Chapter 10
Harper
A few days of living with the three Alphas pass, and slowly but surely, it starts to feel at least a tiny bit less surreal.
I fall into more of a routine with them, and I can’t help but be shocked at how easily they manage to incorporate me and Cora into their lives.
They must have been used to the way they were living, but they just seem unbothered by the chaos that happens when you have a little kid around sometimes.
Cora isn’t a bad kid, but she’s young. And this is the first time in a while that she’s had space to play and regular meals.
She leaves toys lying around everywhere, and needs attention at random moments.
She communicates with gestures and tugs instead of words, and that can’t be easy to deal with all the time.
But none of them complain. They do their best to understand her, and when they can’t, they look to me.
When Everett steps on a toy that has somehow rolled into the kitchen, he has a patient conversation with Cora about not leaving things where people could trip on them, and then deputizes her to make sure the house is ‘safe’ by checking every corner to make sure no other toys are in the way.
It holds her attention for two whole hours, and all her toys find their way back to her room.
When I apologize for the mess or for being in their way, all three of them wave it away.
“You’re not in the way,” Cash says.
“And you’re not any messier than Cash,” Lincoln adds without looking up from what he’s doing.
So it works somehow.
On the third day, Lincoln gives me a ride to the mechanic. Cora insists on coming too, so the three of us end up standing in the waiting room while we wait for Paul to finish up with another customer.
He comes over to me, wiping his hands on a towel before throwing it over his shoulder.
“I just wanted to check on the progress,” I tell him. “Any news?”
“None yet, I’m afraid,” he says.
Lincoln lifts an eyebrow. “Why not?”
“Lots of reasons. It’s an old car that has a lot of miles on it.
They don’t have the parts she needs for it sitting around the way they would with a newer car.
And there’s not just one thing wrong. We have to wait for another part to come in so we can fix the main problem.
Like I told you,” he looks at me. “It would be easier to just get a newer car because this isn’t going to be a quick or easy fix. ”
“If we took it somewhere else would they have the same opinion?” Lincoln asks gruffly.
Paul gives him a look. “You’re welcome to, but I can’t see any city mechanic having better luck. And they’d upsell you on the parts.”
“How much are you charging?”
Paul responds, and the number makes my head spin a little. He explains that he’s not doing any mark ups for the parts, just charging at cost and for labor.
That seems to be good enough for Lincoln, who stands down.
“We’re just playing the waiting game,” Paul continues. “The main thing we need is backordered because it’s not really in use much anymore. Once we get that in, we can start working on it.”
I sigh, feeling a little defeated. It’s not like I can afford it yet anyway, but it’s not good to hear that I’m still a ways out from being able to get back on the road.
Paul moves to talk to someone else, and Lincoln’s eyes fix onto me.
“What?” I ask, looking at him.
“You don’t have to leave once your car’s fixed,” he says quietly. “The job, our offer of letting you crash with us, that’s yours for as long as you need it. Until you can get back on your feet and feel a little more comfortable.”
Cora catches sight of someone walking by with a dog just then, and makes noises as she tries to climb up onto one of the chairs to see better.
Without taking his eyes off me, Lincoln helps her up, keeping a hand on her shoulder so she doesn’t topple over in her excitement to see the fluffy brown dog.
“There’s no strings attached or anything,” he continues.
Cora looks up at him with wide, warm eyes, and while it’s not the same way she looks at me, there’s definitely trust in her gaze.
My stomach twists with anxiety. It’s good that these men are good to her.
If they weren’t, I’d go back to the motel and take my chances there in a heartbeat to keep them away from Cora.
But at the same time, I don’t want her to get too attached to them.
We can’t afford to get attached to anyone or any place. We have to keep moving.
So leaving sooner rather than later is better. The longer we stay here, the stronger the ties will be, and it’ll be harder for both of us to leave when the time comes.
And it has to come.
“Thank you,” I tell Lincoln. “But no. We have to move on as soon as we can.”
Lincoln doesn’t argue, but there’s a look on his face that says he doesn’t like that answer.
With the disappointing update, we head back to the house. I start to get ready for my shift, but Cash stops me.
“You’re not on tonight,” he says. “Laurina’s got it covered.”
I’ve met one of their other employees a couple times. She seems like she’s steady and good at the work. Cash, Lincoln, and Everett mostly have management positions, even though all three of them sometimes take shifts working behind the bar when they need to.
“Are you sure?” I ask. “I can go help her out, I don’t mind.”
“It’s fine,” Everett says. “Tuesdays are the slowest nights. It’s only Thursdays, the weekends, and Mondays that get busy.”
“Why Mondays?”
“Because everyone wants to drown their sorrows from being back at work,” Cash says with a grin. “But don’t worry about it tonight. You deserve a break, Harper. You’ve been working hard.”
I don’t argue with that. It’s nice to have some time to spend with Cora, and to not feel like I’m always pushing her off onto Lainey to deal with.
The guys also stay home tonight, dealing with paperwork and making dinner. Cash mans the stove, frying up pork chops and potatoes that fill the house with the savory smells of garlic and onions. He hums as he works, and it feels so homey that I almost feel like I’m intruding.
We all sit down to dinner together, and it’s odd how natural it’s starting to feel to share meals with them. I offer to do the dishes, but Lincoln waves me away, so I go upstairs and help Cora through getting ready for bed instead.
She snuggles up with her elephant, and I read her a story from one of the books Everett found. Usually, it takes at least three stories to get her to go to sleep, but usually we’re in some shitty motel where it’s never quiet and she doesn’t feel safe.
Now she drifts off before I’m even done reading, and I sit there for a while longer, carding my fingers through her dark curls.
As temporary as this arrangement has to be, I can’t help but be grateful that Cora has a safe, warm place to sleep right now. She definitely deserves it.
I head back downstairs to make myself a cup of tea before I go to my room, but I hear laughter and voices coming from the living room. The three Alphas must be done with their various evening tasks, and are just sitting around, hanging out.
I’m working on getting used to seeing them like this, relaxed and carefree, outside the bar, but it still hits me every time I do. Their scents are mingled in the living room and throughout the house, a permanent reminder of just who lives here.
“Hey, Harper,” Cash says when he catches sight of me. “Come sit with us.”
“Oh. I was just going to make some tea before bed, and—”
“It’s too early to turn in for bed,” Cash interrupts. “Please?” He puts on his version of puppy eyes, which makes me snort with amusement.
“I work until midnight every night,” I tell him. “It’s never too early for bed.”
“She has a point,” Everett says.
I could use that as an excuse to escape back upstairs, but something makes me want to stay. Maybe it’s the warm, relaxed atmosphere. Maybe it’s the way Cash is looking at me and the way Lincoln is scooting over to make room on the couch.
“Just for a little while, I guess,” I mumble and come to sit down.
“Do you guys always take days off at the same time?” I ask them.
Everett shrugs. “It’s not really a day off. We all have day jobs that we still have to go to. The bar was supposed to be a side project, but we ended up getting pretty invested.”
“Seems like it would take up a lot of time when you already have jobs. And not easy ones.” I nod to Everett and Lincoln, who are basically always on call in case there’s crime or a fire.
“And then there’s me,” Cash says with a laugh. “Spending my time with the horses in the fields. The bar was my idea.”
Lincoln rolls his eyes. “All the impulse ideas come from Cash. He has too much free time and too much imagination. One day he just comes to us and says ‘you know what this town needs?’. There were plenty of other things on the list before a bar, but here we are.”
I tip my head to one side, thinking about that. “So there wasn’t a bar before that?”
“There was,” Everett explains. “But it got shut down. Health code violations, and there were rumors that the owner was using it and the small town vibe for all kinds of things. He left town in a hurry years ago, and the bar was in shit shape.”
“The whole thing was a fucking disaster for a while,” Lincoln says. “The building needed a ton of work. There was water damage and rats, and none of the equipment had been updated since the sixties. None of the wiring was up to code either, so it basically had to be gutted and redone.”
My eyebrows shoot up at that. “Jesus. Sounds like more trouble than it was worth.”
“Cash had a vision,” Lincoln deadpans, making jazz hands in a way that is clearly sarcastic. “And he’s like a dog with a bone when it comes to his visions.”
“Hey, it worked out, didn’t it?” Cash asks.
“It could just as easily not have.” Everett looks at me. “You actually had more experience bartending than any of us did when we started the place.”
“Really?”
He nods. “We had no idea what we were doing, and on top of that, we all had other commitments.”
“Don’t take this the wrong way,” I tell them. “But I’m honestly surprised you didn’t just go under. A lot of places with more experience do.”
“Oh, we know,” Lincoln says. “Trust me. It’s all part of the Cash effect.”
I blink. “The… Cash effect?”
“Cash just has this way of making things work out,” Everett explains. “He pulls some harebrained idea out of his ass, and then it just works.”
Cash jumps in to defend himself, but he’s laughing. “They’re not all hairbrained, thank you. Hiring Harper wasn’t out there, but it worked out for the best. She’s the best bartender we’ve ever had.”
My face heats, and I look down at my lap.
“Yeah, sometimes you manage to rein it in, I guess.”
The conversation and banter flows so easily between them, and they somehow manage to weave me into it too. It’s clear that they know each other very well, and that there’s love underneath all the jokes and teasing.
If Everett and Lincoln didn’t want to go along with Cash’s impulse decisions, then they probably wouldn’t bother. But the fact that they do must mean that they trust him. They’re a unit—a pack—and all their interactions just reinforce that.
The night wears on, and they keep talking. Everett talks about some of the wilder arrests he’s had to make over the years, making the other two laugh softly as they ask him to tell their favorite stories.
“It’s not every day you show up to a call about someone hanging out by the creek with their dick out and find your old history teacher skinny dipping,” he says, making a pained face.
“Just naked?” I ask.
He nods. “As the day he was born. Turns out he was drunk as a skunk because his wife left him for some guy she started seeing from the city. I had to talk him down to get him out of the creek, and then he spent the night in a cell until he sobered up.”
“At least it was probably more embarrassing for him than it was for you?” I try.
Everett snorts. “It definitely was not.”
Lincoln doesn’t tell any stories about his work, but he does laugh along and help Cash talk about the people in town who are the biggest characters.
It’s easy to lose track of time like this, caught up in the warm tones of their voices and the buzz of their laughter.
I meant to go to bed at some point, but I must end up falling asleep on the couch because when I open my eyes again, I have no idea what time it is, but I’m covered in a thick, warm blanket that smells like clean laundry.
It’s a sweet gesture, and I try not to think too hard about the fact that one of the men must have done it before heading up to bed.