Page 76 of Into the Fire: Before

Will they try to take her again?Probably. The scheme had been ongoing for decades, and I doubted one incompetent bounty hunter would deter them.

What do we do?Hell if I fucking knew.

Taryn rarely left her room. She didn’t even try to convince us she needed to get back to work. With the realization that her “paranoia” may have been somewhat based on reality—it wasn’t out of the question that peoplewerewatching her—we all felt safer holed up on the top floor of the building, where no one was alone, and where there were four fighting bodies between our omega and the villains coming for her.

That had happened at some point—that she’d becomeours.It hadn’t been explicitly stated by any of us, but by virtue of hers and Brea’s staying here, their trust in us, it didn’t really need saying.

We would, though. Sometime soon, when the saying wouldn’t be marred by fear.

Thefourthnightbroughta preheat spike.

I woke in the wee hours to a mouthwatering sweet scent. It practically carried me to the closed guest room door without any conscious decision to move. Enoughmepersisted that I didn’t burst through it and pounce. I stood outside, sweaty forehead pressed against the doorframe, inhaling the buttery, sticky toffee scent of a perfuming omega as if it were a drug.

Then I heard the moans. The sighs. The creak of the bed as two bodies moved on it, an alpha tending to her needy omega.

Caine joined me at some point in the dark of night. We kept each other anchored, each of us pulling the other back when we sensed they were teetering on the edge of control.

In some other universe, we’d be in there with them. They’d invited us to be heat partners; stood to reason we’d be welcome at preheats, too. But Clint Hooper and Phoenix Labs and goddamn Wainwright had shattered that universe.

When Brooks also stumbled out of our bedroom right as the dark outside began to lighten, the sounds and scents had already lessened a good deal. Yet there we stood. All three of us craved her, cravedthem.

The door swung open inward, and we all jolted back.

Caught.

Brea stood at the door, hair mussed and cheeks flushed. Fuck, shesmelledof Taryn’s slick, and it made my cock twitch in my sweats. Behind her, Taryn lay sleeping in the bed, face more peaceful than I’d seen it in weeks.

“I asked her before she conked out,” Brea whispered as she stepped aside. “You’re welcome to spend the rest of the night in here.”

Brooks immediately burst through and claimed a spot on the far edge of the bed, knitting his fingers in with Taryn’s. I ran my fingers over Brea’s cheek, noting that she, too, looked calmer. I left a light kiss on her lips, indeed tasting Taryn there. I forced my horny and eager alpha down and stepped over the threshold.

Caine, though, stayed rooted to the spot. God, this had to be ten levels of weird for him. He’d been convinced that their invitation had only included him out of politeness, but I wasn’t sure. He only ever gave me the bare bones of what he and Brea covered and worked on in their sessions, but I knew how immensely they impacted him. And I knew his respect for Brea was deep and solid.

Was she technically even his therapist anymore? I didn’t see how she could be after the last few weeks. They may have begun as strangers who happened to share a building, but they shared so much more now.

They shared an omega, even if they didn’t realize it yet.

“You can come in too,” Brea said softly, a hand on his wrist.

He stepped back with a grunt. “Hall’s fine,” he muttered before stationing himself at the doorway, settling in like a soldier on watch.

We didn’t try to change his mind. Brea simply left the door ajar, our scents able to reach him and his form never out of our sight. Then Brea and I climbed quietly into the bed, Brea on Taryn’s left side and me behind her. It was a tight squeeze with four of us. That was fine—none of us was looking for space anyway.

Daysixfoundmestaring at my computer screen. Early enough that the automatic coffee timer hadn’t tripped yet. I sat at the kitchen counter. None of the others had emerged from their rooms yet.

An idea was germinating.

Eventually the coffee machine got to work, and the smell of his favorite brew brought my mate straight to me.

“Whatcha looking at?” Brooks asked as he walked up behind me and planted a kiss on my cheek.

I reached behind myself without turning, placing my hand on his cheek in a loving pat. I turned my screen toward him without speaking.

“But…”

“I know,” I said. “We’d make sure it was safe.”

Taryn would be safe.Hadto be safe. But safe had to mean more than just subsisting here, waiting for the next onslaught. Every day she stayed cooped up in this apartment, no closer to an answer of what we were going to do or how were we going to fight the forces coming for her, her spirit died a little more. Her light dimmed just a touch.

---