Ivy
Iwake up cozy as fuck, sandwiched between two enormous alphas who run hot enough to heat a small village.
Thane's chest rises and falls slow and steady beneath my cheek. His arm is draped across my back, heavy and slack. On my other side, Wraith is curled around us both, his face tucked into the space between my shoulder and the pillow.
The scarf is gone.
It must have slipped off in the night, abandoned somewhere in the tangle of sheets. Other than the bandages covering part of one side, his face is completely bare in the morning light bleeding through Thane's curtains.
I prop myself up on one elbow to look at him.
He's still asleep. Genuinely asleep, which I've learned doesn't happen often for him. His breathing is deep and even, his thick lashes resting against his cheekbones, his choppy dark hair a mess across the pillow.
Without the scarf, without the tension he carries through every waking second, he looks… soft.
Peaceful.
The points of his exposed teeth shine in the light, the scar tissue along his jaw pearly and pale.
And it's just his face.
My alpha's face, slack with sleep and so unguarded and beautiful.
Both of them are. Gods in repose, really. Thane with his granite features finally relaxed, his shaggy hair fanned across the pillow, and Wraith curled around me, my giant scarred shadow.
I'm a very lucky omega.
As if he can feel me watching, Wraith stirs. His brow furrows. His blue eyes crack open, bleary and unfocused, and then he blinks at me like he's not sure I'm real.
He props himself up on one arm.
His hand drifts toward his face on instinct.
I watch the realization hit him that the scarf is gone. His face is bare. And I'm right here, looking right at him, and it's okay.
"Morning, Misha," I whisper.
His whole body goes still. Then those eyes warm, the corners crinkling, and he ducks his head a little, shy even now, even after everything.
Morning, he signs.
"You sleep okay?"
He nods slowly, like he's surprised by the answer. His eyes flick to Thane, still dead to the world beneath me, then back to me. His hand rises.
You're staring.
"I'm allowed. You're beautiful."
He huffs a silent laugh and shakes his head, but he doesn't reach for the scarf immediately.
I reach up and trace my thumb along the unbandaged side of his jaw, over the exposed muscle and the smooth ridges of his teeth. He holds perfectly still, his breath catching, his pupils blown wide in the dim light.
Then he leans into my hand.
My heart goes stupid and gooey in my chest.
"This is nice," I murmur. "This is really nice. We should—"
"PLAGUE, IT'S FINE—"
Whiskey's voice carries up through the floor like a foghorn.
Wraith's head snaps up. Thane jolts awake beneath me with a groan, one arm flying over his eyes.
"—IT'S JUST A LITTLE BURN, IT'S NOT EVEN BLEEDING—"
"Then why is the skin coming off, Whiskey?!"
I'm already untangling myself from the pile. "What the fuck are they doing?"
Thane drags his arm off his face, squinting at the ceiling. "It's seven in the morning."
It's Whiskey, Wraith signs, already rolling out of bed.
I scramble off the mattress and Wraith catches me by the waist before I can faceplant over Thane's shoes. He sets me down gently, then reaches for his scarf where it's tangled in the sheets. He loops it loosely around his neck, the fabric draping low, not pulled up.
Just in case. But actually not hiding, for once.
Wow.
The three of us spill out into the hallway and down the stairs, and the scene that greets us in the kitchen is exactly as chaotic as I expected and maybe slightly hoped.
Whiskey is standing in the middle of the kitchen, shirtless, his red flannel pants slung low, with an angry red mark blooming across the lower left side of his stomach.
Plague has him cornered against the counter, gloved hands hovering over the burn, his disposable mask back in place and his dark hair pulled into a hasty tail, half of it already out.
"Hold still," Plague snaps.
"I am holding still!”
"You're flexing!"
“I’m fuckin’ ticklish, bro!”
Valek is at the stove, calmly flipping eggs and pancakes, looking entirely unbothered by the chaos two feet away. He's already dressed, white hair still damp, a dish towel slung over one shoulder like he's been awake for hours.
"What happened?" I ask.
Whiskey's head whips toward me, his face lighting up. "Wildcat! Morning! So funny story—"
"He tried to flip a pancake without a spatula," Valek says flatly. "With the pan. While shirtless."
"I was just trying out a new technique."
"And now you have a third-degree burn," Plague hisses. "Some technique."
"It's a first-degree burn at most," Whiskey corrects. "Don't be dramatic."
Plague looks like he's considering finishing the job himself. He prods the edge of the mark and Whiskey yelps, jerking away.
"OW—okay, that one hurt—"
"Good."
I move closer to inspect the damage while Wraith hovers behind me, peering down with a furrowed brow. The burn isn't serious. Red and angry, the skin a little raw at the center, but nothing that won't heal in a few days.
"You'll live," I tell Whiskey, but I give his stomach a kiss to make him feel better.
He turns beet red. "See?" He gestures at me triumphantly. "She's basically a doctor. And she has the best medicine. Omega magic. I’m already feeling just fine."
"I was almost literally a doctor," Plague growls.
“Almost, being the key word.”
Plague throws his hands up and stalks to the freezer for an ice pack.
I pull my phone out to check the time and the lockscreen lights up.
The lockscreen of three of my alphas in a… well. A cock-sucking chain.
I forgot it was there.
"Oh," I say, and then I can't help it. "Oh, I should show you guys—"
Whiskey lunges.
But it's too late. Valek's already glanced over from the stove, and his silver eyes catch the screen, and his mouth twitches into a slow grin.
"Ah," he says. "She wasn't joking about the lockscreen."
Plague freezes halfway out of the freezer. The ice pack dangles from his hand. His eyes lock onto my phone and the tips of his ears go scarlet, the color crawling up from beneath his mask.
"You set that as your lockscreen," he says, his voice strangled.
“She told us she was,” Whiskey reminds him.
Plague just groans.
Wraith leans over to look at my screen, then signs something at Valek that makes the white-haired alpha actually bark out a laugh.
"What'd he say?" Whiskey demands.
"He says I look smug," Valek replies.
Smugly.
Thane finally shuffles into the kitchen, hair a disaster, and takes in the scene with the flat exhaustion of a pack leader who's given up trying to understand his own life. His eyes land on my phone screen as I'm still holding it up, and he immediately turns around and walks back out.
"I don't want to see that before coffee," he calls over his shoulder.
"You don't want to see it ever, Captain!" Whiskey yells back. "It's not your business!"
"It's literally on her lockscreen, Whiskey. It's everyone's business now."
I pocket my phone, still grinning, and notice something.
Wraith's scarf is sagging again, slipping down past the line of his jaw, exposing the scarred lower half of his face entirely. He hasn't fixed it. He's too busy signing back and forth with Valek about something.
Valek’s hands are clumsy and slow compared to Wraith's fluid movements, but he’s trying to sign while he speaks out loud, the way Thane does. Only Valek is speaking Russian, not English.
Warm fuzzies flutter in my chest.
And when I notice Valek isn’t reacting to Wraith’s face, and he's maintaining steady eye contact with the feral alpha without his eyes flicking to the scars and sharp teeth even though I get the feeling eye contact isn't necessarily easy for Valek in the first place, the warm fuzzies really get going.
Actually, none of the alphas are reacting. They're all treating Wraith normally. Even Whiskey is managing to fight every stare-and-yell-YO-brO demon inside him.
Although that might be because Plague is actively hunting him with the ice pack, which is now wrapped in a damp towel.
Wraith notices me watching and tilts his head. What?
"Nothing," I say softly, smiling and stroking his solid arm. "It's good. This is good."
He glances at Valek, then back at me, confused.
Valek just shrugs lazily and goes back to the stove. "Your omega is happy. Don't question it."
I cross my arms, smirking at him. "I'm your omega, too, remember?"
His silver eyes flick back to me over his shoulder. "Hmm."
"I'm going on a date with Thane tonight," I continue, leaning on the counter so I can see him better while he makes more pancakes and eggs. We already have a metric fuckton of food, so I'm pretty sure he's just keeping busy to avoid facing me.
"Alone?" he asks.
"Yep," I say, leaning in a little more to make sure I'm well within his field of vision.
He keeps his eyes locked on the skillet.
I try not to let out the giggle stuck in my throat.
This is the alpha everyone's afraid of? The most graceful, smooth alpha I've ever met—even more than Plague, although I'd never say that out loud—is treating pancake making like surgery because he doesn't know how to talk to an omega, and it's kind of adorable.
And I used to think he was menacing.
"Wonder where he's taking me?" I muse out loud.
"Somewhere aggressively normal, I'm sure," Valek mutters finally. "Bowling. Rollerblading. An arcade, if he's daring."
"And where would you take me?" I ask point blank.
His eyes meet mine again, but only for a second. They're laser focused on the pancakes again a heartbeat later. "I'm not normal, so."
"Any hints?” I press.
He blows a puff of air through his nose. “Are you asking me to go on a date?”
"If you don’t beat me to it, I might," I say. Because I'm starting to realize Valek is reserved and shy in his own way, and it's going to take a little bit of pushing for him to realize I really do like him.
Wraith may be the truly feral alpha in the pack, but Valek started out feral, too, from what I've been able to piece together. He just honed his ferality into a weapon. He's still afraid to let anyone in.
Getting past that is one of my strengths, apparently.
Valek lets out a long, dramatic sigh and sweeps his hair back from his face, setting everything aside to turn fully to me. That wolfish smirk of his tugs at his lips as he reaches up with a tentative hand and brushes his knuckles against my jaw.
I fight the urge to show how much his touch affects me as his rough thumb slides to my chin and presses there, tilting my head back, his darkening eyes meeting mine.
"You want to know what I'd plan for a date with you, little omega?" he asks in a low, teasing tone.
"Burying bodies?" I tease him right back.
"Me? Burying bodies?" He presses his free hand to his collarbone, clutching at imaginary pearls. "Of course not. The fire station."
"What?" I choke out, already laughing.
He shrugs and taps the silver scar on his temple from where I clobbered him with a fire extinguisher. "Might as well go back to where it all began."
Whiskey's dramatic yelp splits the air and we both spin around—I'm still laughing—to see Plague has finally managed to slap the wrapped ice pack against Whiskey's stomach, and now they're wrestling.
Or about to fuck.
I really can't tell with these two.
"Let's eat," Valek announces abruptly, already arranging the plates to avoid finishing the conversation. "Wraith, no meat on yours." He points out a separate baconless plate on the table. "Extra eggs, to make up for the protein."
Wraith stares at him in surprise. Thank you, he signs, hesitantly.
Valek inclines his head. "You're welcome."
Fighting back an even wider grin, I help Valek finish setting the table while the chaos continues to unfold in the kitchen.
Whiskey arguing with Plague about how the ice pack is going to give him fucking frostbite, bro.
Wraith hovering at my side, my shadow as always, helping by reaching for the stuff that's too high up in the cupboards for me to grab without a fucking ladder.
Thane returning with his coffee mug and a long-suffering expression, his hair still a mess.
I reach up and push a strand of Thane's hair out of his face without thinking about it.
He goes completely still.
So does everyone else.
"What?" I look around. "He had hair in his eyes."
Whiskey mouths oh my god at Plague.
Thane clears his throat. "Thanks."
His ears are red.
My phone's going off in my pocket, but I ignore it.
It's probably more messages from Eliza about today's coverage, about the league review, about the statements that will define whether half my pack gets to keep playing the only thing that's ever kept them sane.
She's been texting the pack instead of emailing, since Whiskey apparently can't be trusted to not CC random people in emails.
And Wade is in the hospital not far from here, thoroughly destroyed, but alive and recovering. Close enough to make my skin crawl if I let it.
But I don't. I don't let myself even think about it.
Because I'm spending a warm, sunny morning in a pack house full of my alphas. Five of them now, even if one's still figuring out how to belong.
Five alphas who would burn the world down for me.
Who already kind of have.
I've never felt so fucking untouchable in my life.