Chapter Fourteen
Maverick stood sheepishly in the doorway of the kitchen, his hands buried in the pockets of the linen pants he was wearing. Linen pants that seemed about as out of place on the alpha as the buttoned up blue polo that looked like it was two seconds away from choking him.
“Sorry,” he rumbled, looking anywhere but at me as what looked like a blush crept up his tanned neck.
“You should be, young man,” my grandmother scolded good naturedly. “Didn’t your grandmother ever tell you it was impolite to eavesdrop?”
“She did. She does. Again, I’m really sorry. I was coming to check on Len—Ms. Holloway to see if she needed anything after spilling on her dress.”
My grandmother looked Maverick up and down critically, assessing him from head-to-toe and seeming to like what she saw.
“You’re Philip Onassis’s son, right?”
Maverick nodded.
“Farrow told me you’d be looking after my granddaughter but he didn’t tell me how handsome you were going to be,” my grandmother said, a satisfied smile growing on her lips.
“Grandma…” I cautioned, wondering what was going to come out of her mouth next.
She turned and shot me a mischievous grin. “Oh stop, Lennon, I won’t say anything embarrassing.”
Maverick looked like a deer caught in headlights as she pushed off of the counter and approached him, circling him like a predator.
“Tell me, what is your priority here, Agent Onassis?”
Maverick cleared his throat gruffly. “To protect your granddaughter, ma’am?”
“Uh-huh.” My grandmother hummed thoughtfully, tapping her chin. “And how good are you at multitasking?”
Maverick frowned, his warm brown eyes meeting mine to ask for help.
I just shook my head, he was on his own when my grandmother was like this.
The look of betrayal on his face as he answered nearly made me laugh out loud. “Um, well, we are trained to be fantastic multitaskers at the academy, ma’am.”
My grandmother seemed pleased by that answer because she gave his shoulder a firm pat. “Good answer, young man. Now, Lennon, I’m going to go and see if I can find you something to wear for the rest of the barbecue. Why don’t you and your beau stay here and wait for me?”
“What?” I asked, wanting to know what she meant by the word beau, but she was already gone, whistling her way down the hallway.
Then Maverick and I were all alone in the kitchen, the faraway laughter from outside the only noise filling the space as we stared at each other awkwardly.
We hadn’t had a one-on-one conversation since before the car accident and being in this space with him brought the memories bubbling back up to the surface.
The softness of his voice, the warmth of his hand as he scraped them up and down my back, and the vibration of what I now realized was an alpha’s purr being used to calm my panic attack.
Tension hung in the air as I tried to search for something, anything to say to him.
“So,” he finally said, breaking the silence first. “Are you having fun at the party?”
My brows rose at that as I looked incredulously down at my barbecue sauce stained dress. “No, I’m not. Are you?”
“No,” he answered quickly enough that I could help the smile that followed.
He smiled too and it was a dazzlingly rare sight for the usually serious alpha.
Maverick took a few steps closer and I realized that I could smell his scent more deeply than usual.
“Did you use your suppressants today?” I asked, lifting my nose and inhaling his vanilla bourbon scent.
“I did,” Maverick confirmed, his smile turning down into a frown as he stopped. “I always do.”
It was my turn to move forward until I was standing right in front of him, his scent filling my nose more deeply.
“What about you?” he asked, his voice a low rumble. “Your scent is pretty strong today.”
“I did,” I said, copying his words. “But for some reason they don’t seem to be working as well around you guys.”
“You guys?” Maverick questioned, his eyes not on mine but lower.
He’s looking at my lips, I realized, sucking in a sharp inhale.
“Yeah, you and Zeke, and Dallas, and Brooks. It’s like they stop working halfway through the day most days,” I explained, my eyes drifting from the warm amber of Maverick’s eyes and down the sharp bridge of his nose to his own lips.
I’d never let myself look so closely before—at any of them. But something about my grandmother’s prodding all weekend was like liquid courage.
“We’ll have to talk to Collier and your mother about it,” Maverick said softly.
It was like someone had dumped a bucket of ice water over my head. “Why?”
“Because it’s not safe for your suppressants to wear off around alphas, Lennon,” Maverick said as if it was obvious.
“Even if it’s just you four?”
Truth be told I was almost 100% certain I knew why the suppressants didn’t work on me and the four alphas who made up my security team.
When I woke up the day after the accident I had made several frantic google searches after how effectively Maverick had soothed my panic attack and had come to a conclusion that I’d been studiously avoiding for weeks:
They were my scent matches—or at least Maverick was—I hadn’t gotten close enough to the other guys to really test my theory enough.
When I searched up why suppressants may not work when they had worked just fine for years prior there it had been in bold text:
‘At times suppressants may lose viability when in the presence of a biological scent match as the bodies begin producing large quantities of the pheromones associated with alpha and omega designations—a scent match is like a nuclear bomb of what a regular attraction would be like, thereby nullifying most commercial and perhaps even some military grade suppressants.’
It was information I’d been sitting on for days. I hadn’t been sure exactly what I wanted to do about it yet.
“Especially if it’s us four, Lennon,” Maverick answered, his voice irritatingly placating. “We’re your security team and if we get distracted by your scent it could be dangerous for you.”
“What if I don’t care?” I asked, sounding like a bratty child.
Maverick let out a sigh and reached up to tug on the collar of his shirt. “I care, Lennon. I want to keep you safe.”
“Just because it’s your job?” I asked, lifting my hands and unbuttoning the top buttons of his shirt, almost absentmindedly.
Maverick’s eyes softened. “If you really think that, then I would say you haven’t been paying attention at all.”
We stared at each other, the world fading away.
“I don’t want to be a part of Frank Delano’s pack,” I blurted suddenly. I wasn’t sure why, but it was imperative that he knew that information.
“I know,” Maverick said.
I nibbled on my lower lip, trying to gather all of the courage that I possessed for my next words. “And I really want to kiss you right now.”
“Even if it’s a very bad idea?”
I nodded.
Maverick’s shoulders dropped in surrender.
“Shit, fine,” he growled and then his hands were on my face and he was drawing me up onto my tippy toes and pulling our mouths together.
The world seemed to explode into color around us, my inner omega who had been previously quiet and dormant was now hopping up and down inside of my brain in celebration.
Finally, it purred, completely satisfied by the alpha whose hands were moving from my face and down my back to lift me off of my feet.
It didn’t take me long to realize that Maverick, buttoned up and serious Maverick, was a damned good kisser as my ass hit the cold marble counters and he stepped in between my legs and deepened the kiss.
“Open your mouth for me,” he rasped against my lips, as one of his palms cupped the back of my neck.
I complied, every nerve ending in my body feeling fried by the suddenness of everything as I melted into him.
His tongue danced with mine and I let out a moan that would have normally made me blush to hear on TV.
Then someone delicately cleared their throat and I remembered exactly where we were.
Maverick jerked away from me and we both turned to find my grandmother standing in the doorway with a new dress hanging over her arm.
“Sorry to interrupt—” she began with sparkling eyes but I was already jumping down from the counter, my face blazing with embarrassment.
I ran past her, ignoring her thumbs up in Maverick’s direction as I hurried in the general direction of my bedroom.
There was absolutely no way in hell I was going back out to that party now—fresh dress or not.
“Oh, come on, Lennie. It wasn’t that bad,” my grandmother said a few hours later as she tried to coax me downstairs to eat something.
The party had wound down since my escape and the only people remaining were the ones staying at Camp David for the rest of the long weekend—ergo my reason for hiding out in my room where I wouldn’t inevitably run into someone with a face that still felt hot hours later.
“It was that bad,” I mumbled from underneath the piles of nesting materials I’d burrowed under with Ginny at my side.
“So your grandma caught you kissing the broody hot bodyguard in the kitchen, it happens,” my grandmother said as if it happened every day. “Let me tell you during 4th of July in 1992 I found your mom and dad holed up and—”
I flipped the blankets off in my hurry to slap my hand over her mouth. “Please stop talking before I have to bleach my eyes and my ears at whatever visual you are trying to paint.”
I felt her grin against my palm.
“Got you to come out though, didn’t I? Now come on, Len. Your mother is asking me a ton of questions about why you went MIA and I assumed you didn’t want me to tell her that you were too busy sticking your tongue down a very handsome man’s throat.”
“When did you get so gross?” I asked with a groan, covering my face with my hands. “You know, normal grandmas make cookies and knit.”
“I’ve always been gross, young lady, you just used to have PG ears, and as for knitting? I can’t stand the feeling of yarn, it gives me goosebumps. I’ve always preferred woodworking with a chainsaw for my old lady hobby. Your grandpa hates it.”
She gave my hand a pat and Ginny’s chin a scratch before getting up. “Now get up, girlie, before I drag you out of this bed. There’s a half-rack of ribs with your name on it and don’t think I haven’t forgotten my quest to fatten you up.”
“Why?” I asked grumpily, “So you can stick me in your oven and eat me like the witch from Hansel and Gretel?”
She gave me a playful swat. “I’ll remember that, Lennon Holloway, mark my words.”
Thirty minutes later and I was sitting back with a belly full of meat and potato salad.
“Grandpa went into the wrong business,” I groaned as I wiped my face and hands with the wet wipes on the table.
“Don’t I know it, sweetheart,” my grandmother chuckled as she rested her chin on her hands and watched me clean myself up. “I used to joke that we should run away from politics and open up a barbecue spot in some small town somewhere.”
There was more to her words than just a joke. I didn’t know much about their early marriage, yet another thing they had sheltered me from, but I did know that it had been rough for my grandmother early on. Especially considering they had never been able to have children after my mother.
“Was it really hard? To be married to Grandpa?”
My grandmother shook her head. “No, being married to Farrow and being his omega has been the blessing of my life. When I was young I never thought my life would be as happy as it is now.”
“But,” she continued, “I won’t lie and say that Farrow’s parents made it very easy.
They had very explicit expectations for their son.
For their career and for the family he created and I didn’t fit that bill.
It put a lot of pressure on your grandpa to be perfect in every other aspect of his life and he passed that pressure on to your mother and on to you and Carter. ”
I’d known my grandmother’s life had been hard from a young age going from foster care to the omega center. She’d written an entire book about it years ago that I’d done a book report on in high school. I didn’t, however, know much about my great-grandparents.
By the time I came along they were quite old and I had very few memories of them. Carter remembered them better but all he would tell me was they were a miserable old pair that lived in the old Holloway mansion in upstate Massachusetts and that was it.
“Which is why,” my grandmother said, shaking away the cobwebs of memory that had settled over her for a moment, “I want you to do what you want with your life—regardless of what your grandfather or your mother think.”
“Grandma…” I trailed off. “That kiss was a mistake.”
Her silver brows rose. “Was it? It didn’t look or sound that way to me.”
My face flushed.
Grandma put her hands over mine and gave them a firm squeeze. “Look, I just want you to be open to things like that, sweetheart. Keep your heart open, if not for that hunk of an alpha and his team for someone else that will come along to take care of you.”
“What if I don’t need to be taken care of?” I asked stubbornly.
Grandma just grinned. “Lennon, we all need someone to lean on. No matter how strong we are. There’s a reason your mother is relying on you so heavily this time around, she’s missing the person she’d normally lean on during times like this.”
“Now,” she said, getting up with a little groan. “It is time for this old woman to get ready for bed,” she said as she gently cupped my face in her hands and I inhaled her minty scent that was almost as familiar as my own.
“Keep your heart open, you never know who might want to come in.”
Then she was gone, leaving me on my own in the kitchen with just my thoughts and a plate full of rib bones.