror in the corner of the room and nearly smack myself when I see my reflection.
My hair is a mess, sticking up every which way—your girl likes to toss and turn at night until she gets comfy, hence the crazy hairdo—and the moment I see it, I quickly run my fingers through it to smooth it out and catch a few of the knots in it.
They saw me like this. How embarrassing. They’ve seen me in pajamas before, so that’s nothing new, but the messy hair…
Once my hair is relatively fixed, I muster up all the courage and self-restraint I have in me and head for the door. Now that I know they’re here, I can better prepare myself for their scents in the air, for them to stare at me like they haven’t seen me a thousand times before.
They’re my best friend’s brothers, for goodness sake. Things can’t be weird between us.
I step out into the hall like I’m an escapee on the run, inching forward without making a single sound as I try to hear them downstairs.
I don’t hear a single sound, and when I reach the railing that overlooks the living room, I find they’ve disbursed.
No Matteo, Nico, or Felix sitting there anymore, but I’m pretty sure I hear something in the kitchen.
Great. Might as well get this over with, then.
I’m slow in heading down the stairs, even slower in approaching the kitchen.
I only spot one of them; with his back to me, he cooks something on the stove—bacon, based on the smell.
Miranda and I didn’t bring bacon, so it must be something they brought with them.
He wears a plain navy-blue shirt, the fabric tight along his shoulders.
I try not to breathe in through my nostrils too much, lest I lose myself in both the scent of what he’s cooking and his alpha musk, but somehow the scent of both sneaks into my system anyways.
It’s Felix. One of the twins. I can tell based on his scent: woodsy, almost like a campfire after a rain. Combine his natural scent with the bacon in the pan, and I don’t stand a single chance.
God, it smells so good. My stomach rumbles as a result, and he must have fantastic hearing, because he hears me over the sizzle of the bacon in the pan.
Felix’s hazel eyes twinkle as he gives me a once-over, a warm smile tugging on his mouth. His brown hair is a little messy, an inch or so too long, but it gives him a boy-next-door look that drives me crazy. “Morning, Noelle. Bacon and eggs?”
I swallow hard as I tuck some of my hair behind my ear and wander to the island, cautiously sitting on one of the stools. “If you’re cooking, sure.”
His gaze lingers on me a few moments more, and then he returns his focus back to the bacon, grabbing the tongs and pulling the cooked slices off the pan before putting another batch on. “Sorry about earlier. We, uh, didn’t know you’d be here. Miranda didn’t tell us.”
When he says that, I hear a door open down the nearby hall, and moments later, Matteo’s stern face comes into focus.
He walks by the kitchen, lugging in a few bags.
He doesn’t so much as look at me as he passes by, which is fine.
It makes it easier to ignore the way his peppermint-riddled scent tugs at every nerve in my body.
I pick at the stone counter. “She didn’t tell me you guys were going to be here, either. I thought you guys decided you weren’t coming this year. It’s why she invited me in the first place.”
Felix tosses me a strange look. “We never said that.” It must dawn on us both that Miranda played us, because while I shake my head in annoyance, he laughs. “Looks like she played us all, then.”
“Who played what?” Nico appears, the other twin.
His brown hair is a bit shorter, trimmed short at the sides, the only way to tell them apart at a glance.
Their eyes are the same shade of hazel, and their bodies are just as muscular as the other.
He drops the bags he carried in from the garage and goes to sneak a piece of bacon, ignoring the look his twin gives him.
“Our sister played us,” Felix says. “And no more bacon for you. I’m cooking for Noelle.”
Nico sits on the stool next to mine, and it takes everything in me to not react to his nearness. “Why cook for her when you could cook for us both?” His reply comes easily, and even though he has a mouthful of bacon, he grins at his twin.
“Nico,” he says, “you told Matteo you’d help him unpack the car. Pretty sure leaving the bags here in the kitchen doesn’t count as unpacking—and there should be more food to bring in still.”
With a dramatic roll of his eyes, the alpha next to me stands and salutes. “Aye-aye, sir. I’ll get right back to work!” He turns that facetious, mischievous expression to me, gives me a wink, and then goes to pick up the bags he left on the floor.
I fiddle with my hands on my lap. I want to say something else, to talk to Felix, but that awkwardness refuses to disappear.
What do I normally do with my hands? Why are hands so weird when you don’t know what to do with them?
Suddenly they’re right there, taking up space.
Thank goodness he can’t see me toying with them beneath the island countertop.
Soon enough, Felix sets a plate before me: scrambled eggs and bacon, both of which are perfectly cooked. The eggs aren’t runny, nor do they have any burned bits. Perfect fluffy scrambled eggs with bacon that’s not too hard but not too chewy, right in the middle, how I like it.
“Thank you,” I say, and he comes to sit near me with his own plate, bringing along two forks. He hands one to me, and as I stab some of the eggs, I can’t help but notice he didn’t cook anything for his brothers. Just me and him.
Hmm. Not sure what I should think about that.
“So your parents let you come along for the holidays,” Felix remarks. “I’m surprised.”
“Well, my parents thought it’d be just Miranda and her parents, not you guys too.” I pick up one of the bacon slices and take a bite. “I don’t think they would’ve let me come if they knew you three would be here.”
“Why? Don’t trust us?” The questions come out of him easily, so easily they catch me off-guard. I wasn’t expecting him to be so… easygoing after hearing that. “You’re over our house all the time and it’s fine. Why would this be any different?”
“Because I’m not twenty minutes from home?” I offer with a shrug. “Because—”
“Because what?”
I bite the inside of my cheek. “My parents are just… nervous, with my heat approaching.” As I say it, my cheeks flush. “They’re both betas. They’ve never handled anything like that before, and since I don’t come from a family like yours, things are just… different.”
“You mean finding a match at the Omega Garden? I’m pretty sure they take any omega.”