His slight nod answers my question, and I hold her tighter against me. Her hair is soft against my cheek. Nothing’s a guarantee. If they found her here, which we need to find out how, they could find her anywhere. I weigh the risk of staying or forcing an omega out of her home.
I don’t have the heart to hurt her. I can’t. As Pack lead, I need to be stronger than this, but as her tears roll down, I can’t tell her no.
“One night,” I say as if I’m really the one in control. This little omega has all three of us wrapped around her finger.
I know we’ll have to figure this out. We need answers, even if she’s not ready to give them.
Havoc doeshis best to clean off Noa’s bed, washing the sheets and tucking all our shirts into the pillows to create a barrier between the lack of scent from heavy use of scent blockers and the room's destruction.
After getting her tucked in well past midnight, the night wasn’t over for us. We spent hours putting herhouse back together as much as we could. A long night before a game is never a good idea, but we couldn’t let her wake up to this mess again.
Havoc plays security, as Throne and I sleep cuddled together on her torn apart couch for the remaining hours of the night. We had about an hour and a half of sleep before we were up again, wanting to make this day as normal as possible for Noa. Thorne is in the kitchen making breakfast despite all her kitchenware being gone. Nothing left but a few pots and one pan. Throne makes it work, cooking box-ready pancake mix. Thank God for twenty-four-hour grocery deliveries.
She wakes to the house smelling of us and pancakes, and I hope she’s okay with that. She walks into the kitchen, standing at the mini-island next to me. Her eyes wander around the kitchen. “Where is Havoc?”
“Right here, sweetheart.” His voice is grumbly as he walks in after his hourly patrol around the house. His past with the mafia has madeusmore comfortable, buthimmore paranoid.
He walks around the house, inside and out, at uncoordinated intervals to throw whoever is trying to hurt Noa off. I stare at the bags under his eyes as he tries to smile at her.
The right side of his lips lifts, but his eyes and weathered skin tell a different story than the one he’s trying to portray.
That everything is okay.
Thorne slides three pancakes onto a paper plate and sets the syrup and butter in front of her. She smiles one of her little smiles, and I nearly melt at the sight, but then reality hits me again. The situation that’s been running in loops in my head is about this other Pack and about the damage done here.
I try to wait until she’s done eating to bring things up. Tapping my plastic fork against my own pancakes. I don’t miss the way Thorne is glaring at me for not eating, I’m sure. Havoc stands by the door. Maybe he’s unsure where he should go?
I hand him my plate, which is instantly replaced by another, along with a deeper glare and a scowl.
“Havoc,” Throne grumbles as Havoc attempts to give the plate back, but Thorne drops another pancake on his plate. Thorne turns his attention back towards me. “Eat.”
“You telling your lead what to do?” I snap with no bark. I snicker at the eye roll the comment earned me.
“Yeah, when he’s being stupid.”
“Yeah, well—” I stop. Unsure what to say, holding back my smile at Thorne’s protectiveness.
The grump cares so deeply, and rarely does anyone get to see it.
“I know, we need to talk,” Noa breaks the silence as she slowly takes a bite of her food. “But we have lives tolive. I have work, and I know you have a game and Havoc?”
He freezes and stares at her, and it hurts me every time he does this as if he’s not used to people talking to him.
That’s another reason Noa is our perfect mate. She includes all of us.
We’re not the hockey guys. The hockey guys plus one. We are the Gray Pack. We are one.
“What do you have planned for today?”
“Being with you.”
“Before that.”
He considers her for a moment. He stares into her eyes more than he’s ever stared into anyone’s eyes, and I hear the click of his tongue, his sign that he’s decided.
“I was going to go to my shed.” Her eyes light up at his words as she stares down at her plate. Thinking. She wants something. Something with his shed, and like a light bulb, I have an idea that could help us all.
“What if Havoc goes to your consultations as a safety precaution, and then when you’re done, you can go do art with Havoc?” Thorne and I will be gone until past midnight. Game days are long and not as rewarding as they used to be, so it’s the last place I want to be.
