Alejandro sighed and stood to his feet. “While you two going back and forth could be entertaining, it’s wearing on my nerves.”He slid his plate and coffee mug into the sink between me and Noah. “Halo and Gidget have already left. They have one of my vehicles, which has a tracker on it. Geek is already holed up in the library, watching every move they make. I suggest you two either go ahead and fuck to get it out your system or stop teasing each other. I need you on alert.”
I scoffed. “Horny as fuck or not, I’m always on alert.” I patted his back, making him grunt in annoyance and move away from me. “Besides, while I’d love for Noah to go ahead and let me between those thighs of hers, she’d rather chop my head off.”
“Both of them,” Noah added for good measure with a sickly sweet smile plastered onto her lips.
Alejandro’s lips twitched with an aborted smile before he abruptly turned and left us alone. Noah shot me a disgruntled look, then turned, following him out. I smiled into my coffee as I raised it to my lips.
Now that she knew I got off to thoughts of her, I couldn’t help but wonder what she planned to do with that tidbit of information.
10
Blayke
“You’re being a creep,” Miguel commented as he came to stand beside me. Miguel was Alejandro’s second in command, and he was a lot more light-hearted than his boss. But he was also silent, which made him deadly. No one was aware of him unless he wanted them to be aware. Which meant I hadn’t heard him walking up on me.
I cut him an annoyed look. “I’mbeing a creep?” I asked incredulously. “You’re the one walking around here like a fucking ghost, man.”
He snorted a laugh, then inclined his head to the window I was staring through. Noah was on the treadmill, her legs moving quickly as she ran, the pounding of her feet echoing in the room, audible even where I was standing. She had a damn good form as a runner. Clearly, she’d been at it for a while. And I was fucking mesmerized by how gorgeous she looked, even while she was sweaty and her face was flushed.
She’d been running for damn near twenty minutes now, only slowing halfway through for a brisk walk before she’d jumped right back into it.
“Staring at her through the window is creepy, Blayke.”
I huffed. “I’m not fucking stupid. She knows I’m right here. There’s not a thing that woman isn’t aware of when it’s around her. She’s like a… I don’t know. What animal can sense you by like a heat signature or something?”
Miguel chuckled. “A snake?”
I shook my head. “She’s not a snake.” I didn’t like that comparison. A snake usually referenced a backstabber, and I knew without a shadow of a doubt that Noah was loyal. “She’s something else. But I know for certain she’s not a snake. She’s cautious. Deadly but not to those she’s loyal to. She’s got a fiery temper and walls a mile high. But she’s trustworthy.”
Miguel hummed. “No being comes to mind.”
Grunting, I tugged my phone from my pocket to do a Google search. Miguel looked over at me and barked out a laugh as I typed in,what animal is loyal and protective and can sense danger?
“Dogs?” I scoffed at the first result. “Horses? What thefuck?” I muttered, shaking my head and scrolling further. “AI is fucking stupid. Elephants? Christ, Google is trying to get mestabbed. Donkeys, cows, goats?”
Miguel was laughing, his shoulders shaking with it. I scowled at my phone. When I got to the bottom of the results, it gave me options for wolves, lions, elephants—fuckingagain?—bears, dolphins, and penguins. Christ, she’d really stab me if I compared her to a penguin.
Clicking on the picture of the wolf, it just sent me to a general page about wolves. Huffing, I went to the search bar, and besideGray Wolf, I addedcharacteristics.
“You’re really serious about this,” Miguel said, his voice filled with amusement.
“Well, now that I’ve thought about it, I can’t stop until I’ve figured it out,” I grumbled. “I miss when Google’s first answer wasn’t some fucking AI bullshit. Oh, hey, look—” I stopped after I got past the AI nonsense— “they’re good runners.”
Miguel grinned at me, clearly humoring me at that point, but I was used to that from people, especially when I got fixated on researching something, no matter how trivial it was. “You might be on to something.”
I gave him a middle finger, still reading. “Keen hearing and vision… That could work. It helps them sense prey. And I swear, she’s got a sixth sense for people.”
“They’re also dominant beings,” Miguel added without even having to look at his phone. The man had the memory of a fucking dolphin. I snorted at myself. “They’re family-oriented, loyal, and caring. And they’re pretty good at solving problems.”
“You got Google in your brain?” I asked in all seriousness.
He smirked and shook his head. “Got bored one night when I couldn’t sleep and researched them after watching a documentary,” he admitted.
I shook my head. “You’re fucking weird.”
“Why are you standing out here Googling animals like a fucking weirdo?” Noah suddenly asked, coming out of the gym with a towel draped around her sweat-damp neck. She pushed the strands of her pink hair back from her sweaty face. “You couldn’t have researched animals anywhere else once you were done watching me?”
I grinned at Miguel. “See? Told you she knew I was here.” I glanced at my phone, then at her, nodding my head. “Yeah, you’re definitely a wolf. Google thought you might be an elephant or a penguin?—”
