We flopped together in between Doc and Storm who were already dozing off for a nice afternoon nap.
“Love you, PC,” Rex murmured sleepily, the same way he always did when we were finished making love.
Instead of signing it back, I drew a little heart on his chest before drifting off. My last thought before I fell asleep was to wonder what my nest would smell like if a certain omega’s lemon pound cake was put into the mix.
Chapter Ten
OverthenextweekPack Steele taught me about the future. I learned what a microwave was and how it worked, the basic functions of every appliance in the house, and what Doc had nicknamed ‘the top ten don’ts of Modern society.’ It all amounted to not going outside and not revealing to anyone else that I was from the past. Once they were sure I wasn’t going to accidentally flip the gas on the stove and kill us all, they started to teach me more about more fantastic things like computers and the vastness of the internet.
“So, I just type what I want in this box and it’ll pop up?” I asked Podcast as I sat in front of a laptop computer. Storm was on my other side, his distinctly rain-soaked scent filling my nose as I stared at what they called the ‘Google search window’ on the screen.
‘Yes,’Podcast signed before showing me how to do it on his own laptop. Over the past week he’d spent every evening teaching me sign language. It was one of my favorite parts of the day, and it didn’t hurt that I was taking to it much faster than anything else they had tried to teach me.
“You have to be specific about it though,” Storm cut in, his brown eyes on my face as he spoke. Outside of Doc, Storm was the alpha I spent the most time with. He was the most patient of the bunch and never grew frustrated when I struggled to understand a concept or piece of technology.
He also made sure to stay completely clothed when he was around me. I tried not to think of how he had looked naked. He wasn’t my alpha and he didn’t belong to me, but it was hard to get the sight of water droplets sliding in between his stomach muscles and down to his…
Focus, I chastised myself, turning my attention back to the computer in front of me. I searched for the right keys, slowly typing my question with my pointer fingers. I had never been an accomplished typist, and it had driven Nicky up the wall during the summer I spent in his office when I was sixteen. I’d offered to type up all of his correspondence for him, but in the end he’d yanked it out of my hands because it was taking me too long.
‘Where is Wilde Manor?’ I typed into the search box before turning to the pair sitting on either side of me. “Now what?”
“Hit the enter key,” Storm instructed, pointing at the longer key on the right side of the keyboard.
I tapped the key and the screen changed, filling with text. “I did it!” I gasped with delight.
‘Good job.’Podcast’s eyes crinkled in the corner as he smiled at me. I loved being praised by the other omega, so I wiggled in my seat happily in celebration.
Learning about all of the advancements that had happened over the past hundred years was equal parts exciting and dizzying. The invention of the internet, though, was by far my favorite. I no longer needed to sneak out of the house to collect pamphlets of information, I could just type my query into the device in front of me and thousands of results would pop up like magic.
I skimmed the information on the screen before moving the cursor over to click on the first blue ‘link.’ They had explained links to me like it was a chain that connected google with the information that I was requesting. It was still a bit confusing if I was being honest, but I knew that the blue text on google would always be a link.
The screen changed and a page with a picture of Wilde Manor popped up.
“Oh, it still looks the same,” I breathed as the picture faded and was replaced by one of my mother’s Pink Room.
Podcast lifted his hands to sign, but then frowned and grabbed his phone and began to type instead. He usually did this when what he wanted to say was too complicated for my rudimentary sign language knowledge to translate. ‘IT’S A MUSEUM NOW. THEY DO TOURS, I WENT ON A SCHOOL FIELD TRIP THERE WHEN I WAS EIGHT.’
“Tours?” I asked with a frown of my own. It was odd to imagine my home, which had been lived in by my family for generations, as a museum. “Then… Can we go and see it?”
After having been cooped up in the house for over a week, I was itching to get out and explore the modern world.
Podcast and Storm exchanged a look and I could already see the no already forming on their faces. Doc and Rex had been very clear that they didn’t want me wandering around the streets of Boston. I knew they meant well, but I had never met a rule that I didn’t feel the scratching itch to break.
I popped my lower lip out into a pout, the same pout that always broke Nicky down when I was asking him for something. “Please? I am going insane sitting in this house. I fear I’ll begin climbing the walls if I’m trapped for three whole months like this,” I begged, dramatically pressing the back of my hand to my forehead as if I was going to faint.
I heard Storm sigh with surrender first. Out of the four alphas, he was the most easy going, which also meant that he would give in more easily. I watched the wheels turn and crank behind his pretty brown eyes as he seemed to work out the logistics of taking me outside.
“All right,” he finally said and I clapped my hands together with a grin.
Storm wasn’t done yet, though. “But you will be wearing a jacket with the hood and you will keep it up the entire time. You will stick to us like glue the entire time, Juneau, do you understand?”
I nodded my head up and down furiously, just happy that he had agreed at all. “Understood, sir,” I said and gave him a mock soldier’s salute.
Storm’s face was neutral, but I could see laughter in his eyes as he shook his head. “Doc is going to kill me when he finds out.”
Podcast’s hands flew so fast that I couldn’t keep up, but I could surmise what he said when Storm chuckled. “Doc is definitely going to find out, the man has eyes in the back and on the sides of his head,” Storm told him and the two exchanged grins.
They continued to chat, but I was too consumed with staring at the pictures of Wilde Manor. Even if it was a hundred years in the future, I was excited to go home.
