Page 40 of Ember

I almost said the food was from the alpha West and I were toying with, but that didn’t feel right. We weren’t toying with Alejandro, not like I usually meant. It wasn’t just epic sex and then see you later, thanks for all the knots. “Dating a chef has it perks.”

“You too?” Terran raised his eyebrow. “Geez, I guess I should head down to Talk of the Town, see if my bondmate’s been there the entire time.”

“I didn’t say bondmate,” I corrected quickly. “Cart before the horse.”

“Sunshine bonded Logan,” Terran pointed out. “And now you’re dating that chef who’s been flirting with you for months.”

“He wasn’t flirting. He was…” I trailed off at the incredulous look on Terran’s face. “Okay, fine, he was flirting and it paid off.” I waved my hand. “Anyway, back to work. Site maintenance shouldn’t be too horrible. And I don’t see another choice short of taking the website down.”

I shuddered at the thought. Years ago, we could have effectively hit pause on the website and rebuilt the code we needed. But that was years and many, many profiles ago. The Cosmic Bonds website was massive on the back end. We had thousands of lines of code for the matching software, for the chatting app, for the New Age information section.

“I’ll ask West to help,” I said, knowing he’d say yes. He was already helping me scan the code; what was one more project? Besides, us coding together usually led to naked times, so it was almost a Pavlovian response at this point.

“Let me know how you want to set it up.” Terran stood up, stealing some more grapes.

I pushed the tray at him. “You can take more. I have, like, ten other snacks packed in my lunch box.”

Terran laughed. “Of course you do. I’m meeting Abby later for lunch and don’t want to ruin my appetite.”

“Sure you are.” I winked. “And howisAbby?”

Abby was Terran’s beta friend. She was in art school, and they’d been friends for years. The rest of us had a betting pool on when they would finally stop pretending they didn’t want to jump each other’s bones. I had August of this year, figuring Terran would catch wind of our cousins getting all packed up and want that for himself.

“Abby’s fine,” Terran said, sounding annoyed. “I’ll see you later.”

“Byyyyyyeeee.” I drew the word out until he left and then scowled at my laptop.

Just as I got focused on the lines of code again, Stella opened my door with a smirk. She looked entirely too pleased with herself. “Hi, cuz. How are you? Busy?”

Immediately suspicious, I gestured at the laptop. “Just trying to fix the software issues before we have to nuke it back to the Stone Age. Why?”

“Great, because you have a visitor.” She gave me an innocent look, but my cousin didn’t have an innocent bone in her body. She was half the reason I got into trouble as a teenager.

“Who?” My heart flipped and I couldn’t figure out who I was hoping popped in to see me. West? Stella wouldn’t look so smug. West was a done deal. I licked him, and he was mine, forever. Alejandro maybe?

“That client from before? Ben?” Stella tucked some brown hair behind her ear, casually, like she wasn’t wrecking my entire peace of mind. “Just dropped by to see you.”

My heart did a stupid little pitter-patter. “Maybe there’s issues with their profiles.”

He wasn’t here to see me. He was a client, and that was why he’d stopped by. Rian would scowl at me for the software fuckup and I couldn’t even blame the grumpy omega.

I would probably have to admit the software was being stupid lately and that was why it was trying to match him with a duck. How did a duck get into the profiles? I didn’t know; sometimes code had a mind of its own.

“I’ll bring him by.” Stella left before I could tell her I was perfectly capable of going to the waiting room myself, and I realized I was sitting where Ben sat last time.

I scooted over but then stood up. I should go sit in my desk chair. He couldn’t know I was sitting on the couch because of his scent, right? Right. He didn’t know I hardly ever sat on the couch.

But my laptop, drink, paperwork, and array of snacks were all laid out on the coffee table. I didn’t have enough time to move all of it before he got here. I decided to sit down again, and my inner omega was pleased, thinking,Good, let him refresh his scent on the couch. It had been too long.

I rolled my eyes at myself. My omega was a brazen hussy, who was apparently not satisfied with getting regularly railed by an alpha and omega.

From the hall, Ben said, “Got it from here, thanks.” And then he appeared in the doorway.

I stood up again. “Did your profile try to match you with a duck?”

“A duck? No, should it?” He paused, looking yummy in a faded Vann Jeger band T-shirt and faded blue jeans.

“Not at all. Do you want to sit?” I pointed to the couch, before remembering it was a useless gesture. “Would you like to sit down?”

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