Page 184 of Pucking Feral: Part Two

I drag my arm off my face and look at her again. She's still draped across me, still warm, still smiling.

I want this. Not just the sex she's offering, though my dick is never going to forgive me for turning that down.

I want this. Her weight against me. Her fingers in my hair. The fact that she came up here, dragged my brother along, and snuck into my room in the dark because she didn't want me to be alone.

Nobody does that for me. I'm the one who does that for everyone else.

"Hey." The word comes out before I've fully decided to say it. "Tomorrow night."

Ivy tilts her head. "What about it?"

"Let me take you out."

She goes still. "Out?"

"Out." My pulse picks up, which is ridiculous. I'm a grown man, I've done press conferences in front of millions of people, this should not be the thing that makes my heart stutter. "Just us. Not the pack as group thing. You and me."

"Like a date."

“Like a date,” I repeat, grinning.

She blinks at me, and for one horrible second I think I've misread the entire situation, that she's going to laugh or let me down easy or remind me that things are too complicated right now with PR breathing down our necks and Wade in the hospital and the league deciding whether half my pack gets to keep playing⁠—

"Yes."

I blink. "Yes?"

"Yes." Her whole face lights up, that bright wide grin coming back full force, and she pushes up on her hands to look down at me properly. "Where are we going? What do I wear? Is it fancy? Should I be worried it's fancy?"

"It's not fancy," I say, and I'm smiling now too, I feel it, stupid and helpless. "I'll figure it out. Somewhere we won't get recognized."

"Good luck with that."

"I have connections."

"You have a commissioner for a father."

"Which means I have connections," I say. "Trust me. Just say yes and let me handle the rest."

"I already said yes." She drops back down against my chest, still vibrating with that purr. "I get a Thane night. A whole Thane night. The others are going to be so jealous."

Wraith makes a low rumble of agreement.

Ivy giggles into my collarbone, and the sound of it softens up the knot of tangled up nerves in my chest a little more.

I let my hand come up and rest on her back. She's small enough that my palm covers most of her shoulder blade. I feel her purr start up again, low and content, and Wraith shifts closer behind her, his enormous arm draping back over both of us so that I'm half-pinned beneath the weight of it.

"You're crushing me," I tell him.

He doesn't move.

"Wraith."

He signs lazily with his free hand. Sleep.

"That's not…" I sigh. "Fine. Whatever. Crush me. See if I care."

I don't care. That's the problem. My giant feral brother is here and our scent-matched omega is purring into my throat and my migraine has faded to a dull background hum. And yet, despite every disaster waiting for me on the other side of sunrise, despite the statements and the league review and the cameras and the slow-motion catastrophe my life has become…