Page 37 of Crave

A diner with a striped awning out the front was glowing like a beacon, but Tanner drove straight past. The town square was lit up with fairy lights, and people stood in small groups, chatting and laughing. It was like a macabre Rockwell painting.

Tanner pulled into the space in front of a tiny cabin, no bigger than a two-room apartment. It didn’t look particularly like anything, almost a blank canvas.

“Home sweet home. It’s not very big, but we can shower, and you guys can borrow some of my clothes before we head over to talk to Raine,” he said, climbing out of the driver’s seat and stretching. I knew he probably could have run this distance in nearly half the time, but he’d stuck it out with us.

The big blond vamp made me feel soft, but I’d noticed when he was giving us our Pack therapy session earlier he hadn’t added himself into the equation. Maybe he wasn’t interested in anything more with us, and I wasn’t about to admit out loud how much that hurt. Tanner didn’t owe us anything. He’d been more than good to us; he’d saved me and gotten me through the yearning. His responsibility to us ended there.

Hopefully, we could give him something back in the form of a reprieve for murdering Wilkie and Joseph, but then that was it, right?

I sat in the tiny open-plan living-kitchen area, jammed onto the couch beside Susannah while we waited for Murphy to emerge from the bedroom. I was wearing Tanner’s sweats and a tee, and they fit pretty well. But they swamped Susannah, and they were basically like tights on Merrick. Honestly, it looked like he’d stashed a salami down his pants, given the camel tail he was rocking. Manix were just built bigger.

When Murphy came out, I snorted out a laugh before I could suck it back down. “Laugh it up, chuckles. I’ll take it out on your ass later,” he warned, pointing at me, and I winked back. Promises, promises.

Tanner swallowed hard, and his eyes danced with laughter. “We should go. You’re probably hungry, and nothing is better dinner entertainment than watching me get my ass handed to me by a five-foot-three vampire who looks like she's eighteen.”

He was joking, but I could see the very real worry around his eyes. I grabbed his fingers and squeezed them. “We’ve got your back, Tanner. I’ll throw a full Manix Omega hissy fit if they don’t see it our way.” I raised an eyebrow at him. “I’ve never done it before, but I’ve seen it plenty of times. There's a lot of tears and snot; it's kind of disconcerting from a nearly seven-foot monster.”

Tanner laughed, wrapping an arm around my shoulders and pulling me in tightly to his body. “Thanks, mate. I appreciate it.” He kissed the side of my head, and I told my heart that it was just a friendly gesture, not romantic. If I’d learned one thing about the golden retriever vampire, it was that Aussies were huggers.

We took the SUV, despite the fact the place we were going was less than a ten-minute walk away. There were no other cars on the road, mostly just people zipping all over the place at the speed of light. A car would almost be a slower mode of transport.

We stopped in front of a well-lit building. The sign hanging above the plate glass windows said The Immortal Cupcake, and the stained-glass windows glowed invitingly. Sucking in a deep breath, Tanner climbed out, holding the door open for Susannah and I.

Zanny brushed her fingers across his stomach, and he looked down at her with something close to adoration on his face. They’d definitely gotten closer during the heat, and anyone with eyes could see the attraction building there. I’d seen it all along, the way she’d watched him hungrily. They just had to get out of their own way.

He looked over at us all. “We can say our piece, and then you have to let the next events run their course. You can’t interfere, yeah?”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “What's the worst case scenario?”

He just shook his head, walking toward the entrance of the cafe. There were at least a dozen people inside. I followed in behind him with Zanny’s hand in mine, and the Alphas brought up the rear.

The whole place quieted as we entered, and I could almost hear their collective inhale. Every atom in my body stiffened in preparation for fight or flight, but then a girl behind the counter snorted. “Keep your fangs in your pants, or I’ll eject every single one of you from here and give you an eight-week ban.”

There was a collective mutter as everyone went back to pretending to eat. The girl wasn’t the Convocation Member, and as I inhaled, I realized she was alive. A shifter of some kind, maybe?

“It’s good to see you, Tanner,” she said happily. “Who are your friends?”

“Everly, this is Quinn, Susannah, Merrick, and Murphy. They’re Manix.”

The girl’s brown eyes bounced between all of us with interest—the academic kind of interest, not the sexual kind. “Bold of you to bring a bunch of Manix into a town of bloodsuckers, Outback Jack. Like whipping out the caviar at an all you can eat buffet.”

“Desperate times, Everly. Is Raine around? And why are you here and not the guys?”

Everly’s smile was wide. If I had to describe it, I’d say it was a shit-eating grin. “Well, a lot has happened while you took your tiny hiatus to Whoville, Crocodile Dundee. Raine went on a gap year and came back with two new mates. She’s probably somewhere having dirty, immortal monkey sex.”

Tanner screwed up his nose. “There’s a lot to unpack right there, and I’m not sure I have the brainpower for it today. How was seven mates not enough? Nine just seems excessive.”

Everly laughed. “Yep, she’s definitely going to need some kind of vaginal facelift in a decade. Vag-lift?”

A voice cleared behind me. “I promise my vagina is as tight as it was the day I was turned. Could crack walnuts in that baby. Ka-pow.”

I spun on my heel to see a tiny woman with blood-red hair. There was no doubt in my mind this was the Convocation Member. I hadn’t met her, despite her trips to Maxton. We’d been… otherwise engaged.

The vampiress looked at Merrick and Murphy. “Good to see you two again. I just got off the phone with your Alpha General.” Her face folded into empathy. “I’m sorry about your home.”

Merrick cleared his throat. “It’s all gone, then?”

She nodded. “Some of the Legion building stands, but most of the town was demolished by the force of the flames. It took out a lot of properties further down the mountain too, though the human authorities managed to save the main part of the little town you guys frequent for supplies.”

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