Riley kissed his temple and lay back beside him. Jason pressed against his side, and his breath caught as Riley’s arms came around him, holding him.
Even though he didn’t know where this thing between them was heading, how it could head anywhere when Riley was just passing through, Jason let himself hope. He wanted to stay like this always. Well, maybe without the rattle of the air-con unit that sounded like it was on its last legs, but everything else was perfect. Being wrapped in Riley’s arms, warm and naked.
With another kiss, Riley sat up and reached over the edge of the bed. “Almost forgot,” he said. “I need to set an alarm after yesterday, make sure you don’t miss supper again. I take it you weren’t grounded or whatever.”
Jason snorted. “No, but I wouldn’t like to miss dinner again,” he said, with feeling. He’d never before done anything to earn Matt’s disapproval. After the taste he’d had of it yesterday, he wouldneveragain risk it.
Riley’s brow creased slightly as he sat down on the bed, programming his phone and putting it on the nightstand before lying down again and facing Jason once more. “You have to make dinner for them again tonight?” he asked.
“I’m supposed to make it five nights out of seven, but I usually do the other two as well because I’m there anyway, and if youevertasted Bryce’s or Christian’s attempts at cooking, you’d understand.”
“Wait, so they just expect you to cook for them the entire time?” Riley asked. He looked concerned.
Something inside Jason blossomed softly into life. No one save his mom had thought Jason worth sticking up for. But with Riley beginning to look like he was about to wage war for him, Jason better get his act together and answer him.
“Not like that—I’m not some sort of Cinderella, made to slave for the pack, I promise,” he said. His voice was hoarse, because out of nowhere, that soft feeling had been replaced by something darker, uncomfortable, writhing inside him. Wasn’t that precisely what he was?
Not Cinderella, exactly. He knew the pack cared about him. But maybe he was just the pack’s cook. Aside from Jesse asking about Riley, he couldn’t remember the last time anyone had talked to him about something that wasn’t cooking or food. And the conversation with Jesse had only started because Jason had been burning dinner.
“It’s a paid gig?” Riley pressed, almost like Jason’s doubts were showing.
“It’s a part-time job, like at the diner, and Matt pays me for it, the same way he pays Christian and Dave for working the ranch. He just takes out food and utilities,” Jason told him. “Jesse’s taken to looking after the horses and the chickens, though I think if Matttried to give him money for it, the whole town would hear the fight.” Which was probably the understatement of the year.
He grinned at Riley, suddenly buzzing with excitement that Riley was going to meet his pack. The two most important things in his life were going to come together, and he couldn’t wait to share them with one another.
But there was still that tail of unease somewhere deep inside about his place in the pack. He didn’t know where it had come from, and he didn’t know how to get rid of it. It didn’t matter—if he ignored it long enough, it’d be bound to disappear.
RILEY
Riley was itching for his notebook. He used his fingers to outline Jason’s words in long, curving loops over Jason’s skin, thinking that way he could commit it to memory better. Or if he couldn’t, at least it would give him something to trace with his tongue later.
“Do you all work for Matt, then?” he asked.
Jason wriggled, Riley’s fingers evidently tickling. “Well, Bryce is a deputy in town,” he said. “Tristan’s at college, so no, not those two. I don’t know what his arrangement is with Karl.”
“And the rest?”
Jason raised his head and looked at Riley, puzzled. “That’s it,” he said. “That’s the pack.”
Riley stared at him. “Eight shifters is a pack?”
Jason frowned, like he wasn’t sure if Riley was judging them or merely surprised. “Yeah, well, that’s us. I guess Matt never meant to form one,” he explained, running his fingers along the fine blond hairs on Riley’s forearm, making Riley shiver. “He just took each of us in when we needed somewhere, no questions asked.”
Sudden jealousy burned in Riley. God, what he would give for there to be a human version of Matt Urban out there somewhere,someone who would welcome people who needed to lose their past and find a new beginning.
If he looked Jason in the eye right now, he wasn’t sure what he’d give away, so he concentrated on the path his fingers were mapping over Jason’s body, grounding himself in the warmth of his skin.
He frowned slightly when his fingers trailed over the puckered scar on Jason’s side. He’d meant to ask about it before, but he’d had more important things on his mind.
“What’s this from?” he asked.
Jason stiffened. “We had a run-in with another pack a couple of months back,” he said. “It ended up in a fight.”
Fuck. He’d heard stories about shifter violence—who hadn’t—but Jason? He wasn’t like that.
Riley looked at the scar again, then back at Jason’s face. “Youfought another shifter?” It didn’t seem possible.
Jason held Riley’s gaze. “It was them or us,” he said, a rough edge to his voice. “They attacked us and wanted to kill us.”
