Chapter Twenty-Four
Sky
Sitting at the table in the Coruscation dining hall, it was easy to convince myself that I could handle sneaking into Foxy’s and drugging the coffee. It wasn’t until I was sitting next to Colt on the bench seat of a large truck barreling down the highway that I began to overthink it. The more I dwelt on it, the worse the idea seemed. My sudden onset of nerves wasn’t helped by Colt’s withdrawn demeanor.
“Are you mad at me?” I blurted out, biting down on my tongue in mortification at the neediness of my tone.
“What?” Colt glanced at me in surprise. “No, of course not. Why?”
“Oh, well, you’ve been really quiet for awhile.” More like for the entire seven hours that we’d already been driving.
“I have?” Colt hummed for a second, pulled his hand from its resting spot on the gear shift and squeezed my thigh, letting it rest there. “Sorry, Sky. I guess I’m not used to having anyone with me to talk to on road trips and I was thinking about the mission, wondering if we’d missed anything.” He squeezed my leg again and then returned his hand to the gear shift knob, dropping into a lower gear as we started up a hill. “Is there something you wanted to talk about?”
Crap.
“Not really,” I admitted. “It just felt kind of weird sitting in silence. Tell me about your kids?”
“Really?” Colt sent me a side-eye glance. “Okay. Well, I have four. Rolf and Meg are seven. Then there’s Carla, she’s four now. And, of course, Juno is just two and a half.”
“Wow! Twins, huh? I guess that’s not that surprising since you are one.”
“Oh.” Colt tugged at the collar of his shirt uncomfortably. “They, ah, aren’t twins. They have different moms.”
I couldn’t help but raise a brow and he shrugged self-consciously.
“It’s, ah, not that uncommon to have a pup with a pack member,” he explained, his cheeks turning a ruddy red. “You know, since I share the Alpha bloodline..” he trailed off.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “A player, huh? I guess I should have seen that coming.”
“No!” Colt snapped, turning hurt eyes on me. “All the matings but Chloe’s were pre-planned. I’m not!”
“Okay,” I agreed, startled at the severity of his response. “Eyes on the road, big guy.”
“Sorry,” Colt muttered, turning back to focus on his driving.
“Hey, you don’t owe me any explanations,” I tried to calm him. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“Not your fault,” Colt said, his voice tight.
I watched his hands clamp down on the steering wheel, the knuckles turning white. “Hey, can we pull over for a minute?”
“What?” Colt glanced at the navigation screen. “There’s a rest stop in about twenty minutes. Will that work?”
“I don’t need a rest stop,” I pushed. “I just need to get out for a minute.”
Colt sent me a concerned look, but nodded, hitting his blinker and easing the truck to a stop on the shoulder. As the small caravan of motorcycles behind us began to slow down, Colt waved them past. The lead rider returned his thumbs-up as they flew by. Once the road was clear, Colt climbed down and offered me a hand before following me to the other side of the truck.
“Are you feeling sick?” he asked softly, running anxious eyes over me.
I shook my head and turned to face him. “I’m fine. Well, I’m not fine, but there’s nothing physically wrong with me.”
Colt waited patiently, the earlier tension replaced with concern.
“I didn’t mean to upset you,” I said finally, “but since I did, I want to talk about it.” I could see in his eyes that he was going to argue, so I shook my head. “Stop it, Colt. I can’t make you talk to me the way you can me, but you need to. We need to both have clear heads or someone is going to get hurt.”
Colt’s jaw clenched when I alluded to the all-powerful Alpha voice and he drew in a deep breath. “I don’t want you to think I’m toying with you,” he finally said. “I’ve never screwed around on anyone. All of my partners knew the score going in and, other than possibly Chloe, I’m still good friends with them and I’ve involved in my kids’ lives. It bothers me that you think of me as a player.”
Well, that was about what I’d figured.
“Alpha,” I waited until he met my eyes. “I don’t think that. I was just teasing you, but it was a stupid joke.” I walked the two steps between us and leaned against his chest, breathing in his masculine scent. After a long moment, he exhaled and wrapped his arms around me, holding me tight. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Colt said, brushing his lips over mine. “Chloe accused me of being unfaithful in a letter she left behind when she took off.” He pulled back and looked into my eyes. “I never was, so I guess it’s a sore spot.” He kissed me again, slow and deep. “I overreacted. I’m sorry, also.”
We stayed like that for several minutes before he gently pushed me away. “We need to get back on the road and catch up with the team.”
This time he pulled me close to his side, buckling me into the middle seat. And when we started back down the road, my Alpha started regaling me with stories about his kids. As he told me about the time that he’d had to retrieve his oldest son from a skunk den, his face took on a proud grin and my heart stuttered.
Oh, Gods.
Was I really stupid enough to fall in love with him?
