Page 46 of Brutal Alpha

“You drink chamomile?” I teased, unable to stop myself. Most shifter males wouldn’t be seen dead drinking herbal tea, considering it too “girly”.

“Yeah. It’s soothing,” he replied, without a hint of embarrassment. He filled his kettle and set it on the stove, bringing two cups down from the shelf.

I had nothing to say to that, so I sat and watched him make the tea. It was clearly a ritual for him, and there was something precious in being allowed into this very private routine.

“Thank you for today,” he said as he removed the strainer from one cup, sliding it across the table toward me.

“It was nothing, really,” I said as I inhaled the floral steam. “Glad I could help.”

“We uh—we make a pretty good team when we’re not biting each other’s heads off,” he offered, and my stomach fluttered with pleasant butterflies.

“Yeah, I guess we do.”

The moment was gentle, tender, and in the silence that ensued, I wondered if maybe I was safe. If I told him now about the little life growing inside me, maybe he wouldn’t push me away. Maybe he would take my hand and tell me we’d make itwork, that he’d been wrong about not being my mate, that he was ready now.

Knock, knock, knock.

We both jumped. Ethan gave me an apologetic grimace as he moved to answer the front door, and I followed him to the threshold of the kitchen, leaning against the doorframe to look down the hall.

On the porch, there was a woman about Ethan’s age, petite and curvy, with tanned skin and deep brown hair curling around her shoulders.

“Lacey, everything okay?” Ethan asked.

“Everything’s fine,” she said. “I just wanted to swing by and welcome you home. It’s been weird not having you around.”

“You guys can’t look after yourselves for two weeks?” His tone was light, pretending at a joke, but his posture was tense.

“We need our Alpha here with us,” the woman, Lacey, replied. Her voice was high and breathy, pleading in a way that—oh. Oh. She was flirting with him. She was flirting in a way that felt familiar, sure of itself. I knew Ethan slept around, and I had to assume that included females from his own Pack. My wolf growled within me, and I had to grip the doorframe so I didn’t rush forward to stake my claim.

“Well, you’ve got me back now,” said Ethan. He sounded almost bored, without the warmth that lingered in his tone when he’d spoken to the other members of his Pack. “Thanks for checking in.”

“You’re not—you don’t want some company?” she tried once more, but Ethan clearly wasn’t interested.

“Not tonight, Lacey. Have a good one.”

The door clicked closed, and I stood watching Ethan’s back as he took several measured breaths. I should have felt elated at the ease with which he dismissed her—my wolf was certainly curling up, contented, in my chest—but I only felt a sense of trepidation. These last couple of weeks had been intense, but they were nearly over now. Was that how Ethan would treat me when all was said and done? I was, after all, the only one in a long line of females who had ignored our better judgment and fallen into his bed. In my case, there hadn’t even been a bed.

When he finally turned back and saw me lingering at the kitchen door, he tensed. It was stupid, so stupid, but I couldn’t help asking,

“Who was that?”

Chapter 20 - Ethan

Julia’s tone was purely inquisitive, with no accusation or offense in her voice, yet I still felt vaguely guilty as I turned back to face her. Why did I feel bad about Julia when it was Lacey whom I had just unceremoniously rejected? Usually, when I wasn’t in the mood for a hookup, I let them down gently, but that night my wolf’s hackles had risen the moment she leaned into my space, and I had to end the encounter before he started snapping.

“Just Lacey. She uh—she wanted to welcome me back home,” I said. It was true enough. I didn’t need to go into the details of what her welcome would have entailed. I wasn’t interested in it.

“That’s nice of her,” said Julia, mildly. “Are the two of you close?”

“I mean, not really. In a certain way, I suppose.” Lacey might have spent a few nights in my bed, but she didn’t know any more about me than other Pack members, besides perhaps the color of my sheets. She’d never even stayed the night.

“You can just say you hooked up,” Julia said, in the same tone she always used when she was teasing me. I’d thought she might be jealous, but there was no sign of it in her expression.

“I thought you’d be—I don’t know—bothered,” I replied. It was absolutely and completely unfair of me to be bothered that she wasn’t bothered. I had been the one to insist that what was between us was nothing more than attraction, nothing more than I had experienced with Lacey or a dozen other females. Despite myself, I was quickly realizing that I had been wrong about that from the start.

“I’m not the boss of you,” Julia shrugged.

“Can I get that in writing?” I replied on instinct, and she smiled.

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