Page 68 of Fight or Fly

I wasn’t entirely sure the two alphas behind me agreed with the sentiment, but they’d be bothering Beckett during his heat over my dead body. We might not have all the answers we wanted, but if there was one thing I had faith in right now, it was the devotion I’d seen between Beckett and his unlikely, impossible mate.

“Then I will leave you to rest,” said the probably-a-butler. “If you need assistance with anything, the bell pulls in the rooms are all functional. Use them and someone will come immediately.”

“Thank you,” I told him. “You’ve been a great help.”

The man bowed formally and departed, leaving us in the lavishly appointed wing of a fully staffed colonial-era mansion in the middle of the Cuban rainforest.

“This is nuts,” Flynn said. The words were a bit slurred after the dental surgery he’d just undergone to stabilize his loose teeth, but the meaning was clear enough.

On the one hand, I sympathized with the sentiment. But on the other hand, it made sense, given what we now knew. “Beckett is Nikolayev’s mate, and you’re practically Beckett’s pups,” I said. “It’s not really that surprising that he’d roll out the red carpet.”

“Didn’t stop him from tossing us in a cell when we first got here,” Jax muttered. He lowered himself onto the sofa of the living room where we’d fetched up at the end of the tour, leaning the cane he was grudgingly using against the armrest.

Kam sat on the other end, his head falling to rest against the back of the couch. “I get the impression that if Beckett hadn’t been in heat, Nikolayev wouldn’t have let their status as mates slip like he did.” He stared up at the pristine white plaster of the ceiling and the intricate gold-painted cornices for a long moment before adding, “And to be fair, it was a very pleasant cell, as cells go.”

“I’m amazed he was able to maintain the facade as long as he did,” I said. “He must have felt every moment of Beckett’s interrogation and torture through the bond.” To be able to pretend disinterest while experiencing the pain of the one closest to you in all the world...

I shivered.

Flynn flopped down in an armchair, wincing a bit. Thanks to alpha healing, the swelling on his face was already starting to go down, but he’d still been through the wringer.

Speaking of which—

“I don’t like the fact that Alex insisted on separate accommodations,” I said.

“No,” Kam agreed darkly. “The two of you don’t find that worrying at all?”

“Figured she was probably getting reacquainted with Irina,” Flynn said.

“Seems likely,” Jax agreed.

I turned to him. “I still can’t believe you dumped all of that on her with no warning.” There was censure in my tone, and I couldn’t help it. This had been eating at me ever since Alex woke up.

Jax met my eyes and held them. “Leo, the thing you don’t understand about Alex is that she won’t accept coddling, and she hates prevarication. Period. If she wanted to be here with the rest of the pack, she’d be here. She was pretty damned clear that she wanted space from us.”

“What we want and what we need are often two very different things,” Kam said philosophically. He rolled his head up from his perusal of the ceiling. “You could have at least tried to talk to her afterward.”

Flynn scoffed.

“Sure,” Jax said. “And I could have gotten my ass verbally reamed if she was in a good mood, or punched in the face if she was in a bad mood. She’s still got one good hand, you know.”

He must have noticed my answering scowl, because he softened a bit. “Alex doesn’t do feelings, Leo. Trying tomakeher do them doesn’t end well for anyone involved. That’s just the way she is. It’s not our place to try and change her—not that we’d want to in the first place. She’s Alex. She’s ouralef, and she’s also an emotionally constipated hardass. A fact that’s saved our lives on more than a few occasions.”

“I’m gonna tell her you said that,” Flynn said, sounding half asleep. His eyes were sliding closed, exhaustion catching up to him again.

“Which part?” Jax asked, frowning with what appeared to be genuine alarm. The only answer he got was a snore.

“You should both get some more rest,” I said, resigned to losing the argument for now. If she didn’t resurface tomorrow, I’d go track Alex down myself. Maybe I was in the wrong here, and she was shacked up in Irina’s quarters making up for lost time like the others assumed. I hoped that was the case, even if the idea brought an odd little pang of loss with it.

Perhaps the feeling was on Kam’s behalf. That was probably it.

“I want a shower,” the omega in question declared. “In fact, I wantallthe showers. God, I feel grungy.”

“Ditto,” I agreed, not wanting to be alone with my dark thoughts. “Share with me?”

“Always,” Kam agreed. “Jax? Why don’t you see if you can get Flynn to the nest? He’s going to need spinal readjustment if he sleeps for too long in that chair.”

Jax grunted acknowledgement and levered himself to his feet. I got up as well and crossed to kiss him. His lips were soft against mine, and he wrapped an arm around me, pressing my body to his.

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