That’s one way for an omega to get through her heat alone.
I resume my pace to the bathroom and set her down on the edge of the tub. Her face is still a bright pink hue, and she avoids looking at any of us in the eyes. When Mason joins Asher and I, a fresh set of clothes in his hands, she doesn’t look at him, either.
As the tub fills with warm water, Asher must feel the need to fill the awkward air, for he says, “So you have a huge knot in your suitcase and we all saw it—”
Mason shoots him a glare. “Thanks, Captain Obvious.”
“What I mean is, it’s totally normal. We can just, uh, move on from that. Pretend it never happened.”
“Maybe you can. You didn’t touch it.”
Asher shoots back, “No one said you had to keep holding it, or wiggle it around like that.”
Now the elder brother is miffed. “I wanted to see if it moved. I was curious.” When he receives a strange look from his brother, he adds, “Not about that. Shit. Get your head outof the gutter.” To me and Jess, he says, “For the record, I’m not interested in alpha knots, not like that.”
Jess groans. “The more you guys say, the worse this gets.”
I reach for her as I say, “You’re right. Let’s get you out of those clothes—”
She smacks my hand away. “I can undress myself, thank you very much. Besides, call me crazy, but I don’t think it’d be a good idea for any of you to see me naked. You three might lose your minds at this rate.”
“Good to know what you think of us,” Mason says, acting way too offended. “It isn’t like a set of nice tits is going to make me lose my mind. I have more willpower than that.” Jess glares at him, but slowly that glare shifts toward me, until her head is angled back and I’m all she can see. “Why’s she looking at Rourke like that?”
Asher answers him, “He says they’re scent matches.”
Mason chokes on air. “Fuckingwhat? You guys are gone for a few hours and now there’s scent matches involved? What the fuck is going on?”
Under her breath, Jess mutters, “I’m surprised you even care.”
“I don’t,” Mason shoots back, although he’s not as confident as he probably wishes he was. “I don’t give two shits that you and this asshole are scent matches. Go be scent matches somewhere else, then, and leave me and my brother alone.”
Asher elbows him and says, “Come on, you don’t mean that.”
“You don’t have a right to be upset,” Jess tells him, “not after what happened the other night.”
Alarm bells go off in my head, and I glare at Mason as I demand to know, “What happened the other night?” Asher looks confused, which I take to mean he’s unaware, too. What a mess this whole thing is.
Mason is tight-lipped, but Jess spills the beans with an attitude: “We talked under the moonlight. Shared some stuff. Very personal shit. Then we almost kissed—”
That finally gets Mason to say, “You have no right to say it like that. When you spin the story like that, it sounds likeIwas the one who deniedyou—but if you can remember what actually happened, you’d recall that you were the one who got up and ran away from me.” He spares a jealous glance my way. “Now I know why.”
I, on the other hand, can’t get over the fact they nearly kissed, and neither of them thought it was wise to tell me. “I knew this was going to be a mess,” I say, pointing at Mason. “I knew one of you wouldn’t be able to keep your hands off her.” I end up a little bit more riled up than I should be.
Asher attempts to play the peacemaker, saying, “This whole thing is spiraling. Let’s just take a breather and calm ourselves down. The real issue here, right now, is that Jess is hurt. Nothing else matters. We can agree on that, can’t we?”
Jess leans back and tests the water’s temperature. “I keep telling you, I’m fine.”
I look at her. “Then stand and put weight equally on both your feet. Walk a few steps. Show us you’re fine.” She responds by leaning down, taking off one of her muddy shoes, and whipping it at me. I catch it, once again my better reflexes on display. “Really? Throwing shoes? How old are you?”
“How old am I? You are the one acting nuts now that you heard Mason and I almost kissed. And you—” She points at Mason, slips off her other shoe, then throws it at him. Unlike me, he doesn’t care to catch it. He lets it hit him in his stomach, get mud all over his shirt, and then fall to the tiled floor. “—you have no grounds to stand on. None of you do. You’re all making this a bigger deal than it is.”
Mason frowns. “How is Rourke being your scent match not a huge deal?” He turns his frown to me. “As if you’re gonna be able to keep yourself away from her when she’s in heat. Fucking please. You’ll be the first to knock down that door.”
“I’m not the one who almost kissed her,” I throw back.
Jess groans, but Mason and I are too busy glaring at each other, while Asher is still trying to play peacemaker between us. The three of us are so entangled in our own bickering that we neglect to realize she starts to take off her clothes. Hell, none of us realize she’s naked until she’s sinking down into the tub and letting out a low moan.
And that moan? That moan is the only thing that jerks us back to reality.
