Chapter Two
Dex
“Hey, handsome. This seat taken?”
I looked up from where I was absolutely not sulking into the glass of freaking lemonade on the bar in front of me.
It was bad enough I couldn’t have alcohol, but just to be able to go to a damn bar I had to traipse to the next town over to escape my best friend’s notice.
Now I was being crowded and the Alpha standing entirely too close to me was a stranger.
My inner bear was bristling which made me even crankier.
“Yes.”
“Yes, it’s taken? I haven’t seen anyone sitting there and I’ve been watching for a while.”
“You’ve been watching me?” I huffed and looked back into my glass. “Tell me you’re a creeper without telling me you’re a creeper, dude.”
“Mind your manners,” the stranger snapped, flooding the area around me with alpha pheromones.
“Or you’ll do what exactly?” I snarled back.
“Dex? Everything okay over here?” The bartender, Heidi, crossed her arms over her chest and shot a look at the blowhard.
“Everything is fine,” the Alpha snarled, turning his glare in her direction, “except for the help getting too big for their britches. Why don’t you run along and find something to clean while he and I get to know each other?”
I nearly choked on a sip of lemonade. It takes a special kind of stupid to step to a female grizzly shifter. I was still sputtering when a voice came from my other side.
“How’s it goin’, Dex?”
Glancing to my left, I relaxed at the sight of a familiar face. Myke Kravets was a local Alpha that I only knew casually, but well enough to know he was safe.
“Hey, Myke. I’m okay but this gentleman seems bent on getting his ass kicked tonight.”
“You threatening me, Omega?” the stranger seethed, the air around him nearly vibrating with his anger.
“I think you misunderstood him, friend,” Myke chuckled and dropped a friendly hand on my shoulder, pulling my barstool closer to him without any effort at all and nodding over the bar to where Heidi stood scowling. “The regulars know better than to piss our lovely barkeep off.”
The man started to argue but stopped short when a deep, rumbling snarl came from the other side of the bar. Tossing a ten on the bar next to his still-full beer, the Alpha made for the exit at double time, leaving the three of us shaking our heads.
“Some people, huh?” Myke said with a laugh, squeezing my shoulder before removing his hand. “Sorry for touching you without your permission, Dex, but he was a little too close to you for comfort.”
“No problem, Myke.” I reached for his hand and gave it a quick squeeze. “I appreciate the assist.” I winked at Heidi and grinned. “After all, we wouldn’t want the bar shut down again for another suspicious death inquiry.”
Heidi shook her head in mock disgust, but I saw the humor glinting in her eyes as she turned away to mix Myke’s drink, assuring him it would be on the house for the help. He accepted graciously but tossed an outsized tip on the bar before sending me another friendly smile.
“I’ll just get out of your hair.”
Then the door opened and my stomach lurched at the sight of a familiar form.
“Myke?”
“Yeah?”
“Could you stay with me for a few minutes while I finish my drink?” I swallowed hard as Otto ambled toward a bar stool several feet from me. “I’d rather not be alone.”
Myke’s brow twitched as he followed my gaze, but he settled down on the stool the strange Alpha wanted to claim, his muscular form blocking most of me from Otto’s view. “Of course, I will,” Myke agreed gently. “You just let me know when you’re ready to go and I’ll walk you out, yeah?”
“I’d appreciate that.”
~*~
Otto
The fucker was sitting entirely too close to Dex. Even worse, he kept touching him like he had some sort of right to my..to the Omega.
There was no way Dex’s dads would be okay with this prick pawing their son, but they weren’t there to protect him, so I did what I knew they would want- I shoved to my feet and lumbered over to the two men.
“Get your fucking hands off him,” I snarled.
Dex’s head jerked up, his jaw dropping in shock, but the other Alpha just leveled a cool stare at me and rolled his eyes.
“Dex doesn’t object to my hands on him,” the prick said cooly, dropping his hand to squeeze Dex’s knee, “so I don’t see what business it is of yours, anyway.
” He raised a brow at me. “Otto, right?” When I nodded, he shook his head.
“Don’t know if you remember me. I’m Myke Kravets.
And I’m not sure why you’re hassling us. ”
As he spoke, the tart scent of distressed Omega pheromones began to tickle my nose along with the oddest fresh tinge. I rolled it around in my throat for a minute before realizing what I was scenting and spinning to stare at Dex. “You’re pregnant?”
The color drained from Dex’s face and he lurched on his stool, he would have fallen but Myke fucking Kravets caught him with a gentle arm around his waist. “And if he is?”
“You work fucking fast, don’t you?” I growled, fighting back the bear who was more than willing to go back to prison if I just let him out to end this jerk. “No one even knows you’re together and you’ve fucking knocked him up?”
“Otto, you need to go sit down.” The bartender’s voice was low and deadly. “You’re causing a fucking scene and I don’t run that kind of place.”
“What kind of place?” I demanded, turning my scowl on her. “These two are all but fucking in front of God and everyone but I can’t question the intentions of the fucker?”
“Oh, my God,” Dex hissed under his breath. “We are not doing anything, he just patted my knee! Would you please go sit down? This is not how I wanted everyone to find out!”
Great. It wasn’t enough that the bartender was glaring at me or that Myke Kravets was visibly amused, now Dex was mad at me, too. Couldn’t he see that I was just trying to look out for him?
“Fine,” I huffed. “If you don’t want my help, I’ll call your folks.” The more I thought about it, the better that idea sounded. “They can take care of this.”
“Don’t you fucking dare,” Dex snarled, his face going from white to an alarming shade of bright red concerningly fast.
“That’s enough,” the bartender snapped, raising her hand to summon the two werewolf bouncers from their spots by the doors. “Get Otto the hell out of here and put him on the suspension list for two weeks.”
Suspended? I was being suspended from a bar for trying to protect Dex? Talk about overreaching bullshit!
“Wait! You can’t do that!” I argued, dragging my feet against the floor as the two massive werewolves snapped a silver cuff on my wrist. “If I have to leave, I’m taking Dex with me!”
“The hell you are,” Myke fucking Kravets snapped, his hand still laying possessively on Dex’s knee. “The only way he’s leaving with you is if he chooses to.” He gentled his voice and turned to Dex. “Do you want to go with him?”
Dex swallowed hard and shook his head before responding in a voice much smaller than normal. “No. I don’t want to leave with him.”
“Then that’s all there is to it,” the bartender said, gesturing for the bouncers to get on with removing me.
A few minutes of scuffling later, I was on the outside looking in through the massive plate glass windows as that fucking Kravet’s Alpha comforted the Omega that should have been mine.