14. Montana
Montana
W hen I finally closed the lid of my laptop and kicked back from my desk, it was already dark outside, a passing storm bringing down the rain, along with a good showing of thunder and lightning.
Luckily for us, Clay had already gotten Maisie to bed, her little brain and body all tuckered out after a busy day. Otherwise, getting her to lie down to sleep while all the grown-ups were home and watching TV in the living room would have been an ordeal.
I dragged myself into the kitchen and opened the fridge in search of a well-earned cold beer and one of those cookies Dakota had found earlier.
Before Piper, I couldn’t remember the last time there had been freshly baked goods in this house that didn’t come from Evelyn taking pity on us and bringing something by during the holidays.
I reached for the circle of golden brown, studded with chocolate chips and toasted pecans, and closed my eyes as I took a bite.
Damn , that woman could cook— and bake, apparently. The blondies she’d served at lunch the other day were delicious, but the cookies had them beat. I could scarcely imagine what she could do with a cherry pie or a birthday cake.
The fact that she was so attractive, on top of her skills, made her almost irresistible. But as one of Maisie’s dads and her boss, I shouldn’t even have been indulging the thought. So I scarfed down the rest of the cookie and popped open an ice-cold brew.
I was fully ready to set myself down on the couch for some much needed mindless TV time to unwind when Dakota came flying around the corner into the kitchen, nearly knocking me on my ass.
“Watch it, Kota!” I snapped at him, my beer sloshing dangerously in my hand.
“Chill, Monty,” my twin laughed, stepping around me to get to the fridge and his own cold beer.
I was about to give him hell about nearly causing me to waste a perfectly good beer when I caught a whiff of sweet honeysuckle mixed with Dakota’s fresh mineral-petrichor undertones.
“Are you fuckin’ kidding me?” One of my hands snapped out to grab a handful of Dakota’s collar, reeling him toward me so I could get a good sniff.
“What crawled up your ass and died there?” Dakota laughed, trying to wriggle out of my grip.
“You smell heavily like our new omega nanny. Do I want to know why?” I let go of his collar and took a slug of my beer, not wanting to acknowledge that my professional concerns had begun to give way to my mounting jealousy.
“You’ve always been the bright one, Monty—why don’t you do the math?” Dakota grinned, dusting himself off once he was free from my clutches.
I turned away from him as he helped himself to the beers in the fridge.
“Do you realize how incredibly stupid it is for you to be thinking with your cock when we finally have some help here on the ranch, especially when it’s a nanny Maisie actually likes?”
“Did Daddy not explain it to you when we were younger? When an alpha and an omega have those funny feelings in their pants, and you start to get that big bump down at the bottom of your—” Dakota teased.
I slammed my beer down on the counter before grabbing a cookie to shove in Dakota’s mouth just to stop his yapping.
“You taste that?” I challenged as he made a sound of delight, munching away on the distraction cookie. “You remember the last time we were all done with dinner and bath-time and putting Maisie down to bed to have a bit of free time before midnight?”
I gestured wildly around me, a flash of understanding twinkling in the corner of Dakota’s eyes as he began to shake his head, slightly bewildered.
“If you end up ruining a good thing just to get your dick wet?—”
“Nobody’s lookin’ to ruin anything,” he cut in. “I’m just following what my heart tells me. I haven’t so much as given a second glance to a girl in years.”
“Yeah, following your heart —I bet that’s what you’re following,” I snorted, even as Dakota began to puff up his chest in protest. “She’s just lookin’ for a good time!
A little side action while she figures out her next move,” I pressed, a worried look beginning to turn down the corners of Dakota’s mouth.
I thought I was really getting through that thick skull of his when Zeke popped up from nowhere, draping his massive frame over our shoulders conspiratorially as he dropped his big blond head right between us.
“What are you two buttin’ heads about over here?” He grinned lazily, giving us both a once-over before he noticed the half-eaten cookie in Dakota’s hand. “Ooh! A cookie!” he said before plucking it from his hand and scarfing the thing down whole.
As Zeke licked the crumbs from his fingers, an intense wave of Piper’s honeysuckle scent against the fruity tang of Zeke’s prickly pear crashed over me, and my fury intensified.
“If Kota had a little stink on him, you reek like a goddamn honeysuckle omega fuck bush!” I blurted, my words barely making sense in my rage.
Zeke just blinked dumbly at me. “Uh, what’s a fuck bush?”
I buried my face in my hands, shrugging out from under Zeke’s arm.
“You two can’t possibly be this eager to fuck things up with the new nanny when our situation is just starting to improve,” I scolded, pacing angrily around the island to put some distance between myself and those horny knuckleheads.
“It was less fucking up— more her riding,” Zeke interjected with another goofy grin, and it was all I could do not to wipe that smile right off his face.
“Turns out the hay pen in the stables is very comfortable when the right blanket is involved.” His eyebrows moved in a suggestive golden wave before he lifted his arm from Dakota’s shoulder and stooped down into the fridge.
I took several deep, calming breaths as I listened to Zeke close the fridge and saunter into the living room.
I faced Dakota. “All I can tell you is, this is a bad idea. This girl couldn’t even tell you and me apart. She thought I was you when I met her at Evelyn’s. She doesn’t care about you or us.” Finally, I had said it.
“I don’t know, Monty, that’s not really fair. She didn’t even know that there were two of us before she met you at Evelyn’s. I think she’ll surprise you.” Dakota eyed me as I grabbed my beer, no longer interested in joining my brother or the rest of my pack mates for TV time.
“Yeah, we’ll see about that,” I mumbled under my breath as I skulked from the kitchen. If no one would listen, I would need to show them.