17. Lawson
Work has been fucking awful. I came in thinking the huge case we’ve been working on would distract me from the constant revolving door of thoughts involving Lainey, but in reality I’ve been on edge all day feeling the riot of her emotions through our bond.
We’ve only been bonded for a short time, and they feel way stronger than they should.
When she got sick earlier, I actually had to leave the break room at the station so I didn’t vomit when someone microwaved their leftovers.
“Ready for the meeting, Sheriff?” My assistant, Colt, knocks on my office door hesitantly, like he’s expecting to be yelled at.
He’s a great kid, moved here a couple of years ago and has worked for me since I started as Sheriff.
He actually goes to Harbor U with the guys, but he’s a couple of years behind them.
Closing my eyes, I lean my head back against my desk chair with a sigh. “Yeah. Let’s get this over with.”
When I open my eyes again, Colt is staring at me with concern written all over his face. “You doing okay?”
I chuckle, but I’m touched he would ask.
Colt’s pretty quiet and keeps to himself a lot, but there’s this sad aura to him that is part of the reason I hired him.
Reminded me of Lucky at his age, and I couldn’t deny him the job.
“I’m alright, Colt. I appreciate you checking.
” I look at him again, noting the dark circles under his eyes. “Are you okay?”
He grins, but it’s forced. “Never better.”
He disappears before I can question him some more, but it’s probably for the best. This meeting should solve at least a few of our recent problems and take one more headache off my plate, so the sooner I start it, the better.
“Alright, everybody here?”
A chorus of agreements ring out, but I do a visual inspection anyway. One of the pros of a small town is that I can count the number of employees in the Sheriff’s department on two hands. That’s also one of the cons, since we always seem to be understaffed.
“Excellent. I know we’ve all been waiting for this meeting, so I won’t keep you in suspense. Last month I met with the County Commissioner, and after deliberating with the board he has agreed to grant us additional funding to bring on two new deputies.”
The room erupts in cheers, and it’s enough to make me smile.
We have been severely overworked with the influx of new residents over the past year and I have spent at least half of that fighting the County Commissioners Board for more funding.
Now as long as I can get a couple of reliable people hired in the next few weeks, I might actually be able to take some time off when the baby is born.
As murmured chatter continues to fill the room, a foreign sensation bowls me over and makes me growl.
All noise comes to a halt as wide eyes stare back at me.
My mouth opens and closes, but nothing comes out for way too many seconds.
“I’m so sorry. If you’ll excuse me for a moment.
” I rush out of the room, ignoring the way their voices pick up immediately after the door closes.
I’m too focused on the overwhelming mixture of jealousy, panic, and fear warping all the rational thoughts in my head.
As soon as I get to my office, I slam the door shut and call Wyatt. He might be in class, but I don’t care. I don’t want to go to the emergency room if it’s nothing, and Wyatt is the closest thing I know to a doctor and one of the only people I trust.
He picks up on the first ring. “Law? What’s wrong?”
He knows if I’m calling him while at work, something catastrophic must have happened. “I can’t breathe,” I gasp, clutching the phone so tight I worry it might crack.
He snaps into caretaker mode, and the strength in his words stills the frantic energy in my body just enough that I can sit down without vibrating right off the couch.
“Explain in detail exactly what’s going on.
If you really can’t breathe, get someone to drive you to the hospital and I’ll round up the pack so we can meet you there. ”
“No!” I snap, then take a breath and lower my tone.
“I got this crushing feeling of jealousy during our staff meeting. So strong I literally growled mid-meeting. It was completely out of my control. And then a minute or so later the jealousy was replaced with bone-deep panic. The kind that stems from fear. What if my body is telling me something happened to Lainey? After what happened to my mom, I couldn’t…
” I trail off, struggling to catch my breath.
Wyatt hums, and it’s a concerned sound. “And now?”
“Huh?”
“What are you feeling right now?” he asks calmly.
I steady my breathing and take stock of my emotions.
I am just about to say I’m not feeling anything weird when a wave of arousal crashes over me, turning my cock to stone in an instant and making me bite my fist to muffle a moan.
“Still a bit of panic, but I just got hit with arousal. A lot of it.” I grit out.
There’s silence on the other end of the phone for a long moment, and then I hear the telltale hiss of breath that tells me my pack mate is trying not to laugh. “The fuck are you laughing for?” I bark. “It isn’t funny.”
He snorts, finally breaking out into breathless laughter. “Law,” he gasps, laughing even harder now. “Did you stop to consider the emotions you’re feeling aren’t actually yours ?”
I stop, because… I had not considered that. I spent the entire morning worrying about Lainey and the second I snapped into work mode it completely slipped my mind that her emotions could feel even stronger than my own at times. “Oh.”
“Yeah, oh .” He teases. “She was clearly feeling jealous, then freaked out because she felt jealous, and now either Rhys or Luck is taking care of her with a little… reassurance. You are Lainey’s scent match and her first and only bond, so it’s natural that you would be feeling her emotions pretty intensely. Especially the strong ones.”
You could knock me over with a feather, I am so relieved. “Cool. So neither of us are dying, I just have to deal with an inconvenient erection for the rest of the day?”
“Got it in one, sugar tits.” He laughs, and I roll my eyes. We have all picked up some of Rhys’s southernisms the last few years, but that one is a favorite with my brother and Wyatt.
I sigh, sitting back while also glaring at the outline of my dick behind my uniform pants. “Well, thanks for answering my call. Sorry it turned out to be nothing.”
“You call, we answer, Law. You know that.”
That finally gets a smile out of me. “Yeah. I know.”
We hang up and I groan loudly, dragging my hands through my hair and dislodging it from its slicked back style. The one time my obsession with scanning Lainey’s emotions should have come in handy, and instead it sent me spiraling into a state of panic so bad I had to call my pack mate.
I wouldn’t trade this bond for anything, but god damn, this woman is going to turn me grey by thirty. Whatever she’s doing, I hope she’s having enough fun for the both of us.