Page 145 of The Price of Ice

“Hey, teach,” Leo said, making Kallen smile and roll his eyes at him.

“What did we say about that word?”

Leo raised both hands. “Nothing! And besides, that was in class. Here you got no authority, do you?”

Tami and Kami laughed at his dramatics.

Kallen could have argued, but he didn’t really mind that much anymore. It was difficult to deny that he had helped them, even as they had helped him in turn.

“Are you going to expand this class of yours in the new year, young man?” Anthony asked him.

“Maybe these three can teach someone else the basics,” Kallen suggested, eyeing them all in turn. Leo and Kami were underage so he wasn’t really serious, but Tami could probably manage a group of four, and Taylor could probably do double that.

“Nah,” Leo said, easy and self-assured as usual. “You are the teacher, man. I just like to learn.”

“That is a very new take from my grandson indeed,” Richard commented and they were all laughing as Leo argued that he had always liked learning.

Tami took him aside to introduce him to her three children, two betas and a young omega girl who barely stood still long enough to be introduced before she was running off to get into what looked like mischief. Tami’s oldest, a boy who he’d just been told was fifteen, sighed like he was fifty. “Don’t mind her, she’s either eating, running after a ball or asleep.”

Kallen snorted a laugh in surprise. “Well, guess she’s living the life, isn’t she?”

The boy grimaced, shooting his mother a look.

“We are all a bit worried about her,” Tami explained. “That’s why I joined the group. Sports are the only thing Elisera seems to focus on for more than five minutes at a time.”

Kallen nodded, understanding. “I was like that too.” He tried to sip at his cup, only to discover it was empty.

“I can get you more,” Tami’s other daughter said at once. She looked a lot like her mother, a softness to her that would have made anyone seeing a picture thinkshewas the omega.

Kallen looked at Tami, who nodded, and passed her his empty cup.

She placed her hand on the boy’s shoulder, squeezing. “Max and Claudia like to help,” she explained. “They are a lot like me. Eli takes after my alpha, we think.” She shared a smile with the boy, whose own was a bit of a grimace.

“Could you...?” Max started to ask, but cut himself off.

“Yeah?” Kallen asked.

“Could you do the lure thing? Like, now? Mum says she doesn’t want to try it with us until she’s ready. But... Well, itsounds amazing. I mean, you said it feels nice, right?” He turned back to his mother.

Tami offered Kallen an apologetic smile. “It does,” she told her son. “But I have just started to learn it, and I wouldn’t want to do anything that could...” She wavered. “That could make you uncomfortable. And Kallen doesn’t need to do it either.”

Claudia got back with his cup, a little overfull, and gave him a bright smile he couldn’t help but respond to. “Thank you, that was kind of you.” He sipped at the cup to get it to a level where he wouldn’t accidentally spill it. “How about you guys get us all some food while I talk to your mum for a minute?”

They took the hint without checking with Tami first. But the moment they were gone, she started apologising.

“Wait!” Kallen interrupted. “I don’t mind. They seem like good kids, but doyouwant me to use lure on Max? Or Claudia?” He thought to ask because he’d been a younger sibling and he knew he’d wanted to do anything his older brothers got to do, often including things he’d have found completely unappealing otherwise.

“Well, if you—”

“I don’t mind,” Kallen insisted gently. Tami could get stuck on politeness, he’d learned, and if you let her go on she’d just get more and more anxious. Once Kallen had stopped her babbling and asked her for permission to use lure just to calm down the storm he could feel brewing inside her and spilling all over the room.

This time, she seemed to hear him. “Okay.” She paused. “Yeah, that’s— if they want to, I trust you.”

He nearly swallowed his tongue and then found himself blinking hard. He’d been working to earn her trust, of course, careful to establish healthy boundaries for everyone, but he’d fucked up too. Lure was still fairly new to him and he knew nothing about teaching at all. But even when he’d messedup, they’d somehow believed him when he’d apologised and explained, and hadn’t held it against him.

He was still struggling to believe it could be that easy.

“I...” He shook himself, then reached for her hand. “Thank you, that means a lot.”

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