I stood up from the table so quickly that the chair toppled over behind me, and disappeared in a cloud of smoke. The kitchen melted around me until I was by myself in the darkness.
“YOU KNOW THE RULES, TABITHA.” Jordan’s voice rumbled around me from all directions, and panic began to take over as I whirled around in circles, trying to pinpoint where he was coming from.
Red eyes began to blink in the darkness around me, and I started to wheeze and gasp like someone was putting their hands around my throat and squeezing.
I felt a scream bubbling in my throat as I finally managed to gasp a deep breath...and then the smell of spearmint enveloped my body making me pause. I knew this scent. I inhaled more deeply, pulling the cooling scent deep into my lungs. Suddenly, I wasn’t surrounded by red eyes or darkness anymore.
‘You are safe.’ The words that Gary had spoken came to mind again as I deeply inhaled again. I was safe.
I awoke with a jolt and a little gasp for air, confused for a moment about where I was.
“Hey, I was just coming to check on you.” Matteo was crouched in front of where I lay on the couch, his brown eyes were concerned as he smoothed a hand across my cheek. “You were starting to whimper in your sleep, and I was getting worried.”
I quickly took stock of my surroundings, remembering that I had fallen asleep on the couch last night while reading a book. I spread out on the settee end of the couch, and my body was curled around a fuzzy dark green blanket. It smelled heavily of Theo’s spearmint scent which had brought me out of my nightmare, and I inhaled deeply and let the scent soothe the last waves of my nightmare from my body.
The sun was shining through the sheer curtains, covering the living room in dappled light. Wally was curled into the corner between myself and the couch, and he looked up at me through slitted eyes and began to purr. I reached out and gave him a quick scratch between the ears.
“What time is it?” I croaked, sitting up and wincing at the tenderness that I felt in my hips and back. Sleeping on the couch was definitely not the most comfortable thing ever. It always seemed like a good idea, until you woke up the next morning feeling like you went a round with a boxer with mommy issues. Ugh, and judging by the sticky feeling on the side of my face, I’d definitely also been drooling in my sleep, cute.
Matteo held his hands out to me and helped me to stand on shaky legs. “Well, sleeping beauty, it’s just after two in the afternoon. I was starting to wonder when you were going to wake up.”
“You’re fucking kidding me.” I knew that I should have gone to bed last night instead of finishing my book. I kept telling myself that I would wait for a boring part to stop at...and then they just kept having sex! I finally finished around three in the morning, and had practically dropped my tablet on my face at the end before falling asleep. The tablet in question was jammed in between the couch cushions, and I glared accusingly at it. “Damn, sexy romance book. You got me again.”
“Well, hey,” Matteo gave me a kiss, not even flinching at what I was pretty sure was a serious case of morning breath. “We ordered ramen for lunch, and I wasn’t sure what you’d want, so I just ordered a couple of different things.”
At the mention of food, my stomach made itself known with a loud and completely embarrassing rumble.
My face flushed, and Matteo chuckled. “Uh. Yep. Gonna run upstairs and brush my teeth really quick and I’ll be right back down.” I scurried up the stairs to my room and quickly brushed my teeth, and gave my face a splash with some cold water to wake myself up fully. After I finished, I ran my wet fingers through my hair, working through the worst of the knots and shaking it out from where it had flattened to the side of my head while I slept. I’d fallen asleep in a pair of jeans—yet another rookie mistake when it came to sleeping on the couch. The denim material was uncomfortable where the waistband had rubbed my sides and stomach a bit raw.
I peeled them off of my legs, and rubbed the red spots and indents, muttering to myself about never sleeping in jeans again, before changing into a pair of soft leggings and a dark green t-shirt. The color was similar to the blanket that I’d woken up with and reminded me of Theo. Even now I could still smell Theo’s spearmint scent on my skin, like a constant reminder that I was safe.
The fact that his scent had been enough to keep me from screaming myself awake was giving me little butterflies in my stomach. Matteo had talked my ear off over the past couple of weeks about scent matches, and all of the research that he’d done on it. Scientifically, there was a reason that I was so drawn to the scents of the alphas around me. Biological imperatives, Matteo had called them. There was a reason that our society relied mostly on our olfactory senses to find mates—apparently, there was a ton of research that showed that packs that relied on scent matches had a higher chance of being successful. On a more primal level, it was survival of the fittest. Any living thing had two goals: to survive and to pass on its genetics.
I knew all of this information and, logically, it made sense. So, why was I constantly surprised by Pack Simmons, and the way that their scents were able to calm me down or get my engine revving like a Harley Davidson motorcycle?
Heading back downstairs, I was pleased that lunch was already laid out on the island counter. Cobb and Matteo were already sitting on either side of the middle stool and were digging into their food with a gusto.
“Where’s Aria?” I asked as I slid onto the middle of the stools in front of a bowl of steaming ramen. It was tonkatsu, meaning that there were slices of pork, green onions, and a sliced hard-boiled egg. The broth was aromatic and comforting, and my mouth watered as I picked up my chopsticks and began eating. The flavors that burst across my tongue as I slurped my first mouthful of noodles nearly made me moan, and I made a mental note not to sleep past breakfast anymore.
Matteo slurped some noodles into his mouth before answering, “She had a call she needed to take, so she took her lunch into her office.”
We ate in companionable silence which was only broken up by the occasional sound of us slurping the noodles of our ramen. After I finished, I washed my bowl in the sink and put it into the dishwasher. “What are you two up to today?” I asked.
“I’m going to be working with the field office today, and trying to figure out more information about Jamie Jordan today,” Cobb said over his shoulder as he rinsed his bowl, and swiped Matteo’s bowl to wash too.
The alpha rolled his eyes good-naturedly, but let Cobb put his dish into the dishwasher. “And I’m going to facetime with my minions at the hospital. They’ve been too quiet over the last couple of days, and I’m worried that they’ve either killed each other or have finally slept together.”
Matteo had told me all about Dr. Riesler and his Chief Nurse Officer, Paula Lemon, over the past couple of weeks along with all of the other people who he worked with at the hospital. From the way that he made it sound, the hospital was better than any soap opera on television. Matteo respected and cared about his people, it was easy to tell by the way that he spoke about them. I didn’t know many doctors, but I was pretty sure ‘control-freak’ was a pretty common stereotype when it came to medical professionals, but Matteo had willingly given up control to help me, a virtual (admittedly sexy) stranger.
We exchanged a knowing grin, “My money is on that they slept together and don’t want to tell you.” I didn’t have any money to speak of, but judging by the way Matteo’s eyes heated up, I was pretty sure that it didn’t really matter.
“You’re on, the winner gets to lead later on tonight.” His eyes held a hot promise, and I couldn’t help the little shudder working its way through my body at the thought of it.
I held out a hand, “Deal.” We shook on it with silly grins on our faces.
“Well, while you are all working your asses off, I’m going to make some iced coffee and take it out onto the terrace and read. What a semi-charmed life I lead.” I joked as I popped a pod into the Keurig and filled a clear glass mug with ice and creamer as I waited for the coffee machine to gurgle to life.
“Yeah, it’s so relaxing.” Cobb snorted, “Iced coffee, reading books all day, and a murderer on the loose. You truly are a blessed omega.”
