Carter chuckled. “Aren’t you a doctor?”
She gave him a reproving look. While the bruises along his jawline weren’t as bad as they were an hour ago when he’d picked her up from Kat’s shop, it was still obvious he’d been hit multiple times by someone very strong.
“I’m being serious,” she said in frustration. “I know werewolves heal fast, but what if you cracked some of the bones in your face and they have to be reset?”
When they got to the top of the stairs, he turned to face her. “One of our team’s medics checked me out. He’s great at making sure any broken bones are all lined up before he already shoves everything into the right place.”
Shove everything into the right place?
Hadley cringed just thinking about that. She would have let Carter know about it if he hadn’t started walking again. By the time she caught up with him, he was already knocking on Karissa and Hale’s door.
Karissa stepped out to wrap Hadley in a big hug the second the door opened. “Thanks for coming.”
“Thanks for the invite,” Hadley replied with a laugh, holding out the boxed chocolate cake they’d picked up from a bakery on the way over. “And this is for you and Hale. We had no idea what was on the menu for the night, so we skipped the obligatory bottle of wine. Besides, you can never go wrong with chocolate cake.”
The moment they stepped into the apartment, Hale was there to greet them, immediately dragging Carter out to the balcony to get the grill fired up.
“Let’s leave the boys to play with the fire,” Karissa said as she carried the cake into the kitchen. “I’ll give you a quick tour of the place and then we can talk while I get the rest of dinner ready.”
Karissa and Hale’s apartment was much bigger than Carter’s, with three bedrooms and two baths. Her friend told her they’d specifically gotten a place with a guest room so her brother Deven, who was currently out with some friends, could stay with them before he headed off to college after the New Year. That got them talking about the case that had brought Karissa and Deven to Dallas in the first place.
“Your mom and dad did all that for the money?” Hadley asked, stunned beyond belief at the idea that Karissa’s parents would hire a hitman to go after their own client to milk more cash out of the situation while using their own daughter and putting her in danger.
“Unfortunately, yes,” Karissa admitted. “Which is why I have nothing to do with them anymore. Deven doesn’t either.”
Before Hadley could comment, Hale came in to grab the burgers and steaks from the refrigerator. As he did, she noticed the greenish bruising along his arms and neck. She couldn’t imagine how hard Hale had been battered to be that bruised this many hours later.
“Yeah, both Hale and Trey got pretty beat up taking down one of the escapees,” Karissa said as she popped open the oven to check on the potato wedges that smelled amazing. “But nothing too severe. Anytime Hale comes home intact, I consider it a win.”
Hadley could understand that, but still…
She picked up the stack of plates and utensils from the kitchen counter and carried them to the dining room table. “Carter walked into Kat’s shop a few hours ago looking like he’d been kicked in the face by a bull and treated it like it wasn’t even a big deal. I have no doubt there were broken bones in his face and jaw and now you can hardly tell he was injured at all.”
Karissa gave her a rueful smile. “I hate to tell you this, but it won’t get any easier. The guys and girls in the Pack are all alphas so they tend to act first and think later, which leads to injuries that would put a human in the hospital for days or weeks. You’re going to have to get used to Carter coming home to you all beat up.”
While Hadley could secretly admit to liking the idea of Carter coming home to her every night, she couldn’t help but wonder whether she should mention that he was actually an omega, not an alpha. Or at least more omega than alpha. But she decided against it. Being an omega was something that he considered extremely private. It wasn’t her secret to share.
“Before you start worrying too much,” Karissa continued, reaching into the fridge for a big bowl of salad, “I want you to know that the Pack will do anything to protect each other.”
Hadley hadn’t realized until then that she had been kind of worried. But hearing that Carter and his pack mates watched out for each other helped allay some of her concerns a little.
Peeking around the corner past the living room as she carried small salad bowls to the table, Hadley could see the guys out on the balcony, drinking beer and talking while manning the grill.
“Can I assume from how concerned you are about Carter’s safety that you’ve decided to go for it with him?” Karissa asked with a smile, heading back into the kitchen long enough to grab bottles of ranch salad dressing, ketchup, and steak sauce.
Hadley didn’t even try to deny it. “I have. Which is crazy right? Not crazy in the I-need-a-psychiatrist kind of way, but in the this-is-not-normal kind of way. It’s just that I’m so comfortable around him. I mean, like really, really comfortable around him. As in I’ve slept in his bed with him the past two night. No sex or anything, but it’s still confusing since things don’t normally move this fast for me, you know?”
“If you remember, I’m the one who pretty much tossed aside my life, career, and family within a week of getting back together with Hale, which was something drastically outside the norms of behavior for me. So, yeah, I know what you’re talking about.”
“But that’s different,” Hadley murmured. “You two were in love by then. Carter and I haven’t even been on a real date yet.”
Karissa regarded her for a moment, her expression thoughtful. In the background, Hadley could hear the rain pouring down outside, and under the covered balcony, Carter and Hale laughing every once in a while.
Her friend pulled out a chair and sat, pointing Hadley toward another. “It’s probably way too early to tell you this, but honestly, I wished I’d learned about it from the beginning. It would have made everything I was feeling a lot easier to understand.”
Hadley frowned, not sure where this was going. “O-kay.”
“I’m sure you’ve already figured out that werewolves don’t have an easy time finding people who can accept them for who they are,” Karissa said. “So fate, or destiny, or magic, or nature—whatever you want to call it—has come up with a way to help them. Something that lets them know when they’ve found that one in a billion person who they’re supposed to be with.”
