Page 109 of In the Mouth of the Wolf

I sat up, now seeing that I wasn’t the only one down here. Elias and Marlowe were spooning, asleep in a makeshift nest of couch cushions, while Archer sat against the wall, pushing his fingers into his chest.

“She was right, I’m completely healed,” Archer whispered to himself.

“Of course I was right,” Marlowe chimed in, starting to rouse. But Elias had other plans, his hands now hungrily running up and down her body while he licked and nibbled along her neck. With a quick jerk he was inside her, and she began moaning.

I wanted to watch, feeling my own cock begin to stir, but Archer jumped up, stretching and laughing as he twisted his chest without any pain. He walked over and offered me his hand. “Come on, let’s go survey the damage.”

I glanced back longingly at Elias and Marlowe, watching in admiration and envy as he thrust relentlessly into our omega, and she enjoyed every second of it.

Were all omegas so ravenous, or was that just Marlowe?

I let Archer help me up and followed him upstairs. “Hey, wait. Why do they get out of cleaning up again?”

Archer shrugged. “I’m just being pragmatic. They’ll be occupied for the next thirty minutes or so, and I have no idea when Cam’s coming home. It couldn’t have been easy for him, watching his whole pack shifted and running off without him. The least we can do is make sure his house isn’t a disaster.”

“Yeah, I suppose,” I grumbled under my breath. “But Elias and Marlowe are definitely on the hook the next time this happens.”

Aside from some muddy paw prints and the broken door, the house remained intact. Archer found painter’s tarp in the garage while I swept the glass, and we sealed the open door as best we could from the cold.

“I think we’re going to need to take a page from old shifter architecture and install a wolf-friendly entrance,” Archer said.

“You mean a giant doggy door?” I smirked.

Archer rolled his eyes. “If you want to call it that, sure. Of course, we are still learning how this works, and in the future, we’ll have more control about when and where we shift. But it wouldn’t hurt to make it easier for our wolf forms to get in and out of the house.”

I wouldn’t put it past Cam to already be thinking about all of this.

Marlowe’s beautiful voice, keening in pleasure, echoed up the stairs, and I realized I really needed some pants. Archer and I had shared our omega before, but it still felt weird to just be hanging out naked and hard in front of my pack.

“I want to find out what made her so upset today,” I said quietly. I had felt her so acutely down the bond. She had been upset and scared about something, and then had collapsed into unbelievable sadness. “Do you think she ran into another one of Cam’s exes? He has a horrible habit of shitting where he eats.”

Archer ran his hand over the edges of the tarp, feeling for gaps of cold air. He added another layer of tape and kept going. “Had,” he corrected. “And no, Marlowe was fine when we saw her, remember? Camden didn’t seem particularly rattled either. I bet it had something to do with her father.”

Right, that made more sense. My own phone began to ring and I found it in the kitchen, biting back a groan when I saw who was calling. I had totally forgotten about my meeting with Seth, the City Manager.

“Hey Seth, I know, I’m so sorry…”

“I don’t want to hear it, Nolan,” he snapped. “This is getting ridiculous. I’ve been covering for your ass since you disappeared two weeks ago, and now you can’t even bother to show up to a meetingyouscheduled? Are you even coming to the Town Council meeting tomorrow night?”

Shit, tomorrow was already the first Thursday of the month. “Yes, of course. Let’s go over the agenda in the morning. I’ll be in at nine, I swear it.”

Seth scoffed. “You better be.”

I cursed under my breath when he abruptly hung up. By now, nearly the whole town knew about Marlowe, thanks to gossip and Cam’s eulogy at her dad’s funeral. But two weeks for an omega honeymoon was pushing it. Especially since I’d likely need to take more time off again in the near future once she started another heat.

My cock twitched at even the fleeting thought of it.

“Everything okay?”

Archer broke me out of my thoughts and I sighed. “Not really. I’ve been a crappy mayor recently and it’s finally catching up with me. Thank the Moon the next election isn’t for two more years.”

He nodded knowingly. “Yeah, my dean isn’t too happy with me, either. Once things calm down, we’ll find a better balance.”

Once things calm down… He said it like we just had a few extra things on our plates and not like our lives had turned completely upside down since Marlowe had arrived. Of course, if I had to choose my job or her, she’d win in a heartbeat. But I still hoped we could quickly figure out who the creep that had threatened to take her was so we could neutralize him and maybe start living in a mentally and emotionally sustainable way, instead of just rushing from one emergency to the next with no breathing room in between.

All I wanted was to go to work, help make meaningful, positive changes, and then come home, cook dinner, hang out with my pack, and fall asleep with my omega in my arms.

The American Shifter Dream.

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