"Not at all," Marcus said, pulling away from me to pull the sauce pan off the stove, adding the egg and sugar mixture to it in batches while he whisked.
I missed the feeling of closeness instantly, but it didn't seem like Marcus minded at all. His attention shifting to Eva now that she’d joined us.
A ball formed in the pit of my stomach.
"Dessert is almost ready, if you want to sit at the breakfast nook."
"Cool, thank you," she said as she drifted in that direction, hanging up Marcus’ jacket by the back door for him. “Indi will be down soon, and Cameo.”
I hopped off the counter to join Eva, pulling her close on the bench.
"How was your day?" she asked with a smile that almost made me forget that I was annoyed.
It was hard to be mad at anything when her sparkly blue eyes were looking at me like that, even if she reeked of my alphas.
"Fine," I said, my thumb tracking along the back of her hand on the table. "Mostly just drew, I have a piece due to a client soon. So I’m trying to get on top of it. How was your date?"
Since I’d moved in with the pack and Cameo had made it abundantly clear that I wasn’t to contribute to the household bills, I didn’t have to take quite as much paid work. It was nice, it meant that I could be choosier about the projects that I took on, saving my time for things I was really excited about. This client in particular was really interesting—a female alpha looking for splash screens for her stream. Even if she wasn’t my type, I had to admit she was hot. And getting to work on the project had been really inspiring.
Maybe I should draw Eva next.
I was so lost in fantasies of asking Eva to model for me that I missed half of what she said about dinner, clocking back into our conversation midway through.
“And the staff are so sweet! Getting to see the back was, like, crazy cool. And Cameo came to uh… help me get ready.”
Her suggestive smile and brush against her marked-up thigh helped her meaning click into place.
"Oh, you slept with him?" I asked.
She nodded, looking a bit bashful. "He broke into my apartment," she said, dropping her voice to a whisper. “It was so fucking hot.”
I should’ve guessed; she reeked of him. It obviously wasn't a big deal that they slept together, she’d signed a contract to be the mother of the pack’s baby for fuck sakes. But, still… I thought that Cameo stalking and terrifying before sex was our thing. And he’d never asked to cut me before… but that was totally fine!
It probably meant nothing.
I wasn’t bothered one bit.
Not at all.
Except… I totally fucking was.
I couldn't help feeling that Eva was getting this special attention that I was missing out on, at least from everyone but Indi. Was it because there was something wrong with me? Because they thought she would bond with them, and I wouldn't?
Or was this all because of the baby? Keeping her happy and pliant so that she’d behave and act like the good little fuckdoll they’d paid for?
The close of the refrigerator door pulled me from my spiral, turning my focus to Marcus.
“Those just need to set a while—but I brought these from the restaurant,” he said, a pair of ramekins clinking down onto the table holding perfectly golden little custards topped with a mountain of strawberries and dark chocolate drizzle on one, the other with white chocolate. “You’ll have to forgive the theatre, Joon. I was maybe doing a bit of show boating… And I needed to replace what I took for dinner service tomorrow.”
"So we aren’t eating the ones you made?" I asked.
“Nah, they need to rest.”
"Oh, you remembered," Eva said brightly, dragging the white chocolate drizzled dessert towards herself.
"I did," Marcus confirmed, sliding in next to her, forcing both of us to scoot in to make room.
"Remembered what?" I asked, using my spoon to break the caramelized sugar shell.
