Jayden grinned, showcasing all of his beautiful white teeth. “I’ll pass, dear. I’m secure with the length of my manhood.”
Becca’s mouth dropped open.
Oh snap! God I loved that man. Ryder just shoved the comment off and sat in front of Sam. They engaged in an epic staredown. This was the battle of the alphas, and just like wolves, neither looked away.
“You could have trusted me with this,” Ryder finally said.
Sam sighed. “It wasn’t your burden to bear. You had enough going on.”
I knew he was talking about Molly, Ryder’s fiancée.
Sam held up his hand and Ryder gripped it tightly.
Sam leaned himself over the table. “You know this isn’t a fair fight. You’re a descendent from the house of strength.”
Ryder grinned his cockiest of grins. “What’s wrong? Scared?”
It was on; they both flexed their muscles and Sam’s hand started shifting backwards. He grunted and I thought the veins in his face might burst if he kept this up much longer.
With a slam, in the end Ryder won with ease.
Sam looked resigned. “I should have told you.”
Ryder nodded and clapped Sam on the shoulder. Just like that, everything was great between the boys again. My animal analogy was really not far from the truth; men had changed very little over the thousands of years of humanity.
Jayden ran forward. “Group hug!”
Oliver laughed as Jayden tackle-hugged a bewildered Sam and Ryder and I decided why the hell not and got in on the pileup. Sam was still sitting in the chair so we ended up just sitting on him or hugging him from the back. Jared reached forward and yanked a hair off Sam’s head.
“Ow! Did someone pull my hair!” I heard the silent enforcer yell.
“It was me, mate. Payback.”
Gotta love Australians and their payback.
Becca stood there awkwardly and I felt bad for her. She didn’t seem to quite fit in with our group yet. But something told me she would, one day.
Sam’s muffled voice came out again: “Okay, you’ve tortured me enough. I’ll never lie again. Please, God, just get off of me.”
We all laughed and backed away from the Sam love pile. A weight lifted from my chest. Sam was forgiven and we were back to being one big happy family again. I was so relieved to know that I could stop worrying and doubting one of my guys. It was us against the vampire world, and we had to have total trust in each other. Speaking of…
“Okay, now that all of this is worked out, Sam, I need you to find out what’s going on back at the Hive. Is Tessa safe? What happened to Lucas? Has Carter updated with anything about him and my mom?”
Sam smoothed back his mussed hair and nodded. “I have a secure computer here.”
Jayden pointed at Becca. “You.”
Becca paled. “Me?” she all but squeaked.
Jayden nodded. “You need to take me shopping. I refuse to wear this…” He was at a loss for words to describe his sweatpants and flip-flops. “Any longer.”
Becca smiled. “You won’t like any of the shops in town, but we get deliveries out here. So you can order anything online.”
Jayden’s mouth popped open and his eyes almost rolled back in his head. He looked like he was having a mini-orgasm.
Becca handed him a credit card. “Spend however much you need. Sam has us well funded.”
Again I raised my eyebrows at Sam and wondered if this wasn’t one of the “charities” that had received money from Deliverance.
