Chapter 5 Cooper Hart #2
“Mister Hart, I presume?” She offered me her hand once inside. “It’s a pleasure. I'm Sylvia Matthews, Senior Client Representative for Eros Institute's Rural Division.” Behind her trailed three lab techs in white coats, carrying various equipment cases.
"Please, call me Cooper," I insisted, grin widening. "Welcome to Sagebrush Ranch.”
“Yes, thank you.” The woman gave a little sniff of displeasure, which I ignored.
“Come on in. We can finish paperwork at the kitchen table.” I led them inside, navigating our group to where I’d just frantically cleaned.
The morning light streamed through the window, highlighting every speck of filth on the damn floor.
I frowned at the cramped, lived-in space where my pack and I had shared a thousand meals and twice as many arguments.
Probably looked like a rat hole to the polished Eros employee.
"Ms. Matthews, since you’re a bit early, we might have a bit of a wait for everyone to be together," I began, “Levi goes over the books after breakfast, and the others have things around the ranch.”
“Yes, I understand,” she nodded curtly, pulling out a chair and swiping crumbs from the wood seat before setting her briefcase atop it.
I shuffled my feet nervously. Where the hell did Wade and Boone go? Boone knew someone had unexpectedly arrived. Wade must have heard him yell about it and saw me changing too. Why the fuck did they disappear? I knew why Levi was oblivious—once he got focused on accounting, he tuned out the world.
A moment of uncomfortable quiet.
She cleared her throat.
Her colleagues looked bored, glancing around the room with zero interest. The woman turned to them, sharp words already spilling from her mouth. “You two go check that the techs are getting ready. Tell them we might need to deviate from the adjusted timeline.”
“Yes, Ms. Matthews.” The slightly shorter one answered, then both turned in sync and disappeared. Silence that made my skin crawl began to stretch through the room again. I cleared my throat.
“I wasn’t expecting you all until later, so I didn’t have time to—”
A door opened and banged closed, cutting me off.
Not the front door, the distance and pitch were wrong.
Seconds later, Levi walked into the kitchen, a pencil tucked behind one ear.
His lavender eyes narrowed into slits at the sight of our guest. His hands were covered in ink again; he’d snapped a pen.
He’d taken to using pencils often these days, since breaking them was less messy, but when he was writing in the physical ledger, he wanted permeance.
Not sure what ticked him off enough to bust another pen.
Maybe the books weren’t balancing. He didn’t care if we were Midas rich, he still wanted every penny to add up.
Levi went a lot of nights without eating as a kid.
It made him frugal. Even when he was starving, he wouldn’t overeat, making sure there was enough for tomorrow.
I kept telling him that he needed to relax.
He needed to realize we could buy groceries whenever wanted, that the money wasn’t going to run out any time soon.
But it’s hard for a person to chase away their demons, even when peace knocks on the door.
"Makes it hard to check my numbers in a noisy house. Pots banging. People running.” Levi’s voice was tight. He glared at the Eros woman. “You why Boone shouted? I don’t like loud when I’m working.”
Levi was lean and lithe, all sharp angles and wiry muscle.
His scent clouded into the space. It was Earthy, like all our natural colognes, with notes of fresh rain and cut grass today.
As if we’d been formed right out of the Wyoming landscape, born to the hills and pastures, we smelled like the outdoors at all times.
"Ah, perfect timing," I chirped, ignoring his annoyance, as if this was all going according to plan. “Ms. Matthews, this is Levi. He’s our numbers guy.” I shifted my focus to my pack brother, and lover. “Levi, this is the rep from Eros I was telling you about.”
His expression told me plainly that I hadn't told him anything about Eros, but he was too dignified to call me a liar in front of strangers. He nodded stiffly instead.
Boone darkened the doorway then, filling the entire thing with his large frame.
He’d taken time to brush his hair. It was glossy as hell, waterfalling down the back of his stained shirt.
Made sense he’d take time to tend his hair but would keep on the same clothes.
To him, hair wasn’t a vanity. Boone didn’t say anything, instead moving through the cramped room to position at the back door, pushing his body into its surface and crossing his beefy arms. Full guard dog mode.
I turned back to our guests with a smile that was probably too wide, too desperate. “This is Boone, our Jack of All Trades. So, we’re just waiting on Wade and Wyatt Nelson.”
Ms. Matthews glanced at her tablet. "Yes, five Alphas. Two biological brothers. That’s a bit unusual.”
Her tone suggested she disapproved of keeping it in the family. Really too bad I couldn’t shake her sensible foundation by saying we were all intimately involved. I hated lying though. Well, I hated flat out lying. Preying on people’s prejudice by feeding into their assumptions was an exception.
“We like to keep it in the family here,” I found myself saying, though I’d decided not to imply Wyatt and Wade were doing anything except giving each other brotherly hell.
“Hmm,” she sniffed, peering at me before regaining her composure.
“Well, we of course value discretion. Eros will always protect its clients, and how they choose to conduct themselves in private quarters. And you all have the money to secure our services, so we will treat you like any other client.”
The meaning under her words was crystal clear.
She’d rolled up to our ranch, which had seen better days, and made a snap judgement.
What she’d failed to see was how far we’d come.
The future pack home outlined in dirt, the greenhouses nearly ready for planting, the substantial herd we were finally able to maintain.
Not too long ago, Sagebrush had been a wasteland on the brink of ruin.
I wondered if Eros knew this Beta employee liked to make thinly veiled digs at their clients.
“Oh, we like it private.” Rather than call Eros and complain about their representative, I’d just keep pushing her buttons.
“Yes, well. Shall we get started? This is the most important stage of the process. After today, we can truly begin hunting the globe for your perfect partner! I’m sure there’s an Omega out there who will absolutely love these rural surroundings.”
Touché, I thought, you’re better at being cruel with a smile.
“I suppose some people might not see the beauty in this place,” I shrugged, “Just like some people can’t see the beauty in a smog soaked, crime plagued city.”
“Yes, well. Is there any way we can get the other two clients here? There are a few things to sign before sample collection.” She leaned over, unzipping her briefcase, and pulling out a tablet.
“Sample collection?” Wade strolled into the kitchen. “What exactly are we sampling?”
Before he got an answer, he glanced at Boone. “I checked out the calf you mentioned. Think he’s not getting enough milk from mom, so I separated him for bottle feeding.”
“Thanks,” Boone simply said, then went back to brooding.
Wade looked at the Eros woman, then back at me. “Not from the bank, right?”
Funny how that worry still existed for all of us, despite our good fortune.
“Nothing like that,” I said quickly. “What kind of sample would the bank take anyways?”
“I don’t know… probably blood, sweat, tears. Banks are fond of bleeding folks dry however they can.” This from Levi, who was sitting backwards in one of the dining chairs now, chewing on the pencil’s eraser end.
“We’re here for your scent and blood samples.” Ms. Matthews sounded slightly annoyed. “It was all explained in the initial consult.”
As if the aura in the room couldn’t get worse, Wyatt finally arrived, bringing with him the storm cloud you could almost literally see hovering over his ornery head.
“What the fuck’s going on, Coop? Those Betas in suits are carrying.” His voice thundered. Surprisingly, the Eros lady didn’t seem alarmed. “Those assholes are fucking lucky I didn’t have my shotgun on me.”
“They’re here for scent matching,” I explained quickly, feeling sweat bead at my temples. I loved Wyatt, and even as a kid, I knew we were meant to be in the same pack. But the guy was still intimidating sometimes.
“Scent matching?” Wade perked up, swiping his right sleeve over his face and chasing away one layer of dust and sweat.
“It’s to find us an Omega. A compatible one.” I latched onto Wade’s hopeful tone.
"A compatible one," Levi repeated slowly, before snapping the pencil between his fingers. He glared down at the writing utensil like it had personally betrayed him by breaking, then he tossed it onto the dining table. “For all of us? At once? Didn’t we decide there was a slim chance in hell of that?”
I nodded, enthusiasm overtaking my momentary nervousness. “Used to be a slim chance in hell. This company called Eros can find Omegas who are highly compatible with whole packs.”
“And these Omegas just sign up and go wherever their matches are?” Wyatt sounded unconvinced, almost combative.
“Ah,” the Eros rep held up one finger like a teacher fussing at students, “our process is proprietary, with extensive legal measures to protect the origins of our products.”
“The origins...of your product.” Wyatt repeated. “And, in this case, the Omegas are your product.”
I could hear the challenge in Wyatt’s tone, and I knew what could happen next, but the Eros rep continued to prove she was unflappable.