"The thing where you try to shiver right out of your skin." A large, warm hand settled on my knee. He didn't squeeze, didn't demand attention. He just anchored me.
I finally looked at him. Fritz looked entirely too comfortable in a multi-million-pound aircraft. He'd shed his suit jacket, his sleeves rolled up to reveal forearms that were thick and dusted with golden hair. His tie was gone, the top two buttons of his shirt undone. He looked like he belonged here, in this bubble of luxury suspended in the air.
The cabin was a sanctuary of scent. Without the suffocating dominance of Hastings's cedarwood and leather pressing against me through the bond, I could finally taste the air again.
Fritz smelled calming, of rain-slicked pavement and a hint of vanilla. It was like stepping out of a sweltering room into a crisp autumn breeze.
He reached into a leather bag at his feet and pulled out a small, foil-wrapped package and a tablet. "I put together a playlist. Mostly 90s pop, because you strike me as a woman who needs a bit of Britney when her world is ending.”
“Is it ending?”
“It can be fixed. And these are the sea-salt brownies you liked from the café last week."
I stared at the brownie in his outstretched hand. "You remembered that?"
"I remember everything about you, Liebling." He pressed it into my palm. "Eat. You barely touched your toast this morning."
I took the brownie, the rich chocolate scent momentarily grounding me. My fingers worked at the foil, the crinkling sound loud in the enclosed space. "You're too good at this, Fritz."
"At what? Being a legendary wingman for my own pack?" He leaned back in his seat, his eyes dancing with that familiar, easy mischief. "He's a mess, Liebling. I know Henry. He’ll be currently pacing the length of the study. I left him trying to calculate the exact percentage of 'sorry' he needs to be to make you smile again. He's got a spreadsheet open. I'm almost certain there's a pie chart involved."
Despite everything, I felt my lips twitch. "A pie chart."
"Colour-coded. With footnotes."
"And Etienne?"
“He’ll come around.”
I bit into the brownie. The salt and chocolate combination burst across my tongue, sweet and savory and somehow exactly what I needed. I chewed slowly, letting the sugar work its way into my system.
Fritz watched me eat with a smile. Maybe it was a relief that I was actually consuming something other than panic.
"Do you think he should have waited," I said quietly, once I'd swallowed.
"He should have. But the man has spent his whole life thinking he was a glitch in the system. Four scents,Presley. Do you know how rare that is? One in every ten million alphas and the probability of finding an omega is much worse. He's spent thirty-five years believing he'd never find a match. That he was fundamentally incompatible with the universe."
I looked down at the half-eaten brownie in my hand. "And then he found me."
"And then he found you." Fritz's voice softened. "He didn't just see an omega, Liebling. He saw a miracle. He didn't rein in the need because he didn't think he could survive another second without knowing you were his."
“And you’re okay with him claiming me like he did?”
“I trust him. He’s my pack mate. He chose me, he found Etienne. And perhaps he knew you were out there.”
The bond pulsed in my chest, a warm throb that felt like Hastings was pressing his hand over my heart. I touched the claiming mark on my neck, the raised skin tender under my fingertips.
Through the bond, I still felt his guilt and fear, but underneath it all there was a fierce, possessive satisfaction that he'd marked me. That I was his.
"Will it ever stop?" I asked. "The feeling of him?"
"No." Fritz's hand squeezed my knee. "But you’ll get used to it. It’ll become background noise. Like breathing. And then myself and Etienne will claim you, just as you think you have it under control."
I grinned at him, then bit my lip as I looked out of the window.
This was nice, better than nice and I wasn't sure I wanted it to be background noise. Right now, it was too big, too overwhelming. Like Hastings had crawled inside my chest and set up camp. One day, it could be all three of my alphas.
At least, I think they’re mine.
