Page 44 of Their Alpha

We were a good hour away from the cliff house before we stumbled across a massive truck stop and travel center. I could have shouted in relief. As we veered off the highway and pulled into the sparsely filled parking lot, I knew it was exactly the sort of place we needed.

“This looks promising,” Gideon reflected my thoughts, peering out the window once I cut the car’s engine. “That sign says they have showers.”

I grinned at Fletcher. I could hear the question in Gideon’s statement. The water at the cliff house had still been running a tiny bit dirty when we’d all gotten up this morning. It was passably clean now, but the well it was drawn from obviously needed attention. We’d all taken sponge baths with cold water before getting dressed.

“I suppose we could take the risk of showering here,” Fletcher said, calculation ringing through our bond. “Maybe one at a time, though.”

Yeah, I would definitely stand guard outside the shower room door while Gideon cleaned up. Goode wasn’t the only alpha Fletcher and I needed to worry about. Even as we got out and walked to the travel center, I spotted several rough-looking alphas eyeing Gideon up while licking their lips.

Some ogled Fletcher as well, but unlike Gideon, Fletcher was fully aware of it. He even gave one alpha the finger and glared at the man so hard he held up his hands and walked away.

I loved it. I loved Fletcher. He was so fierce. Nothing was ever going to stand in his way, with or without an alpha in his life. He didn’t need me to protect and defend him, at least not the way Gideon did, but I sure was happy I would get to stand by and watch him live and grow.

The travel center had everything we needed, which was a huge relief. The first thing we purchased was the fuel tank for the generator. That went straight into the back of the SUV before we headed back into the center for our showers.

There were enough shower rooms that we all could have taken a shower at the same time, but I insisted Fletcher go first so that he would be done before Gideon took a turn. I stood guard like the brute alpha that I really wasn’t for both of them so that by the time it was my turn, both of my omegas could wander off and look at everything the travel center had to offer.

As I waited for them, I pulled out my phone, grateful for a few minutes of internet. I texted Victor first, giving him the shortened version of what was going on and where we were. I knew Fletcher didn’t want people knowing about the cliff house, but I trusted Victor with my life, and I felt miles more comfortable with him knowing exactly where I would be until I could contact him again.

Once that was done and Victor and I had a short conversation through texts, I checked my work email. There was an email from Goode offering me the job that had been sent less than half an hour after I’d left the interview. He’d asked me to respond by the end of the day, but clearly I hadn’t.

I answered now, thanking him for the opportunity but letting him know I didn’t think we were a good fit. It was more than the bastard deserved, but the professional in me wouldn’t let me respond rudely after an interview.

I was one tap away from closing my phone and putting it away when a response came to that email. My heart rate kicked up, and I immediately tapped the email to open it.

It was an out-of-office message, which relieved me a little.I would have ignored it, but it was one of the strangest out-of-office messages I’d ever seen.

“I will be out of the office for the next few days or weeks as I have received a divine calling to restore my family and make it right with God. Just like the story of the Prodigal Omega, my place as head of my household will be restored. As soon as it is, I will be back in the office to carry God’s message to all who Arise Financial touches and to bring us all toward the light.”

The message was chilling, and I sent it straight to my trash folder. Once we got through this and my omegas were safe, I hoped to never have anything to do with Justice Goode or The People of God on Earth ever again.

My omegas. It defied logic, but that’s how I felt about them. The bond was an obvious connection between me and Fletcher, but once it was my turn in the showers, as I scrubbed the day’s dirt off my skin in the musty-smelling shower stall, a part of me actually worried about washing too hard and removing Gideon’s scent from my skin.

I shook my head and sighed before leaning back to rinse my hair. I barely knew what was going on. I needed to know more about bonds. I really needed to know more about love, too.

“So what kind of supplies do you think we’ll need to get us through for a while?” Fletcher asked once I was done with my shower and dressed again.

He’d already filled up the collapsable wagon he’d found for sale somewhere in the store with new clothing, like t-shirts, sweatpants, and underwear, for all of us. There were full-size toiletries in his wagon, too, so he was definitely thinking long-term.

I drew in a breath, rubbed my clean but still unshaven face, and looked around at the several small stores containedwithin the umbrella of the center. Gideon was off to one side, looking at books in the surprisingly large bookshop section of the center’s convenience store. As long as I knew where he was, I was only tense instead of all-out panicked about him.

“Assuming we can get that generator running as soon as we get home and fire up the fridge, we should get things like milk, eggs, meat.”

“Cheese,” Fletcher added. When I grinned at him, he shrugged and said, “What? I love cheese. Is that a crime?”

I laughed outright. “Nope. I love cheese, too. But not all of it has to be refrigerated constantly.”

“Non-refrigerated cheese it is, then,” Fletcher said, smiling.

It was the first easy smile I’d seen from him since meeting him, and it transformed him. Yes, Fletcher was strong and determined, but that smile gave me a hint of his vulnerable side. I wanted to get to know that side of him more. I wanted to learn what would make him laugh and smile like that more often. I wanted him to feel safe enough with me that he could breathe into his omega side, whether it was weak or not.

More than all of that, I wanted to kiss the living daylights out of him. His smile turned heated as our eyes met and the bond between us throbbed. Fletcher was as attracted to me as I was to him. I could already envision smoking-hot nights between the two of us, in heat or out, where we would be able to give each other everything and more.

But then there was Gideon. Every time I started to get all worked up about Fletcher, thoughts of Gideon slipped in. I knew he was watching us, though when I glanced over at the bookshop, he had his nose in a book. He couldpretend all he wanted, but he couldn’t pretend away the giant question mark hanging over all of us.

“I’ll do some grocery shopping while you…check out some books,” Fletcher said with a sigh, thinking the same thing I was.

“Perfect,” I said. Then, because it felt right, I stepped closer to him and gave him a quick kiss on the lips.

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