Page 26 of Dubious Match
“Make me the bouquet, Malcolm, and I'll take it to her,” Brice murmurs. “Should I bring her food too? Do you think that’ll help?”
“I think a fed omega makes for a less dangerous one,” Felix grunts. “Or something.”
We are so outside of our depths right now it isn’t funny.
“We’ll try this,” I decide. “If this doesn’t soften her at all, I want to ask her if we can join the mixer again as a pack.”
Remy gives me a startled look while I shrug. “I don’t believe she doesn’t know that she’s our scent match. I mean, how could she not?”
“I felt it as soon as I got close to her,” Felix confesses. “Hollis smells like her invitations.”
“Same,” Remy says. “Except, it made me feel really aggressive. It was really odd. I wanted to pin her to the desk and rip off her dress.”
“Really?” I ask, eyes wide.
“I felt like that too,” Felix sighs. “That's why I started getting more and more angry. I couldn’t stop saying things that my mother would beat me with a spoon for.”
“I felt really protective,” Brice says. “I wanted to make her life easier.”
“That’s how I felt,” I agree. “I don’t know if I made that clear or not.”
“So are we planning to make her jealous by attending her mixer?” Remy asks.
“We try the nice way first,” I confirm. “We obviously aren’t interested in anyone other than her, but I see no harm in seeing how she reacts.”
“You clutched your dick,” Felix says suddenly, remembering. “I think that’s the harm we have to worry about.”
“Then we make her out of her mind aroused. I’m talking a hostile fucking takeover for her heart and her body,” I say. “I want her to think twice before stabbing us in the dick.”
“So anywhere else is on the table,” Remy breathes. “I wonder if they have protective cups to save my knot.”
Unable to help it, I chuckle. “That’s not a bad idea,” I murmur, standing. “I’m going for a jog. Does anyone want to come?”
“Yeah,” Felix says. “I’ll come. Maybe we can see if our tenant needs anything. She’s been really quiet.”
“I think she’s working on her van,” Brice says as we walk inside. “It made a godawful sound the other day.”
“It’s a death trap,” Remy says. “I promise not to tell her that though!”
Well, at least there are small mercies in life.
Six
HOLLIS
My fingers massage my temples as I lean my elbows on my desk. Whimpering in pain, I try to release the migraine that’s building and trying to make me stab my eyes out.
Between looking for Alisa, working at Cupid’s Call, and doing hacking jobs on the dark web to be able to pay for all the mixer, my eyes are fucking throbbing. I usually try to take as much of the weekends off as possible, but that wasn’t in the cards for me.
Fuck, maybe I should just go home and try to sleep this off in the dark. My Monday is going to shit in a handbag. My app is current for my clients, and they can match with each other, set up dates, and message. I won’t need to touch that again until the end of the week.
I also have checked in with the clients that I know had first dates last week, and spoken to them about how it went. Some want to see where it goes, while others didn’t mesh. I regularly tweak the app’s algorithm, but I can’t help it if personalities clash. Sometimes, people just have an off day.
It happens.
The door opening to my office makes me want to cry, and I squint to see who it is. Fuck, this hurts so much.
“Hollis, are you okay?” asks Brice.
