“Hmm?” He looked up at me, and I realized he’d already eaten nine-tenths of his whole plate.
I laughed. “You hungry?”
He groaned. “Famished. We should make more in, I don’t know... half an hour.”
“Agreed. We should see if we can polish off the whole fridge. I want to see if your grandmother’s impressed or horrified.”
Dakota nodded, scooping up another large bite.
“Dakota?”
His head popped up again, and he hummed curiously.
“Do you want to stay longer?”
He crinkled his nose and took his time to chew his food.
“Or I can give you some space?—”
Dakota scoffed, staring at me like I’d lost my mind. “You arenotleaving me here alone.”
Maybe it shouldn’t make me feel so good, that he considered me more a pillar of support than anybody else here. It wasn’t like I wanted him bereft of anything he needed.
But... well, it was nice to think I was doing good for him, even when all that I really managed was sticking by his side.
Despite myself, I smiled softly. “No,” I agreed, “I’m not. Never, unless you ask me to. I just wanted to make sure that you know there are options. We can spend all the time you need here.”
The pack was back in California, taking care of everything. I was glad they didn’t have any pressing need for me, as un-alpha-like as my appreciation was. I didn’t want their safety and security to hinge on me alone, as much as I wanted to provide for it.
Truth told, Jillian was the more capable of the pair of us.
Dakota was chewing his bottom lip, only because he’d finished his plate already, when he shook his head. “I don’t think—I mean... let’s go home on schedule. I don’t think I can process all of... everything? At least not on one trip. We can always come back?”
The way his voice lifted at the end, like he could ever be unsure that I’d give him anything I could, was sweet and made me want to blot any insecurities out at once.
Back when we’d been in Idaho, it would’ve been unthinkable for us to ever travel across an ocean. Now, it was a matter of money and the willingness to go on an absurdly long flight. For Dakota, I had plenty of both and more besides.
“Of course,” I promised, reaching across the table to squeeze his hand. “Jillian and the others are more than capable of watching over Crescent when we come back. I have space and time for every part of you.”
Spots of pink appeared high on Dakota’s cheeks. Moon above, he had nice cheekbones. Everything about him was so goddamn pretty.
“You want to prove that?” he asked, glancing at me from beneath his dark lashes.
I shifted around on my floor seat, then grabbed the edge of his and pulled it closer to me. “You know, now that you mention it, I definitely, definitely do.”
6
Dakota
Jax was one of those guys who seemed effortlessly good at everything. From wearing a suit to high-stress merger negotiations, he just showed up, smiled, and did an amazing job.
But planes? Planes were an exception—maybetheexception. We got onto a plane, and Jax sort of compartmentalized his entire self. He sat in the middle of his seat—roomy, since they were first-class chairs—hands wrapped around each armrest, staring straight ahead as the plane taxied and took off. The whole time, his eyes were shut tight and his jaw was clenched—so tight I worried he might hurt himself. It was like he was afraid to acknowledge where we were and what was going on, let alone get comfortable.
The flight attendant offered him booze, which was nice but not all that helpful, since as wolves, our bodies processed booze too fast to get tipsy, unless we were double-fisting full bottles, and that... well, as much as I might have liked to get tipsy sometimes, that was a terrible idea, and Maia told me the hangover was the absolute worst.
Even more annoying, we couldn’t get drunk effectively, but we could get hung over.
I’d let Jax do his thing the first time, when we’d gone to Japan, but this time, I decided to try something else. Maybe sometimes the alpha still needed someone else to give him orders, and he always took them from me pretty damn well.
