11. Chapter 11
eleven
Avoiding Gabe until the evening was not as easy as Cyrus wanted.
They needed to talk to Patrick and Nina, but Cyrus couldn’t get them on the line, and not answering Gabe’s texts about it was a bad idea.
So he was forced to at least interact with him via text.
He was plagued by what had happened in the bathroom—not because he was guilty for his sexuality, no.
He had stopped feeling wrong about that years before when he broke free from the people who made him feel like something was wrong with it.
Regardless, he couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened with Gabe. His kiss, his sounds, the scent of his skin, and the feeling of his warm body against his.
Still, he avoided Gabe when they were in the same rooms and texted him shorthand reassurance that they’d get a hold of Patrick and Nina soon enough.
He was trying not to freak out about it himself, but he knew driving three towns over to try and get in contact with them could turn out very poorly; so he needed to wait for them to get back to them; if they didn’t, they could deal with it later.
Cyrus felt he had been doing far too much action first, thinking later since Gabe came into the picture.
The day was coming to a close. Cyrus was hungry, people were preparing for the claiming ritual in the backyard, and Rachel and Evan had guests arriving.
Cyrus decided to duck downstairs and grab some leftover pizza instead of waiting to see what else would be made.
When he got down there, he could smell a roast in the oven and saw the timer on the stove set with a couple of hours left.
Yeah, he was not going to make it through that. He hadn’t eaten lunch, and breakfast had been ten hours prior.
Cyrus started to go to town on a couple pizza slices while standing in the kitchen. Michelle walked in and rolled her eyes at him as he was doing so.
“You couldn’t wait for dinner?” she teased.
“I didn’t eat lunch,” Cyrus said, slightly mumbled through his bite of pizza.
Michelle chuckled. “Well then.”
She leaned against the counter and folded her arms as she looked at him.
Cyrus continued eating, pretending he didn’t feel her eyes on him, but as he was finishing off the crust and looking for a napkin, he couldn’t help but look over and see the look of judgment on her face.
“What?” Cyrus asked.
“What’s going on with you and Gabe?” she asked quietly.
Cyrus wiped at his mouth but didn’t answer.
“I saw you two,” she reminded him.
It was kind of hard for him to keep it a secret from someone who had walked in on them making out against a brick wall.
“I don’t know right now,” Cyrus insisted. “That wasn’t planned.”
Michelle nodded slowly. “Well, with everything going on right now, you should probably—”
“Yeah, figure it out. I got it,” Cyrus cut her off.
Michelle pushed off the counter and stepped closer to him.
“No, talk about it and cut the brakes. Neither of you needs to be gettin’ into this right now,” she told him.
Cyrus’s brow furrowed.
“So you don’t think we should…” he trailed off. “…explore it?”
Michelle sighed.
“You don’t seem super interested in exploring it without it being a mess, so, no right now, I think unless you plan on being with him and not glaring at each other every single time you’re in the same room, you should cut it and focus on the attacks and shit right now,” she told him.
Cyrus nodded.
“I can respect that,” he mumbled, though his stomach was tight. He tossed his napkin in the trash can.
“I’d like to know how the hell you and him ended up in this position, but, clearly, you’re going to keep it to yourself, so, just…use your head, alright?” she asked and started into the kitchen once more.
“Got it.” Cyrus sighed.
Cyrus didn’t often agree to such things with other people, not without a fight. He was stubborn, but Michelle didn’t often take the initiative like she was in that conversation. He knew that she wanted what was best for the pack and herself—so did he. Did Gabe?
Cyrus wasn’t so sure. Part of him was still convinced that Gabe was only there for reasons relating to their history together. How could he possibly care about their pack as much as Cyrus and anyone else in the pack did?
Shaking his head, he went heading for Lily’s room to talk to her, but when he got there, the door was wide open, and Gabe was sitting on her office chair while she sat in her bed.
He didn’t hear what they were saying, but they were smiling and laughing a little before they noticed Cyrus and cut off.
Gabe looked up at Cyrus from his seat with a momentarily worried look on his face. Lily smirked at Cyrus.
“What’s goin’ on here?” Cyrus asked.
“Just hanging out with the new Alpha,” Lily said. “That’s okay right?”
Cyrus rolled his eyes.
“You can do what you want,” he said.
His gaze shifted to Gabe.
“But I did come to talk to you, Liliana,” he admitted.
Lily could tell he was serious by the way he said her name.
“Oh, okay. Can you give us a few, Gabe?” she asked.
Gabe nodded. “Of course,” he said before he stood up and brushed past Cyrus to get out of the room.
Cyrus closed the door after him and sat down in the same space Gabe had been sitting.
“What’s up?” Lily asked.
“Gabe and I kissed,” Cyrus admitted.
Lily blinked, “Oh wow,” she chuckled.
“So Gabe didn’t tell you?” he asked. “I thought he might have.”
Lily shook her head.
Cyrus sighed as he scrubbed his hand over his face.
“Well, yeah, at the bar. When we went outside, you were right about something happening,” he admitted.
Lily laughed. “Yes! I mean, I knew I was, but—” She chuckled but then seemed to tone it down when she saw the distressed look on Cyrus’s face.
“Yeah…and, things have been tense since then, remembering him from the past, and…earlier today we may have”—Cyrus waved a hand around—“Dry humped each other in the bathroom.”
Lily’s face contorted. “Uh ew, I didn’t need to know that.” She leaned back and cackled for a second shaking her head. “Oh my god.”
“I thought you wanted to know!” Cyrus insisted, furrowing his brow at her, laughing at him.
“Only as much as a sorta-sister would want to know,” Lily insisted.
Cyrus sighed. “Alright, well, you know anyway,” he mumbled. “Things have been even tenser.”
Lily leaned back straight and folded her arms. “I imagine,” she said. “So, you like him?”
Cyrus’s brow furrowed. “I-I don’t know. I took care of him when he was a kid,” he reminded her.
Lily nodded. “But, you didn’t feel the same way about him then as you do now, right?” she asked but continued before he could even get the ‘not’ out of his mouth, “So, now he’s an adult, and you feel differently about him. He feels differently about you. You’re attracted to each other.”
Cyrus chewed on the inside of his cheek. “Sure.”
“I think that’s fine,” Lily admitted. “If we were somehow attracted to each other, for example, even though you took care of me a lot when I was five, and you were sixteen. That’d be normal. I’m an adult now. You’re an adult.”
Cyrus wrinkled his nose. “You’re like my sister Lil,” he insisted.
“No right, gross—but, it wouldn’t be if we liked each other, we would see each other different,” Lily told him.
“You had a couple of years of history with Gabe because you were hired to be there, ten years later, you meet, and you find yourselves wracked with sexual tension, normal-tension, and general attraction. Nothing wrong there.”
Cyrus cocked a brow. “Nothing?” he asked.
“I don’t think so anyway.” Lily shrugged. “I think you’re you, and it’s gonna bite you in the ass frankly.”
Cyrus rolled his eyes. “How so exactly?”
Lily sighed, and her face grew a bit more serious. She scooted a little closer to the edge of her bed.
“You haven’t been in a serious relationship since Kasper.
Every time someone tries to get close to you, bond with you, you push them away.
I’ve seen it. A date or two, and suddenly they’re gone.
Fling here and there, which is fine, but when people try to care about you more than just sexually, you move on,” Lily told him.
Cyrus looked to the side for a moment.
“You know an awful lot about my patterns for someone who doesn’t want to hear about my sex life,” he commented.
Lily rolled her eyes. “Unfortunately, I have eyes, ears, and care about you, so yeah, I do notice things,” she replied.
Cyrus shook his head.
“So what I should be with Gabe is what you’re saying?” he asked. “I don’t even…really know the Gabe he is now.”
Lily clicked her tongue.
“Well, no, I’m not saying that you’re attracted to him. Maybe don’t push him away. You’re not going to get to know him that way.” She shrugged.
Cyrus hated to admit it, but…she wasn’t wrong. He shook his head a little.
“Alright, well, I’ve had enough talk for now,” Cyrus mumbled and stood up from the chair.
“Hey, you came in here talking at me, okay?” Lily chuckled and stood up.
Cyrus headed out of the bedroom and for his bedroom. His door was open when he got there, and Gabe was sitting on the end of his bed.
Cyrus eyed him for a moment and sighed.
“What?” he asked as he closed the door behind him and shoved his hands into his pockets.
Cyrus knew that both women he’d heard from that day were right.
He needed to talk to Gabe. Nothing was going to be accomplished, good or bad if he didn’t speak to him.
He wanted one day where he didn’t feel like he was being smothered by the things he was feeling—the tension between them, the weight of the situation that felt like it fell on his shoulders.
“I wished you’d stop avoiding me,” Gabe told him and stood up. “I thought we were supposed to work together.”
Cyrus sighed. “It’s been one day,” he insisted. He rubbed at his face. “Okay, I guess I have been. I didn’t expect any of this”—he waved at the air in between them—“to happen.”
Gabe waved his hand around.
“Neither did I,” he insisted, “and yet it has happened.”
Cyrus nodded.
He shook his head.