Page 52 of The Pack's Knotty Runaway
“Okay, hold it right there, you’re doing amazing!” he calls. “I gotta step out for one quick sec. Keep breathing, keep glowing!”
He jogs out the side door into the hallway, chest heaving, a grin plastered across his face.
“What’s up, guys?” Reed says, wiping sweat from his forehead with his sleeve. “I’m killing it in there. I think I found my calling.”
“Seems so,Richard Simmons,” Ash says, chuckling. “Verysadly, though, it’s time to go. Bram found Luna.”
Reed’s grin vanishes. His posture straightens, his eyes locking on mine with a sharp, cold focus.
“Where?” Reed asks.
“She was in the cafeteria,” I say. “So let’s go check on her, grab our scent-fix, and bail. And let’s beinvisibleboys, because if she catches us sneaking around in these getups, I am legitimately scared she’ll never want to talk to us ever again.”
Reed nods. He leans back into the studio, holding the door open a crack.
“Okay, everybody, that’s the work!” he yells. “You crushed it. Class dismissed, go hydrate!”
He lets the door swing shut. “Lead the way.”
The three of us head down the hall together, a pack again. A pack made up of a lunch lady in a bad toupee, a janitor with a dead squirrel on his lip, and an aerobics instructor straightout of 1985. I try to picture a version of us that winds up here without a biological imperative dragging us along by the nose. I come up empty.
“Shit, I think we took a wrong turn somewhere,” I say as we walk. “But the cafeteria should be this way. Come on.”
We turn down a dim, quiet corridor where the smell of burning sage is thick.
But underneath it... Gooseberries. Honey.
Mate.
All three of us slow down at the exact same time. The hit of her scent is so strong it practically punches the breath out of my lungs. Beside me, Ash makes a low, rough sound in the back of his throat. Reed’s hands curl into fists.
The scent is pouring out of the open doorway to our left. A small chalkboard beside it reads:Midday Meditation — Mindful Reset.
I hold up a hand, signaling them to stay quiet, then edge toward the doorway and peer inside. Ash and Reed flank me, looking over my shoulders.
The room is dark, lit only by a few candles. A dozen women sit cross-legged on mats with their eyes closed.
And right there, in the second row, sits Luna.
The tight band of tension that’s been wrapping around my ribs all day loosens. My eyes didn’t deceive me in the cafeteria. There she is, beautiful and serene, her eyes closed and her hair twisted up in that messy way I love.
Just a little longer,I think, breathing her in, letting my lungs fill with the gooseberry and honey.Juuust a minute to steady ourselves, and then we leave.
Then a man in oatmeal-colored linen pants steps up behind her mat. He pauses, leans down, and presses his palms flat against our mate’s collarbones.
Luna’s shoulders tighten.
A low, gravelly vibration starts in my chest. Ash and Reed answer it with their own as the instructor’s fingers slide upward, toward the nape of her neck, right over her scent gland.
Easy,I tell myself, my teeth grinding together.Bram, cool down. It’s just a class. It’s just a class—
“DON’T TOUCH HER!” Reed roars, lunging into the room.
Oh, fuck.
24
Luna
