The eggs blurred for a second as my pulse kicked up, a whooshing sound filling my ears. I flipped them anyways, hands trembling, trying to keep my breathing quiet and controlled.
“Hey,” Evander said softly, closer now. “You’re okay.”
The words were gentle, but they didn’t reach me at first. Panic surged up fast and sharp, drowning out everything else. My fingers tightened around the spatula. I couldn’t look at him.
“Let me take over while you go find some clothes. No cooking unless you have at least pants or shorts on.”
I nodded quickly as his hand wrapped around my own, taking the spatula away.
I felt like I was caving in from the outside. Already so soon, and I was a disappointment to the Alpha. I was a failure at this.
Why didn’t I get a rule book like the one we all had at Lockswell? Why didn’t he just tell me all the rules and expectations last night instead of having me go to bed? Why didn’t he just take my body instead of being so polite?
There are so many reasons that I couldn’t dare ask.
Instead, with tears streaking down my face, I quickly high tailed to my bedroom and found the same pants he had given me yesterday. I slipped them on, nearly falling on my face while doing so.
Chapter 18
Evander
I wasn’t sure what I expected to wake up to, but it definitely wasn’t Kasey standing in my kitchen at dawn, barefoot and wearing nothing. Cooking.
It took my sleep fogged brain a few seconds too long to register what I was looking at. His back was to me, small and tense, spatula in hand as he hovered over the stove. Naked.
Whatever he was making smelled incredible, and the scent pulled me closer before I even realized I’d moved.
I rubbed the last of the sleep from my eyes, blinking at the sight of him, quiet and focused like he belonged there and didn’t at the same time.
It took my brain a couple of extra seconds to find words, telling the Omega to go get some sort of clothes on as I gently pried the spatula out of his death grip.
A deep blush coated his face before he booked it from the area and disappeared around the corner of his room.
All I could do was shake my head, knowing there was nothing I could have done differently at that moment, other than bringing him his clothes myself.
Some ground rules needed to be set the moment we finished eating. If I didn’t put a few lines in place, this Omega was going to run me ragged without even trying.
It was already hard enough not to let my eyes linger where they had no business going. Not because of anything he was doing, just because my brain hadn’t caught up to the fact that he wasn’t a kid anymore.
He’s my best friend,I reminded myself. Or he had been, once. Before everything. Before the years and the silence and the loss.
He wasn’t that eight-year-old boy I used to chase through the yard. But he was still Kasey. Still the person I’d spent half my childhood protecting. Still, someone who felt like mine in a way I didn’t have the right to claim anymore, no matter how stubbornly my instincts tried to argue otherwise.
And that was exactly why I needed those rules. Before my own head made this harder than it already was.
I finished the last of the cooking, then plated everything, set the dishes on the table and stepped back for a moment. It wasn’t fancy, but it was warm, and it was the start of a new beginning. I grabbed two glasses, filled them with water, and placed them beside the plates. Small things that I hoped would make the room feel safe for the skittish, unsure Omega as he found a place in my life once again.
Kasey reappeared in the doorway a moment later, moving like he wasn’t sure he was allowed to cross the threshold. He had one of my shirts on, one sleeve showing a bit of skin on his shoulder as it began to slip off.
Looking at him sent a pang of want through my heart. I wanted him to wear my stuff, to claim it as his own even though he’d have his own items.
I could picture him willingly wearing my clothes because he was more comfortable in them than his own. Maybe he wore my clothes because he couldn’t bear to be apart from me.
Shaking those thoughts off, I tore my gaze from him, and I ignored the fact that he didn’t look at me. Because if so, I wasn’t sure I’d have the willpower to not drool right there at that moment over how attractive he truly was.
“Food’s ready.” I cleared my throat.
Kasey was in no way mentally stable enough for my thoughts to take over. My own desires didn’t belong here. If ever, for that matter.
