Page 28 of A Pack of Honey
I'm going to need more heat suppressants. The problem is that I'm at my max dose.
My phone buzzes on the table, and I pick it up. I freeze before remembering that every alpha at the table is watching me, and I should school my expressions better. Not to mention my scent, which has gone bitter. The shitty part about being an alpha or an omega was that you can't hide your feelings. They're written in your pheromones. Cole reaches over and slowly but firmly takes the phone from my hand. It's already opened to the texts from Craig—every one of them wishing me a good morning or good night.
"Who's Craig?" Jess asks. He doesn't look jealous or mad that a male is texting me. Just curious. He's leaning over to peer at the screen in Cole's hand. Luca's hand covers my right thigh, and his thumb begins stroking soothing circles over my pants.
"My cousin. He's been texting me these innocuous little messages every day. He's trying to intimidate me. I never respond. Just swipe them away." Now, my scent isn't the only one that's gone bitter. Cole's is burnt and cracked leather. Hunt's is too much soap and not enough water. Luca's is rotten oranges, and Jess's is dried-up grass.
Cole simply opens his own phone and starts dialing. "Hey, Dom. I need a number traced and tracked."
My mouth falls open, and I gape at him but say nothing.
"Thanks." He hangs up. To me, he asks, "Is this the phone you use for your business?"
I snap my mouth shut and shake my head. "No, Sally runs the company phone. She takes the calls and directs me to anything I need to know."
He nods. "Good. You'll have a new personal phone with a new number by the end of the day."
I almost argue, but then I stop. I don't want to see those messages anymore. I nod, and he pockets the phone. At the same time, Cole slips something out of his pocket. It's a box with a Dandy Stuff logo on top. It's long, rectangular, and thin. He slides it to me.
"What's this?" I ask, not touching it.
"Our first courting gift for you. You were so upset with us that first dinner, I feared if I gave it to you you'd have thrown it in the trash."
I roll my eyes but really, I might have.
I open the lid to find a charm bracelet. My eyes shoot to Cole's and then around to the others.
"How did you know…?" I trail off.
"The shopkeeper may have suggested the bracelet, but we picked out the charms," Luca explains. A bee for my farm, my favorite flower from my garden, my birthstone, and a beautiful heart symbol. I touch the last one, unsure of what it was.
"It's a Claddagh. It's a symbol from my mother's homeland—Ireland." As Cole talks, he takes the bracelet out of the box and clasps it around my wrist. My skin tingles everywhere he touches. "The hands mean friendship, the crown means loyalty, and the heart means love. If you choose to accept us, it's what we'll show you every day as long as we breathe."
My heart is pounding in my ears, and I take a deep breath to steady myself. I look around the table to find them all staring at me with serious, yearning eyes.
"This symbol was on my mother's wedding ring. The one to my father before he passed,” Cole says.
My gaze whips back to him. "I'm sorry," I say automatically, and then kick myself because what good does that do? Hedoesn't say anything but lifts the hand he'd begun holding after he placed the bracelet on my wrist and kisses the back.
"What are you up to today, Sunshine?" Jess asks, breaking the tension. And although it's somewhat interrupting, I'm glad to be brought back to familiar ground conversation wise.
The question launches us into a normal conversation about my plans for some new shipments around the farm. Their plans are for meetings with construction crews and design teams today. How someone will always be around the farm in case anything happens. By the time we're done eating, the entire thing feels domestic. So easy. I'm not sure how to think about it. Now that they're living in the house, they've slotted into place like a missing piece that was always meant to be part of the whole.
Jess
Goingtobedinsideof the house had been a minor miracle. My back could not have taken one more night on the ground. We spent the day in meetings and then had dinner together. Sunny cooked a fabulous meal again, and we discussed the plans and strategies for getting everything off the ground. Now that we have scrapped any plans of buying Sunny’s farm we can get moving on the hotel itself. Sunny told us about her new hires and a bulk order of royal jelly she'd been trying to complete. It felt like a regular routine, and while some might find it boring, I found it as precious as diamonds. I'd never had anything so domestic in my life.
I'm aware that I'm not alone in my room when I wake up. Moonlight streams through the window. I hadn't bothered with the curtains when I'd gone to bed. I like to see the moon and stars at night. It's something I never got to see in Detroit.
Sunny sits at the end of my bed. At first, I can't make out much of her. I rub the sleep from my eyes. When she comes into focus,I realize she's hunched over with a pained expression. She's sweating even though it's a relatively cool night.
"Sunshine, are you ok?" I move closer, and her scent hits me. It's thickly sweet. Arousal and slick and heat pheromones, if I had to guess. Sure enough, her pupils are blown wide when I tip her face up to look at me.
"Are you having a heat spike, Sunshine?" I ask softly.
She whines, high-pitched and needy. Most omegas lose their voices when their heat spikes. It's their primal selves, their omega psyches coming to the surface. It's a wonder she got past—
"Omega." Cole stands in the doorway. Clearly, her heat-induced walk past his door hadn't gone unnoticed. Yet, she still came to my bed instead of his. He seems to understand this too, because he makes no move to enter. Simply tips his chin toward me.
