8. Floral Shirts and Shiny Suits
Chapter eight
Floral Shirts and Shiny Suits
“Hey.”
I blink at Carter. His nose is barely an inch from mine, despite the mountain of fabric wrapped around me like a burrito. “Hey?”
A rough hand smooths over tangled hair. “You were out pretty hard there.”
I blink a few more times, buying time before tonight hits my memory bank like a puck to the head. My eyes slip down, but Carter brushes his finger over my eyelashes. “Don’t do that. Don’t hide from me.”
Sleep helped, but not much. My eyes start to burn all over again. “I don’t know what happened. I saw… I don’t know. But it was weird.”
“I know.” He swallows. “They told me.”
I wait. “Told you what?”
He looks so tired. Deep, dark circles underscore his eyes, lines buried between his brows that I’m not sure would disappear even if he wasn’t looking at me like something’s wrong.
“Tell me,” I whisper. Even with the blankets, my skin feels like ice. My nails find my wrist away from his sight, scratching at it lightly. “Whatever’s going on, I want to know.”
He risks the blanket mountain to gently tug my wrist free, turning it over and pressing his lips to the reddened skin. “Don’t do that.”
“You know I can’t help it.”
“I know.” His lips find my forehead. And my cheek. My lips, so soft that I lean forward, looking for more. I need more.
His face blurs as I close the gap. “You know you’re the only thing that matters to me, right?”
“What? Cart—”
“No,” he murmurs. His finger touches my lips in silent request. “Let me say it now. I mean it, Ro. Nothing else.”
“But the team.” Liam, and Jonas. How can he say that?
“You think they don’t know?” He shakes his head. “Don’t get me wrong. I love the game. Adore it. You know how much. But… it’s all for you. Always was. Every bit of it. The pack, the home. I want you to have everything.”
He doesn’t have to say it. Everything we didn’t have.
He carefully wipes the dampness from my face, his smile a ghost. “All roads lead to Rosie. I need you to remember that. No matter what.”
When I wriggle out of the blanket trap, kicking them away, he pulls me into him. His face buries into my neck, my arms wrapping around him until I could trace the faded script inked across his shoulders beneath his shirt.
All roads lead to Rosie.
Finally, he sighs. “Get dressed, okay? Take as long as you need. Meet us in the living room. Miles is here too.”
“Miles?” I pull back. Almost pull a face but manage to stop myself. “Why?”
“You should hear it from all of us.” Carter shifts back, climbing out of my nest as I stare up at him. His eyes are dark enough that I can barely see any blue at all. “We’ll be there when you’re ready.”
***
I’m not ready for this. Whatever this is. Swallowing, I rub my sweaty hands against my most comfortable yoga pants and bury one in the pocket of Carter’s hoodie before stepping into the living room. “Hey. This looks cozy.”
My eyes sweep across the set-up. Liam and Jonas are waiting on the couch, a space between them. Carter watches from the leather armchair, his jaw tight. And Miles springs up like a jack-in-the-box. “There she is.”
When I flinch away from his enthusiastic embrace, the feigned enthusiasm wavers. Miles settles his hands on my shoulders instead, squeezing lightly. His hair is the usual pale mussed-in-every-possible direction mess, but he’s wearing a shirt and jacket. “Why are you here?”
He only wears a suit for the tough conversations. Carter told me that when I wondered why their agent was wearing a bright floral beach shirt to the draft. Says it helps him get in the right mindset for a fight.
Miles purses his lips, still smiling, but it looks less real by the second. “I’m here to help.”
Help who? I want to ask, but Liam clears his throat. “Come and sit down.”
He pats the middle, and Jonas shifts over as I make my way to them. But his hand reaches for mine, winding our fingers together and squeezing. “You holding up?”
Liam snags my favorite blanket from where I left it sprawled out over the back of the couch earlier. He nudges it into my lap, and I grip it with my other hand. “Did someone die?”
I try to joke, but it comes out as a serious question.
“Nothing as dire as that.” Liam tucks a few flyaways back behind my ear, studying me. His hand lingers, and when I breathe in, I catch it again.
He still smells like Lauren.
My stomach flips. When I jerk away, his hand slides to my nape, massaging it.
And holding me in place. “Rosie.”
I don’t like this. I look at Carter, and he looks like he’s in pain. Miles isn’t looking at us at all, focused on our soft cream carpet like it’s the last ten seconds of the playoff finals.
I’m not a fool.
When I struggle, Jonas’s grip on my hands tightens. Liam holds me in place easily. “Look at me.”
“Let me go.”
“No.” At Liam’s refusal, my head jerks to him in shock. “You need to sit here and listen.”
No, I don’t.
But the more I struggle, the more I realize that they’re not giving me a choice. When I twist, trying to tear my neck free, Liam loses patience. “Stop. Moving.”
I always wondered what it would be like to hear an alpha bark. A true bark. What it would feel like. I never really thought I would, truthfully. I asked Carter once and he’d refused.
I didn’t know it would feel like this.
Fear—full, white, cold fear—floods every part of my body.
And it stops working.
It stops obeying me. As if we’re strangers, this body and me—as if my skin no longer fits properly, as if it now answers only to the alpha beside me.
Even my mind wipes away beneath a tsunami of immediate obedience. Alpha.
My vision flickers, waving and warping as movement erupts. Shouting—people are shouting, and a small, quiet noise builds in my throat until it becomes a whine.
“Rosie.” Someone is saying my name. Murmuring it, over and over again. “I’m so sorry, baby. The first time is harder. You’re alright.”
They keep saying that. But I don’t think anything is. Not anymore.
I’m in Liam’s lap, his arms around me. A whine ripples again, and the room quiets. His lips brush my forehead, my cheek, anywhere he can reach. “That’s it. Fuck, Ro, you scared me.”
I… scared him?
“You barked at me.” My throat feels raw.
His face is pale. Liam examines me, his eyes sweeping over my face. There’s a cut under his eye that wasn’t there a few minutes ago. “I know. You were panicking, Ro.”
I’m not panicking anymore.
I don’t know what I feel.
Jonas’s face appears next to Liam. He rakes a hand back through his hair. “You okay?”
I don’t know.
In the absence of anything else, I try to nod. When that doesn’t work, my lips shape words that don’t feel right. “Think so.”
Liam exhales shakily. “Good. That’s good.”
I try to turn my head, but my body isn’t cooperating. “How long?”
How long will this last?
“Not long.” Liam kisses my forehead again. “Focus on me.”
“Carter will be back any second,” Jonas murmurs. “Miles took him to get some air.”
He…left?
He left me.
I swallow. “Tell me now.”
Tear off the band-aid. Tell me what’s happening.
Jonas looks uncertain. “We should wait for Cart.”
“N…no.” I stutter over the word. “Now.”
“It’s your decision,” Liam says after a moment.
“Put me down.” My voice wavers awkwardly. Uncertain, more a question than anything else. Liam doesn’t move. “Please?”
“Whatever you need.” He shifts me back to the couch.
When Jonas offers me my blanket, I don’t reach for it, and he tucks it over me instead. “Better?”
This time, I manage to nod.
The low ding of our elevator has us all stiffening. There’s a heavy, rapid step before Carter is leaning over me, his hands on me, checking, shaking. “Ro. Jesus.”
“She’s fine.” Carter slides his eyes to Liam, and I suck in a breath as his hands pull back. His right knuckle is swollen, and my eyes shift to the cut on Liam’s face.
“I’m okay.” The words tumble out of me.
When Carter whips his head back to me, I see disbelief there. “You’re sure?”
I nod. “Liam was going to tell me what’s happened.”
“Right.” He doesn’t move.
“We agreed,” Jonas murmurs. “We knew this wouldn’t be easy.”
I glance over at Miles. He’s settled back in the chair, but his expression is…uneasy. He doesn’t meet my eyes.
The pieces are starting to click together. And the jigsaw isn’t what it should look like. It’s too many pieces, a horrifying awareness as the picture builds in my head, but it’s right. Dawning comprehension wars with the nausea that’s been wearing me down all day.
Since Carter sent me home.
Since they left me in that room, and I found them in the corner of a party they forgot to invite me to.
With her.
Ever since I saw the omega with perfect hair and perfect nails.
The omega who took my job.
“She’s your scent match,” I whisper.
The omega who’s taking them.