Page 74 of Starting a New Life

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, voice gentle but raspy.

“No, I’m sorry. I overreacted.”

Gray chuckled, his chest shaking against my cheek. “I’m the one who overreacted.”

“Agree to disagree.”

Fuck. I never wanted to let go. Like this, the bond was happy, my magic was happy, and I was happy. And Gray was too. I could feel his wolf excitedly yapping while Gray’s aura calmed, turning peaceful and content with every breath he took.

I didn’t know how long we stood in the middle of my room like that, but at one point, I felt Gray stiffen a bit, and then he chuckled.

“I see you have visitors.”

Oh.

The pups.

My cheeks heated, and I instinctively hid my face against his chest.

“Uhm. Yes, Alpha,” Connie stuttered, his voice thin, demure in a way it hadn’t been when he’d been bickering with Nick. “It was nice to talk to you, Nix, but we’ll, uh, we’ll…”

“Go,” Nick supplied. I caught him smirking at me as he pulled his friend up, and they quickly passed us before leaving the room with a respectful nod at Gray. “Alpha.”

Connie repeated the gesture, even tilting his head to the side, then stumbled out the door.

“What were they doing here?” Gray asked, one eyebrow raised in amusement.

“Fuck if I know,” I mumbled against his chest. “They came to thank me and just… didn’t leave.”

Gray chuckled, his arm tightening, pressing me even closer against him, but there was a sliver of something that started clouding his laugh. A hint of sadness. “Maybe you made them feel safe.”

The thought was absurd.

Me making someone else feel safe when most of the time I didn’t feel safe myself. Then again, there had to be a reason they’d come back to my room even when they could simply have gone to theirs.

Maybe it wasn’t me making them feel safe, but rather them not wanting to be alone, just in a way that didn’t overwhelm them. I didn’t know, and right now, I had other things to do than figure it out. There was time for that later. Because I knew without a sliver of a doubt that the boys would be back. After all, they’d left their game all set up.

“Soo… want to talk about what happened in the woods?”

Gray sighed. “Not particularly, no. I was being an idiot. I’m sorry. Can we maybe put a pin in it and talk about it later? Right now, I just want to hold you close. Being apart is agony. And being apart while on bad terms is pure and utter hell.”

“Agreed,” I whispered and closed my eyes. If being apart was hell, being wrapped up in his arms was heaven.

Chapter 16

Gray

“Okay,” Rhett said, handing a list of names to me. “We already have twenty pack members who are willing to let Nix connect them to the barrier. Twenty in forty-eight hours. That’s huge.”

I nodded, giving the piece of paper a short look. The first names didn’t come as a surprise. Oakley, Diana, Jenny, Paul, Jasper, and Angelo. The list went on and on. Ideally, there’d be more in the future, but twenty was a lot.

“That’s good,” I said, handing the list back when I realized one person was missing. “What about Heath?”

Rhett furrowed his brow. “Did he not sign up? Huh. I’ll have to ask him later.”

I shook my head. “Don’t. I’ll ask him. I wouldn’t care about other pack members, but at this point he’s kind of your deputy, and if he wants to hold that position officially, he needs to be tapped into the barrier directly. That is, if you want him as your second.”

Just as I expected, Rhett didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he took a while, staring into orbit, but I knew his mind was racing.