Page 26 of Seven is Swell

“Just…can you kiss me?”

A shirtless Adam wanders in from Delaney’s bedroom, and I watch as her eyes take him in, and then me, pinging back andforth, then her mouth forms an ‘O’ shape, and her breathing changes a bit. “I’m interrupting, aren’t I?”

Adam snorts. “This is your dorm, Delaney.”

“It is…” she trails off, clearly wanting to say more about it. “Why are you both here when I’m not?”

“Here’s the thing,” I say the same time Adam says, “It was Cory’s fault.”

I scratch the back of my neck. “Yeah, that looks bad. We thought you would be occupied longer.” I am absolutely unwilling to finish the rest of that sentence.

Unfortunately, my partner has no such scruples. “Cory thought it would be hot to get off in your bed and leave our scents for you to find later. And then they wanted to cook dinner because we figured everyone would be home in a little while. Thought it would be nice, you know?”

“You know what? Not mad at all. That is pretty hot. Well done, Cory."

“You want to talk about the picture Wilder sent through?” Adam asks.

It almost seems like when Professor Wilder is doing something stupid, he becomes Wilder, and when he's more in our good graces again, people start reverting to Ash again.

Delaney reaches for the bowl of grapes on the counter and pops a few in her mouth before she answers. “I was sick of being ignored. So, I went to Wilder's last class of the day hoping I could confront him, and instead I happened upon him getting hit on by another member of the faculty.”

I inhale sharply, praying to the goddess that man didn’t do anything he can’t come back from.

“I accidentally interrupted their conversation. He swore he was going to reject her once we were able to talk about it, but I realized I couldn’t say one way or the other if that was actually true.

“If August and Jackson were in that situation, I have zero doubt they would laugh in the face of whoever decided to try their luck with them and then call me and laugh about it with me. With you two I know instinctively you would never entertain attention from anybody else. But Wilder? I don’t know him well enough to say. I know shifters are supposed to respect their mates and all that BS, but he hasn’t really demonstrated those traits so I don't actually know what would have happened if I hadn't interrupted. It bothers me that I don't trust him, even if that's all on him.”

“Okay,” I say as I turn to stir my sauce again with a new spoon. “So, you went to confront him about ignoring you, someone made a pass at him, and then what happened?”

“That woman sounded ridiculous coming onto him, and I made a noise that they clearly heard. They didn't know I was in there until then. She got catty, I probably got cattier, then before I know it, he’s pinning me against the door in the staff bathroom, promising me I’m the only one he wants.”

“But that picture he sent out, which was hot as fuck by the way, wasn’t in a bathroom,” Adam points out helpfully.

She eats a few more grapes, leaning a hip against the counter. I like how easy this all feels, us talking like this while I cook.

“Honestly I didn't know he took a picture, but you’re right,” she says. “I protested the location, so he took me home. I’ve wanted to say it did feel like we made some headway, I got outsomeof what I needed to say and he did the same, and he did apologize for his behavior, but like—"

“You’re not sure if he said what he said because you cornered him into it, or if he would have said it on his own, right?" I ask.

“Thank you!” she says. “That’s exactly it. I think I’m satisfied with what he said, and yes, I’m bothered by the fact that I couldn’t predict how he would have reacted to somebody hitting on him, but I’m so sick of these head games with him. It feels like every time we make progress, we lose so much more. It’s exhausting and so unhealthy.”

“It's almost like this is what happens when you force somebody into a bond without preparing them for it,” Adam snarks.

“Completely agree, but there's not much we can do about it now,” she points out. Both palms come to the island and her head droops, her shoulders sticking out, exposing the bite marks he gave her.

Immediately I step behind her and start rubbing her shoulders. “Please tell me you left him high and dry?” Unfortunately, I'm going to be working with him for a while as a teacher’s assistant, but he desperately needs some hard lessons.

She sighs, leaning into me more. “I got him to touch me finally, so there’s that. He got me off, so there’s that also. But then he made the mistake of saying I was his.Histo touch,histo claim… it fucking pissed me off, so I got dressed and left. After throwing a bunch of crap at him about how he can’t just ignore me for a week and then decide to try and pick it up where we left off. He definitely did not come though. So, there's that.”

I’m trying to picture this whole scenario and end up laughing. “Did he actually get it in you before you left?”

She pops more grapes into her mouth, blinking her wide eyes at me. She chews carefully and swallows, but I keep eye contact, as does Adam. “Yeah. He got a couple of good thrusts in before I put my clothes back on.”

The front door crashes again, this time admitting August and Jackson. Their eyes fly wildly about the room before landing on Delaney, and then it’s game on. They stride towards her, and she knows she messed up.

“What’s up guys?” She tries to give the illusion that she’s not affected, that she’s all lazy and nonchalant right now, but every muscle is tight, ready to spring into action the second she needs to.

“What’sup?”August repeats, pulling his phone out and showing her the picture that Ash sent out. “What’supis you left without anyone there to keep you safe. What’supis you clearly sent us on a false errand to get us out of the way so you could go and do something stupid.”

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