Page 88 of Into the Fire: Before

“I swear to god if you don’t go back there and comfort that omega I will roll you down the mountainside.”

Caine growled at me, and I only stared pointedly at him longer than I should’ve before he finally unbuckled and scrambled over the center console to the backseat.

“Caaaiiiinnne!” came her ecstatic reaction. “You’re here!”

“I’m here, princess,” he answered with gentleness. “I’m right here.”

No further sex sounds emanated from the backseat, so maybe she’d just needed to be surrounded before drifting off. The others must have, too, conked out by the pheromones thick in the air.

Seventy minutes out.

If we hadn’t been scaling a goddamn mountain via winding ribbons of road, the wind often strong enough to rock the vehicle, I’d have gunned it. But I figured arriving alive beat arriving fast.

Fifty minutes out.

Fuck, the car smelled good.

Thirty-two minutes out, I heard stirring in the backseat. Someone was waking.

Next thing I knew, I couldn’t see the road.

“What the—”

“Kiss me, Brooks,” Taryn breathed against my lips. She pulled my face to hers, her tiny body straddling my lap with no issue.

Well, withonerather glaring issue.

“Fuck, sweetness, I need to see the road behind you.”

“Need you, Brooks.” She pressed downward on my lap, and my traitor cock stiffened.

Not good, not good, not good.

“Hey, backseat alphas,” I called out, “now would be a great time to tend to your omega.”

Lin leaned up between the two front seats, trying and failing to pry Taryn off my lap. “C’mon, Taryn, we’re almost to the cabin and Brooks can join in there.”

“Nooooo.” She wrapped her arms around my neck and held on. On the one hand, she was now all but glued to my lap despite Lin’s and Brea’s and Caine’s best efforts. On the other,she was glued to my lap,and I could halfway see the road over her shoulder.

So, all in all, not the worst.

Until, that is, she rolled her hips against my still-hard dick and my vision damn near blacked out. “Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck—”

“Taryn,” Brea barked. The omega sat up in my lap, and I leaned as far into the door as I could to see around her. “Come to the backseat. Right now.”

Omegas could resist alpha barks with effort. During heats took even more effort, but she could have disobeyed if she truly wanted to. Somewhere beneath the haze, though, she must’ve known she needed to listen. That Brea wouldn’t have barked to begin with if her obedience wasn’t imperative. So with a kiss to my cheek, she grasped Lin’s hands and scrambled off my lap and over the center console back to the alpha-filled backseat.

“Good girl,” Brea crooned behind me, pumping out buckets of pomegranate perfume. “That’s my good omega, listening so well.” Taryn’s scent blossomed too, and I thought I even heard her purr in satisfaction.

But my chest and my lap were cold.

Twenty-seven minutes out.

Three

Brea

Fuckme,weneededa nest. Or something as close to a nest as possible. And we needed it about three hours ago.

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