“Vegetables,” Tristan mutters, reluctantly returning some boxes. “On pizza. It’s like she wants us to suffer.”
Zoe just laughs, the sound like a spark against my frayed nerves. I jerk back a step, the cold air of the aisle hitting the space where her warmth had been. My wrists tighten, and I realize I’m clenching my fists. The ghost of her body against the freezer door is a brand on my front. My lungs burn with the need to close the distance again, to breathe her in until the scent of her is the only thing left in the world.
Fuck…
“Okay, breakfast,” she says, oblivious to the internal war I’m waging. She points a finger down the next aisle. “And before you even ask, Tristan, the answer is no.”
“Huh? I haven’t even said anything yet!” he protests, following her.
“You were going to ask for five boxes of Lucky Charms,” shecalls over her shoulder, not breaking stride. “I can see it in your eyes.”
“What about three?” he bargains, catching up to her. “Plus one grown-up cereal, like Raisin Bran, to maintain the illusion that we’re responsible adults?”
She stops, turning to face him and pretending to mull it over. “Two boxes of Lucky Charms. And the grown-up cereal has to have the word ‘fiber’ in bold on the front of the box.”
“You drive a hard bargain, Clarke,” Tristan says, clutching his chest in mock pain as he tosses two boxes of Lucky Charms into our cart. “But for the promise of magically delicious marshmallows, I accept.”
Zoe laughs again, and the sound is a bright, clear note in the dull hum of the grocery store. It’s a sound I’m quickly becoming addicted to.
It’s that sound, that moment of her unguarded joy, that makes the hair on my arms stand up a half-second later.
My head snaps up, my senses instantly on high alert. It’s an old, familiar instinct. Something I can’t explain. My eyes scan the aisle, past beta families and other bored shoppers, and lock onto the source. A beta at the far end of the aisle. He’s not just looking. He’s staring. At Zoe. His gaze is hungry, speculative.
A low, vicious growl builds in my chest, a sound I have to physically swallow back down. My hand tightens on the handle of our cart, the metal groaning under the pressure.Mine.
I don’t have to look at my brothers to know they’ve felt it too. The shift in the air. The threat. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Diego’s easy smile vanish, replaced by a watchful stillness. Tristan subtly pivots, his body becoming a casual but solid barrier on her left. And then Dane is just... there. Moving with a silent, unnerving grace to block the man’s line of sight from the other side.
He freezes. Absolutely, completely still. The easy confidence he held a moment ago vanishes, replaced by the rigid, wide-eyed stillness of a prey animal that has just heard a twig snap in thedarkness. He pales, gives a jerky nod to no one in particular, and then turns and practically flees down the aisle.
A dark, deeply satisfying heat curls through me. Good. Let the world see. She is claimed. She is protected. She is ours.
I look at Zoe, expecting to see annoyance. Instead, I catch a faint, reluctant flush creeping up her neck, a slight quickening of her breath. She noticed. And something in her responded to our protection.
Victory. My alpha purrs.
“I think we have enough cereal to last through the apocalypse,” she says, clearing her throat and pointedly ignoring what just happened. “Let’s get bread next.”
She leads Dane’s cart away, and we follow, the tension slowly bleeding out of the air.
The bread aisle, thankfully, is empty. Zoe immediately grabs a loaf of whole wheat and a package of English muffins. “Okay, what else? Bagels!”
“And sourdough,” I add. “For toast.”
“Brioche,” Diego grabs a bag. “For French toast. The non-carbonized version.”
“The cheapest, squishiest white bread they have,” Tristan grabs a loaf that looks like it’s made of pure air. “For grilled cheese.”
“That’s not bread,” Dane says, his voice full of quiet disdain. “It’s a sponge.”
Tristan simply grins back. “It’s a vessel for melted cheese.”
Zoe just watches this exchange, a look of profound bemusement on her face. She shakes her head, a real smile playing on her lips, and tosses all four loaves into the cart. “Fine. We’ll get all of it.” She turns the now-overflowing cart toward the front of the store. “I think we’re done here. Before you guys start a gang war over rye versus pumpernickel.”
The cashier’s eyes widen comically as we approach with our convoy of overflowing carts.
“Big... family?” she asks as she openly scans the claimingmarks on Zoe’s neck and then back to the four of us, her eyebrows climbing halfway up her forehead.
“Something like that,” Zoe says, already starting to unload items onto the conveyor belt. Tristan and Dane immediately take over.
