Page 59 of Heat Clickbait
"Same time tomorrow?" I asked hopefully as I pulled back so I could look at her beautiful eyes. "I promise to keep breakfast on the table this time."
"Same time every day," she corrected, pulling me down for another kiss. "Except maybe sometimes we skip straight to dessert."
I was already planning tomorrow's menu in my head, already thinking about what I could make that she'd love, what would make her smile. Because that's what I did now. That's who I was.
Hers.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Nova
I caught the end of Callie and Milo's intimacy in the kitchen, drawn by sounds I'd been trying desperately not to hear. My feet had carried me down the hallway on autopilot, searching for tea to calm the restless energy that had been building since morning, when I saw them through the doorway. Milo's teeth sinking into Callie's neck, her body arching against his as she claimed him back, the kitchen counter supporting their joined bodies as they exchanged the most intimate gift two people could share.
I backed away before they could notice me watching, but the image burned behind my eyelids. Not the physical act itself, we'd all been intimate with Callie during her heat. This was different. Deliberate. Chosen without biological imperative driving the decision.
The bond had happened in his kitchen, his domain, surrounded by the lingering scent of cinnamon and butter from whatever he'd been stress-baking at dawn. Of course Milo would claim her somewhere that felt like home, somewhere that represented nurturing and care and all the things he offered so freely.
I retreated to my office, closing the door with more force than necessary. The spreadsheets on my monitor blurred as I stared at them, numbers that usually soothed my need for order now meaningless in the face of what I'd witnessed. My Alpha instincts roared beneath the surface of my carefully maintained control, demanding I go to her, mark her, make her mine in the way Milo just had.
But that wasn't who I wanted to be. Not for her.
The whiskey decanter on my shelf called to me, but drinking at two in the afternoon would be admitting defeat. Instead, I pulled up the presentation I'd made about nest construction, clicking through slides about optimal thread counts and temperature zones. Anything to avoid thinking about the way Callie had looked at Milo, the complete trust in her eyes as she'd bared her neck.
My phone buzzed. A text from Callie.
Can we talk? Your office?
My hands trembled slightly as I typed back.
Door's open.
She appeared minutes later, Milo's mark fresh on her neck, the skin still pink around the edges. She'd changed into one of my shirts, I had no clue when she had even taken that, and her pink hair was mussed in a way that made my fingers itch to smooth it down. Or mess it up further.
"You saw," she said, not a question.
"I didn't mean to." The words came out rougher than intended, my accent sharpening the consonants.
She moved into my space with that casual confidence that had undone me from the first moment, perching on the edgeof my desk like she belonged there. Between the contracts and spreadsheets and all my attempts at control.
"Are you angry?"
"No." It was true, though the emotion churning in my chest defied easy categorization. "Milo deserved to be first. He's the heart of this pack."
"And you're the brain," she said softly. "The one who holds us all together with your spreadsheets and planning and those ridiculous color-coded schedules that secretly make me feel safe."
I looked up at her then, finding her brown eyes steady on mine. "They make you feel safe?"
"Nova." She slid off the desk, moving to stand between my knees where I sat in my office chair. "Your need for control doesn't scare me. It grounds me. When everything feels chaotic, you create structure. When I'm spinning out, you give me framework to hold onto."
"Structure without purpose is just a prison," I said, the words escaping before I could evaluate them.
"Then what's the purpose?"
I reached up, fingers ghosting over Milo's mark on her neck. She shivered but didn't pull away. "To keep you safe. Free. To give you choices instead of taking them away."
"I'm choosing now," she said, and the weight of those words settled between us like a contract waiting to be signed. "But I need to know something first."
I waited, having learned that Callie's pauses usually preceded something important.
