He sighs, running a hand through his hair. “Yes. You do.”
I grin up at my alpha. “Then let’s go.”
He lets me lead him down the hall and to the stairs, where the guys are waiting in the living room. I clear my throat to get their attention when we reach the entryway, but when all their eyes fall on me, my mouth goes dry.
Teddy, his hair gelled back, wearing a black button-down with the top three buttons undone, fully exposing the way his tattoos expand from his neck to his chest.
Ethan, in an olive green dress shirt that makes his eyes pop.
And Maverick, wearing a button-down that stretches across his broad chest, and a gray suit jacket.
Brennan joins them, and then I have the complete picture.
My pack is dangerously hot.
I feel like I recover fairly quickly from ogling them, at least, quicker than they do.
“Holy shit, Dove.” Teddy shakes his head first, jogging up to me. “I knew you were a fuckin’ smoke show, but you look damn incredible.” He takes my hand, twirling me in a circle as I giggle. “Let’s see the back then.”
Maverick, Ethan, and Teddy all groan in appreciation at the sight of my ass.
“Her ass has always been fantastic,” Ethan comments as I complete the circle and face them again, “but has it gotten…more?”
“Morefantastic?” Maverick grunts, eyebrows raised. “I would have said it’s impossible, but I definitely think our omega has gotten her natural curves back.”
My cheeks flush at his praise. Not too long ago the doctor was saying I was malnourished, and now I havenatural curves.“You guys like it? It’ssocomfortable.”
“You make it look good, Baby Girl, not the other way around,” Maverick says, walking over. “I hate that you were ever forced into clothes that were so horrible for you.”
“Never again,” Ethan swears, joining us. “And I’ve already put your painting in the car.”
Ah yes, my parting gift for my parents.
“One thing though,” Brennan speaks up, and based on his tone I immediately know what he’s about to say. My death glare fails to silence him. “Her temperature was one-oh-three.”
“Fuck,” Maverick mutters, his hands reaching up to run through his hair. “That’s…uncomfortably close.”
“As I already told Brennan,” I put my hand on my hips. “I may have gone up a degree, but between lunch yesterday and lunch today, it’s gone up two degrees. So one more degree by dinner time is on track—I should still have a day or two until my heat actually hits.”
“The thing is, Wren…” Ethan sighs, “this is the first time for all of us. We’re going purely based on Maggie’s theory, which isn’t fact. You could jump up those last three degrees by the time we make it to the restaurant. And…one-oh-six isn’t an exact threshold, just an estimate.”
I huff, crossing my arms. “Okay, then why did we even agree to dinner in the first place? Because back when we did this, my heat could still have hit at any moment. The only difference is now we have a reference point.”
Teddy looks between us. “She ‘as a point. If we cancel now, it’ll look like we was bluffin’. We can’t just outright say she’s gon’ into ‘eat either. They’ll try to get us while she’s vulnerable.”
Maverick purses his lips. “Fine. We’ll still go as planned but…Brennan, bring the thermometer. We’ll do discreet checks, and if it gets to be too high, we toss the flash drive with the copied evidence at them, tell them to fuck off, and leave.”
It’s better than nothing. “Alright. Are you guys ready to go?”
Toscano’s is fairly busy, as usual, but when Maverick tells the host who we’re meeting, he quickly takes us to a private room. I can tell the guys are a little on edge being ina place like this, and I can’t really blame them. Maybe if I hadn’t shared that it’s the restaurant where my family has routinely met with rival families to broker deals, they’d be less nervous.
I couldn’t let them come into the wolves’ den blind though.
We pass through the main dining room, and it’s hard not to notice the way other women’s eyes catch on my men. One in particular has her eyes glued to Teddy, eye-fucking him with abandon. My instinct is to rip her eyeballs out of their sockets, but luckily, I’m able to tone it down.
A low growl emanates from my throat as I grab Teddy’s hand in a death grip. The woman startles, giving me a dirty look before turning back to her table.
Three more hands make contact with my body in some way as we trail close behind the host. Maverick’s on the back of my neck, Ethan’s on my lower back, and Brennan taking my other hand.
