Page 58 of Pucking Feral: Part Two

We grab our bags and head for the entrance. The pack house is quiet when we enter, but Thane is in the living room with a cup of pitch-black coffee, looking as tired as usual.

That honeysuckle scent is all over him.

I have to clench my teeth until they creak so I don't let on how it's affecting me, even clinging to an alpha standing across the damn room.

"You're back," Thane observes unnecessarily.

"Astute," I mutter.

"She okay?" Whiskey asks immediately, dropping his bags.

"Upstairs," Thane says, and the relief in his voice is palpable. "She's fine. Wraith's with her."

They still won't say her name around me. The Ghosts still don't know I know exactly who she is, and I'm going to keep it that way. If they find out just how much I know about the mysterious omega they're hiding, I'll be on thinner ice than I already am.

And I refuse to leave the pack house.

"I'm tired," I announce to Thane, who's still standing there like he's not sure what to do with me. "Going to my room for the longest fucking nap of my life."

"Valek—"

"Whatever you're about to say, save it." I adjust my bag on my shoulder. "We all need sleep before we kill each other."

I head toward my suite without waiting for a response. The stairs feel longer than usual, my body heavy with exhaustion that has nothing to do with the flight and everything to do with the emotional gymnastics of the past two days.

My room is exactly as I left it. Bed made, curtains drawn, everything in its rightful place. I drop my bag by the door and collapse onto the bed, not bothering to remove my shoes.

The ceiling fan spins lazy circles above me, and I track the motion with my eyes while my brain refuses to shut down.

I can hear them. Muffled voices. Movement. The soft rumble of Wraith's growl that carries through the walls. He isn't the only one with remarkable hearing a cut above what most alphas are capable of. We're both survivors, cut from the same cloth of violence and pain.

And underneath it all, faint but unmistakable, is the soft voice of the fierce little omega who faced me with nothing more than a fire extinguisher and put me down like a rabid animal.

Ivy.

Chapter 11

Whiskey

Thane looks like someone ran him through a meat grinder and then squished the resulting hamburger back into a Thane shape.

His hair's a fucking wreck, his dark eyes have even darker bags under them, and his cup of black coffee is shaking slightly in his hand.

But he looks happy as shit.

Like whatever fresh hell clearly went down in Cedarbrook, it was worth it.

"So," I say, dropping our luggage by the couch. "How'd your trip go?"

Thane takes a long sip of his coffee. Longer than necessary. Then he heaves a huge sigh. "We're alive and we're home, and that's what matters."

"Shit, that bad, huh?"

"You could say that."

I wait for him to elaborate, but he just stares into his coffee.

"Wraith okay?" I ask carefully, because Wraith is never okay after Cedarbrook trips.