Page 202 of Pucking Feral: Part Two

Whiskey stops.

Wraith doesn't look up.

Whiskey means well. But his heart runs faster than his brain, and by the time his brain catches up, his heart has already kicked down the door and set the building on fire.

I already saved Wraith from being thrown into prison, and hopefully from being thrown out of the league. Looks like I have to save him from the pack's resident fucking bull in a china shop, too.

"I don't know what to do either," I find myself saying.

The other alphas' heads all turn toward me.

I clear my throat and lean back in the armchair, crossing my ankle over my knee casually even though I'm on edge now that all their eyes are on me instead of each other.

"With a date," I clarify, because Whiskey's already squinting like I've grown a second head. "With any of it. I don't exactly know how to be an omega's alpha."

Whiskey opens his mouth.

I hold up a hand. "If you say bro, I'm leaving."

"I wasn't gonna say bro."

"You were," I say, and he's looking sheepish and thoroughly caught the fuck out, so I push myself out of the armchair before he can regroup for another assault of enthusiastic pack bonding.

I fucking hate this emotional pack bullshit. It drives me crazy with my family, and now these fuckers are becoming my family, too.

Disgusting.

I go straight to the kitchen. It's dark, which suits me fine. I open the fridge and duck down to glance inside at the plethora of repulsive colorful sports drinks scattered throughout the beer on the drinks shelf.

I grab a rare bottle of plain water and crack the seal, leaning against the counter. The cold liquid escaping the cap trickles down my palm and my wrist, running along the cluster of round burn scars I keep hidden beneath my sleeves during the day. At night, in the dark, they're just texture. Just skin that healed wrong.

A fucking lot of me healed wrong.

The soft sound of footsteps makes the shorthairs on the back of my neck prickle. There's a shift in air pressure, the faintest creak of a floorboard that wouldn't creak under anything less than a giant.

I don't turn around.

I take a sip of water and wait.

The only other alpha in this pack who healed as wrongly as I did materializes in my peripheral vision like a shadow. Like his namesake, really.

He stops at the kitchen island a few feet away, and watches me. His scarred face is fully exposed in the light from the fridge, every sharp tooth bared in that permanent rictus grin, and the contrast between that and the softness in his blue eyes is… strange.

Shocking, maybe, if I were anyone else. If I hadn't seen what I'd seen from day fucking one on this godsforsaken planet.

Despite the rest of his face, Wraith’s eyes are even more puppy than Whiskey's. Bright and blue and warm, even with the lingering sadness there from the conversation we were just having in the living room.

But why the fuck is he looking at me like that?

Like he likes me?

"What?" I mutter warily.

He raises a hand and taps his fingers to his chin, then out. Thank you.

My jaw tightens. The scar on my temple from Ivy clobbering me with the fire extinguisher itches, but I resist the urge to touch it. That's another tic I have. That, and the fucking cigarette burns.

"You don't need to thank me, Wraith."