Page 68 of Pack Frenzy
Cassian rejoins us, carrying pink cotton candy as big as his head and hands Rowan a generous wad, then hands me and Eli. The absurdity of a six-foot-something Alpha with shoulders like a shipyard delicately eating spun sugar shouldn’t make me soft, but here we are.
I’m watching him like he’s performing some kind of magic trick, and I guess in a way he is. Making the world feel lighter. Makingmefeel lighter.
We walk through the fair, checking out what we want to do next while we eat the rest of the cotton candy.
Eli points his chin toward a tent draped with beaded curtains and a cardboard sign that reads TAROT in hand-painted gold. “Come on. Let’s consult destiny and then immediately ignore her.”
“Eli—” I start, but he’s already walking, and Rowan and Cassian are following, and somehow I’m being swept along.
The inside smells like incense and old paper with a floral note that makes my nose itch. A woman with silver hair and too many rings fans a deck of cards and smiles like she knows the end ofa joke I haven’t heard yet. Eli pays because he insists on funding his own doom.
“Cut,” she tells me, sliding the deck.
When I go to take a step back, all three of the guys motion me forward.
My palms feel clumsy as I grab the cards, cut them, and give them back to her. She flips them over. The Fool. The Lovers. The Two of Swords. I don’t know enough to be spooked, but the image of a blindfolded woman holding two crossed blades isn’t hard to decipher.
“Two paths.” The fortune teller hums, tracing the crossed swords with one ringed finger. “Two truths. You already know which one you’re taking.”
My palms go slick. I wipe them on my jeans, trying to ignore the way my heart is hammering.
Two paths. The words echo. The blindfolded woman on the card holds two blades, perfectly balanced, choosing nothing. Or choosing both. Or already knowing and pretending she doesn’t. Whichever way she turns, a sword will cut her.
The version of myself who keeps everyone at arm’s length. Who stays safe and small and alone. And then the three men standing behind me, patient and steady andhere. The path where I let them in. Where I stop bracing. Where I choose the terrifying thing.
I already know. God, I already know.
“Vague,” Eli says, but his voice is gentler than his sarcasm. He glances at me, and there’s something careful in it like he’s checking whether the word hit bone, whether I’m okay.
The woman smiles, unbothered. “Vague is how fate keeps her job.”
I slide the card back with fingers that aren’t quite steady. Rowan’s palm finds the small of my back, just a touch,grounding me, and I’m grateful he doesn’t ask if I’m alright. Because I’m not sure I could answer honestly.
“Your fates are entwined. All four of you.” She taps the lover’s card, and my whole face heats like I’m a teenager again.
“Um…thanks.” I duck through the beads, letting the cool air help my heated skin.
The air off the water raises goosebumps on my arms.
The tent flap sighs closed behind me, and the pier’s chill steals some heat from my cheeks. For a heartbeat, none of us speaks. Then Eli bumps my shoulder with his, light as a question.
“Funhouse?” he asks, like he’s offering a pressure valve instead of a plan.
Rowan’s knuckles brush mine; Cassian tips his chin toward the string lights.
I breathe in the sea-cold and nod. “Yeah. Sure.”
We follow the chain of lights to the funhouse because Eli claims he needs photographic evidence of Cassian in front of one of those mirrors that shrink your legs and balloon your torso.
Cassian, to his credit, takes it like a champ and flexes in front of a version of himself shaped like a tomato. Rowan’s distorted reflection stretches him into a lanky stork; when he tries to look severe, I wheeze-laugh hard enough I have to brace on the wall, and for a moment, everything is justeasy.
Eli takes a video. “For morale,” he says. He doesn’t specify whose.
We hit ring toss next and fail in increasingly creative ways.
“It’s rigged,” Rowan observes, which is true but also the point.
Eli mutters something about physics and then throws so hard that a ring ricochets and nearly dethrones a stuffed penguin. The attendant watches us with the weary joy of a man who’s seen too many love stories and tantrums.
