Chapter Sixteen
“It feels like I haven’t seen you in years.”
My older brother, Ben, sits across from me inside Cuppa, each of us with a cappuccino and a croissant at a corner table by the windows, far from the door.
It’s our favorite table.
Just over seven years ago, he and his pack brothers completed their pack with the addition of their Omega, an amazing woman named Violet.
Since then, their pack has welcomed one daughter and one son, and now has two more babies on the way.
I can say without hesitation that they are great kids.
And not just because they're my niece and nephew, and future whatever the twins are.
Their firstborn, Ivy, is five, and Ben’s daughter.
There’s no questioning the family resemblance with her pale skin and black hair, though her eyes are green like her mom’s.
Ben and I look so much alike, one glance is all the proof anyone needs that we’re related.
We have the same jet-black hair, light blue eyes, the same jaw, although his tattoos peer out of the necks of his shirts and crawl down his right arm to his hand, and he has piercings where I don’t.
Ben’s a tattoo artist, now the owner of what was once Lloyd’s Tattoos, but is now Ivy’s Ink.
I swear the kids aren’t spoiled. At least not too spoiled.
I sip my cappuccino, my way of stalling to think. When I place the cup back on the table, I look my brother square in the eye. “I am scared shitless, bro.”
The way his brows fly upward would be comical if it weren’t my life I was talking about.
“Scared of what, exactly?”
“Having a pack. Being with them, living with them.” I clear my throat and lower my voice to just above a whisper. “Mating.”
He gets all bemused before sipping his coffee like I had, almost snorting on it with a laugh.
“Yeah, thanks a lot.”
“I’m sorry.” He sounds sincere, but I still give him the stink-eye. “I mean, you don’t need me to give you a ‘Birds and the Bees’ refresher course, do you?”
I am going to melt into my seat and disappear. “Of course not,” I hiss.
Now, he’s full-on laughing at me. “There’s no reason to be scared, Adam. You’ll do what comes naturally, and it will be great.” His head tilts as he regards me. “I assume she’s… not in the same situation as you?”
Uh, not a virgin, no. “She’s mated with one of my pack brothers.”
Ben nods at this, tears off a piece of his croissant, and pops it in his mouth. “Well, I know you’re going to be fine. And honestly, we can’t wait to meet your pack later today.”
It’s Saturday, the day we’re all going to head to Ben’s place and take a look at the interior for some inspiration. The whole family will be there.
I take a bite of my own croissant as my brain whirs in overdrive, until the bell at the door jingles behind me, and a familiar and delectable scent hits my senses.
Eyes wide, I’m frozen in my chair, and I don’t have a clue why. Embarrassment? Like, do I think she’ll know what I was just talking about?
Shit.
“Adam!”
I pop out of my chair so fast that I knock it over, catching it before it tips to the floor.
“A-Adley.”
Oh, great. Fantastic. Real smooth, man.
But she gives me a grin, leans in, and kisses my cheek. Warmth flows through my body at her touch, and I’m all better.
Magic kisses, apparently. Need to add that to the list of amazing things about Adley.
Ben clears his throat, and I jump a little, gesturing to him. “Uh, this is my brother, Ben. Ben, this is Adley. She’s my…”
What do I call her? “My Omega” sounds so clinical and cringe in a public setting. Can I call her my mate when we haven’t bonded yet?
“I’m his mate,” she supplies, and I guess that answers that question.
As they join hands to shake, Ben smiles. “It’s good to meet you, Adley. I’ve heard a lot about you.”
Taking her hand back, Adley shoots me a sideways glance. “Is that so?”
I cough, gesture to the empty chair between my brother and me. “Can you stay a bit?”
“Absolutely.” Her smile is so happy, it makes me feel it in my chest. “Let me just go order. Be right back.”
As she walks to the counter, I stare after her, watching every movement she makes as she waits in the short line. I sit when she makes it to the counter to order from Liz, the two of them laughing and talking animatedly.
I guess they’ve met.
Ben whistles low from across the table, drawing my attention.
“What?”
“You’ve go it bad.”
“No kidding,” I deadpan. “You know I’ve never been attracted to anyone before. Not their scent, not their personality. I could say a girl was hot, but it meant nothing. Like, ‘Yeah, that chick’s good looking,’ but,” I shrug, head shaking. “With Adley…”
“It’s completely different.”
“Yeah. I think I’m like, consumed by her.”
Ben grins. “You’ll be that way forever.”
Oh. That’s not great news. I’d like to get through the day without my every thought revolving around Adley, at least once in a while.
Like he can read the thoughts across my face, Ben laughs. “Things will smooth out once you, you know.”
Ah. The mating makes things easier.
But I don’t want to rush anything. The last thing I want is for our first time to be a disappointment. For any time we share to be, actually.
Adley returns a moment later with a tall cup and a strawberry-cheese danish I kind of eyeball when she puts it on the table. She turns to Ben. “I have to ask you something that may be a little strange.”
Ben grins. “If you want to see Adam’s baby pics, they’re at the house. He’s especially cute in the bath with all the bubbles on his head. I’ll show them to you later.”
I glare at my brother, and Adley giggles, and it’s so adorable, I stare at her, wide-eyed.
“No, no. Though that would be cute. But, actually, I used to spend every summer here when I was a kid. I would stay with my Uncle Jim. And Adam looked so familiar when I first saw him, but we figured out we couldn’t have met.
For one, we’d have absolutely remembered it after a certain age, and for two, well,” she gives me a look I can’t read.
“Adam is five years younger than me, and he said he was away a lot as a kid.”
Inwardly, I wince at her words. I know Ben won’t take them the wrong way, but I can’t help my knee-jerk reaction to worry.
Ben is twelve years older than me. Both our parents were dead by the time I was almost thirteen.
I spent a lot of years away at school. Boarding school, then university.
“Actually, the more I look at you, I think I do recognize you from somewhere.” Ben squints at Adley, then purses his lips. “Were you here the year they had the carnival in the hotel parking lot? It only happened once in my lifetime.”
“Oh, yes! I absolutely was. That was the last year I stayed the summer before going to university.” Adley is so excited, I smile on her behalf. And a second later, her mouth forms an O of surprise. “You were there. You worked the Tilt-a-Whirl ride!”
Ben laughs. “Yeah, that was me. I needed some extra cash.” His head shakes. “You were too scared to get on the ride.”
She huffs, giving him a knowing look. “I wasn’t scared of the ride, more of how it was constructed in such a short time, just to be taken down a week later.”
Ben’s laugh turns to a chuckle. “Now I remember. We talked about it over cotton candy on my break.”
Adley’s head shakes. “You flirted with every single girl you saw there. And you—”
She cuts herself off, lips clamped shut before sipping her coffee.
Wait, what? She can’t stop the story there. “What did he do?”
My voice comes out way more aggressive than I intended, but I don’t really care.
Ben chimes in then. “Calm down. I tried out my game on Adley and got denied.”
I see red.
I know I love my brother, but I can’t feel it past the rage in my brain.
My words come out as a growl. “You ‘tried out’ your ‘game’ on Adley? When you were twenty-five and she was at most eighteen?”
“It wasn’t like that, Adam.”
I can hear Adley’s words, but they don’t quite register.
Ben’s expression isn’t at all apologetic, it’s more knowing, and that further enrages me.
I get up out of my seat and look down at my mate. “What did he do?”
Her face is shocked, but I’m not bothered. “Adam, he didn’t do anything. We talked, and he tried out some cheesy pickup lines on me that I just laughed at.” She takes my hand and looks up at me from her seat. “And I never saw him again until right now.”
She speaks like an adult to a petulant child, slow and steady. And maybe I’m acting like one. And maybe I don’t care.
I pull Adley to her feet by our joined hands until her chest crashes into mine, and I grip the back of her head, dive in to kiss her. I plunder her mouth with my tongue, my mouth open so wide I’m swallowing her lips, holding her tight and growling into the cavern of her mouth.
It doesn’t take more than a minute for a voice in the back of my mind to start whispering, You’re in public. You’re eating your mate’s face in a cafe you go to almost every day.
My body stiffens before I pull away from Adley, leaving her lips puffed and wet, my dick struggling not to stand at attention. And failing. Miserably.
What did I do?
“Do you feel better now?”
I blink at Ben, who’s got one brow raised in question as a fog lifts from my consciousness, and all I feel is confusion. Then, out of nowhere, Adley stuffs my mouth with a piece of her strawberry danish, and my brain sizzles back to life.
I look at her with wide eyes, but all she does is smile at me, understanding shining in her dark eyes.
What… what was I so mad about?
My brother shakes his head at me as he reiterates, “It’ll get better once you’ve mated.”
And that line hits me like a freight train.
Heightened emotions. Instability.
This is the start of Bond Sickness. This is because we haven’t mated yet.
Fuck me.