Page 18 of Bad Blood Panther

Her bravery lasted until she got to the main cabin—and then it trickled away, like it always did.

Not that Flynn’s pancakes weren’t awesome. So was the main cabin. If Jenny had ever designed a dream house, the cabin would be it.

Most of the main floor consisted of a two-story great room with a living and kitchen area, and a curved wooden staircase with a carved banister, leading to a loft. The kitchen was all warm wood and granite and sleek black appliances, and there was a breakfast bar and a dining area with a heavy wooden table, scarred with claw marks.

The living area held a massive stone fireplace; deep, comfortable-looking leather couches and chairs; and a huge widescreen TV. There was just enough clutter to make it look homey and lived-in.

It was a hell of a lot more welcoming than Flynn was. He served her pancakes silently, accompanying them with a calculating, predatory look that made her mouth go dry.

He’d been a little nicer last night, after Sloan said she and Xander were mates. They all had—helping her get settled in his spare room, and explaining a little more about the crew and way he was. Jenny wasn’t dumb enough to think that meant they liked her, though.

They just loved Xander.

That was obvious, after the shock of the whole crazy shed thing wore off and she understood what was really going on. Just the fact that Flynn and Tank had taken a couple dozen deep and painful panther claw gouges without comment or complaint, trying to help him, told her how much they cared about him.

They were all willing to bleed for him. They’d accept her if it made him happy. But if it didn’t, if he couldn’t handle the bond, they’d kick her out without a single regret.

For one tiny moment, she longed to find a place where she could just be accepted for herself. Then she shut down the self-pity party. She would just have to be a really good mate to Xander, and get him to accept her. Maybe eventually he would even love her.

And when he was ready, she’d tell him about Brandon. She had to make this work. If Xander bonded with her, with Brandon, then the crew would protect them for his sake, if nothing else.

In the meantime, she knew she was getting those looks from Flynn because he still thought she was about to bring trouble down on his crew. He hadn’t insisted that she tell him her story last night—he said it could wait till morning, when Xander could hear it too.

But he hadn’t forgotten. She already knew enough about Flynn to realize he didn’t forget things like that.

The others didn’t try to talk to her much during breakfast, which she was grateful for. She was stressed out enough without trying to think of things to say to them.

She observed them instead, especially Flynn, because after Xander, he was the key to her getting to stay here. Jenny had to figure out what kind of person he was, what he wanted, so she could do all the right things to make him accept her.

When she first saw the inside of the cabin and compared it to the trailers Xander and Sloan and Caitlyn lived in, she’d assumed that Flynn, like the alphas of Broken Hill, kept his crew in their places by making them live in modest dwellings while he spent money lavishly on himself.

It only took her halfway through breakfast, though, before she realized that wasn’t true at all. The whole crew was at home in the cabin, wandering in without knocking or announcing themselves, helping themselves to food and coffee, wrangling over whether they were going to watch baseball or hockey on the big screen that afternoon.

“But it’s hockey playoffs,” Xander whined. He grabbed a cinnamon bun off a tray Jasmin had just pulled out of the oven, and juggled it from hand to hand. “Ow! Hot!”

“Definitely hockey,” Lissa said. “Go Devils!”

Brody rolled his eyes. “Atlanta Braves, dude.”

“Not a dude, dude,” Lissa said, at the same time Xander said, “Nobody cares about early season games. Or baseball. What part of ‘playoffs’ don’t you understand?”

Brody turned to his mate. “Jaz, help me bleed them, would you? We can turn on the Braves while they’re getting bandaged up.”

She snorted. “Hockey fan, here,” she said, as if she’d said it a million times before. “And I’m the one usually doing the bandaging, so this helps me how?”

Brody play-pouted, wrapping his arms around her waist from behind and nuzzling her hair. “I thought you loved me more than hockey.”

Jasmin wrinkled her brow in mock thought. “Hmm. I’ll get back to you on that.”

Brody just grinned and swiped her long hair away from her neck so he could kiss it.

Tank stayed quiet, chowing down on his pancakes. He wasn’t a morning person either, apparently.

“Where’s Sloan and Caitlyn?” Flynn asked, mixing up a fresh batch of batter. He definitely did not spend lavishly on his clothes—what there were of them. He was wearing nothing but a pair of faded, low-slung jeans so covered in rips they were barely holding together. And no underwear—half of one of his ass cheeks was hanging out of an especially big rip on the butt.

So much for alpha dignity.

“Fucking, probably,” Xander answered indistinctly, around a mouthful of cinnamon bun. “I interrupted their Sunday morning boink-a-thon, so they had to start over.”