Alpha Ever After (Midnight Liaisons Book 5) (8 page)

I
get
to the coffee shop a half hour early just in case Savannah shows up a few minutes ahead of schedule. I scope out the best, quietest table in the place. I want nothing but perfection for my girl. Unfortunately, the best table is also occupied by a guy with a laptop. Fucker. I sit nearby and glare convincingly at him until he gets up and moves to a different table, and then I clean off the surface with a moist towelette. The chairs aren’t super comfortable, and one wobbles, so I switch it out for another. The sunlight is bright as it filters in through the blinds so I get up and adjust them a little.

Everything has to be perfect for when my girl gets here. Perfect.

I order one of every breakfast sandwich, cookie, bread, and muffin they have, and an iced coffee, a hot coffee, and a soy latte. I get extra napkins and steal the creamer jar from the stand so Savannah can have as much as she wants. I know she likes dairy. I…think. Fuck.

I drum my fingers on the table, staring at the front door. Waiting. The sunlight is still casting too much light on her chair, I think, so I move it a little to the left. I don’t want her to have to squint. When I’m satisfied it’s perfect - again - I look up.

And there she is.

The sight of Savannah always takes my damn breath away. She’s an absolute dream to look at, with that beautiful oval face, those dark eyes and that long fall of silky brown hair. She’s wearing a plain blue dress that tents around her belly, and I’m momentarily dumbstruck at how utterly gorgeous she is as she walks in. One hand is resting atop her rounded stomach as she scans the coffee shop for me, and I resist the urge to wave like an excited schoolgirl. I jerk to my feet, nearly upend the coffees I’ve bought for her, and pull her chair out.

She blinks at the spread I have on the table, then looks at me. “Is it just us?”

“I wasn’t sure what you’d want to eat,” I say, and my hands clench the back of the chair so hard I can feel the wood creak. Did I fuck this up somehow? When I sent her the key, I didn’t expect her to meet me. This is…well, fuck, it feels like a gift and I’ve got nothing to give in return.

“Oh,” she says softly. “So you ordered this for me?”

“I didn’t want you to have to wait at the counter,” I tell her as she sits, and push the chair in. God, she smells incredible. Like shampoo and cougar and a feminine hint of dewy skin. I want to lick every inch of her.

“I can order my own food,” she says, and there’s reproach in her tone.

Yeah, I’ve already fucked this up. Shit. “I know. I just—“

She shakes her head. “Don’t worry about it. I won’t stay long.”

My heart feels as if it thuds to a stop. She’s not staying? “You got someone else to meet today? Maybe that new guy?” I can’t help the jealousy that spews out of me. That fucker wants to touch what’s mine. I want to pound his face in.

Savannah looks startled. A light flush crosses her pale cheeks. “I’m not meeting anyone. Even if I was, it’s none of your business.”

“I know it’s not. I’m just asking. I worry about you.”

An angry look crosses her face. “You’re being overbearing.”

I am. I can’t fucking help it, though. She’s got circles under her eyes and she looks thin despite her big belly. “Are you feeling okay?” I ask, and push a muffin toward her. “You want to eat? You should eat.”

Her nostrils flare and I can tell she’s getting pissed at me. She can be pissed as long as she eats something. “Connor,” she says in an irritated tone of voice.

“I know, I know. Comes with the territory.” I’m alpha of my pack now, and I’m still working on finding the balance between ‘overbearing asshole’ and ‘beta’.

“Right,” she says softly. She pulls out the keys and offers them to me. “You left these at the office.”

“I left them for you.” Just seeing them fills me with a wealth of emotion.

“What are they for?”

“It’s a house I bought. For us.” I force myself to shrug oh so casually. “There’s no ‘us’ so it’s yours now.”

She looks shocked. “Mine?”

“Yeah. I guess you can move in with one of your new boyfriends. Now, eat something. My kid’s probably hungry.” I search her neck for a mate mark, and feel an ugly stab of satisfaction when I don’t see one.

Anger crosses her face. “That’s the problem with you, Connor. You never ask. You just insist.”

I’m about to insist that this bran muffin go into her mouth, but she’s practically trembling with anger. I narrow my eyes at her. This is more than just me making a jab about her seeing some other guy. “What do you mean?”

“I mean you’re always demanding! Telling me what to do! You never ask, you just plow ahead with what you want and it doesn’t matter what the rest of us want.” She gets to her feet. “You never let anything be my decision.”

“What are you talking about?” She’s crazy, right? I let her walk away from me instead of dragging her back to my den and deep-dicking the protests out of her.

“You push and you push,” she says, dropping the keys on the table next to the untouched food. “If I’m seeing someone else, it’s because it’s what I want, not what you want. Understand that?”

“I don’t see how any of this can be about what I want,” I say slowly. “Considering that you’re determined to cut me out of your life.”

Her nostrils flare with anger. “Take these back,” she says, pushing the keys at me. “I won’t take your hand-outs.”

“No,” I say, pushed beyond my limits. I get to my feet and gaze down at her. Even furious, Savannah Russell is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen, and I want nothing more than to bury my face against her neck and mark her as mine. My fists clench against the need to touch her. “You want to cut me out of your life because that’s what you want? Fine. That’s yours.” I point at the keys.

“A house?” she cries.

“That’s right. I bought it thinking we’d have a family there. That’s on me. I assumed too much.”

“You always do,” she says bitterly.

Her words cut like a knife. Maybe I do. It’s the wolf in me that wants to protect his mate. I can’t help who I am. “Doesn’t mean you can’t take it for yourself. You can’t live with your cousins forever. Take the home and make a nice house for our kid, all right?” And I get up and walk away from the table, though it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.

Let Savannah think I’m walking away from her. She doesn’t have to know that this is all part of my plan. Because wolves are predators, but we’re cunning ones. One of the oldest wolf tricks? Abandoning the prey and then circling back when its guard is down.

And this particular wolf isn’t above pulling a sneaky move or two to get what he wants.

I drive home to the Russell house and stare at the keys one more time. A fricking house. Of all the ballsy things to do, Connor bought a house for me and the babies. I’m not going to take it, of course, but it’s just one more example of Connor acting and not bothering to ask.

I think that’s the root of the problem I have with him. Connor just
does
. He doesn’t stop to ask, he just does. He fucked me. He pushed himself into my life, assuming I’d want him to be the father of my child. Even today, he tried to force breakfast on me and then a house.

A fricking
house
.

I’m pissed about the keys but for some reason, I have them in my purse. I guess so I can throw them at Connor’s face the next time he pushes something on me.

A teeny tiny part of me feels ultra guilty. Like I’m the bad guy for not flinging myself in his arms and letting him play house with me and our baby.

It’s still early and I don’t feel like going to work just yet. I have the night shift and it’s not even noon. Plus, I’m starving. Maybe I should have eaten some of the stuff Connor had bought for me, but that felt like giving in, and I’m feeling a bit stubborn at the moment.

Back at the house, though, all is chaos. The moment I step inside, a naked Primordial streaks past, holding up a package of raw bacon. I stare as he scrambles up the stairs…and then four others chase after him, equally naked.

“Damn it,” Ellis says as he enters the room a few steps behind them, panting.

“Do I want to ask?”

“It started out as a shower and got weird from there,” Ellis says. He hauls himself upright and heads up the stairs, where the others are crashing around. In the living room, I can hear the wail of a siren on TV, and the sound of an action movie. Probably Terminator. They’ve watched that thing about fifty times this week.

I head for the kitchen, only to find the contents of the fridge strewn all over the floor, the door hanging open. Lily’s picking up half-eaten raw meat with a pair of tongs and a garbage bag.

So much for breakfast.

She cringes when there’s another crash upstairs, and then multiple men start shouting at each other.

“Goddamn it, you can’t eat that, Lir,” Ellis shouts from up above. “Give the soap to Bevan already! And you guys realize you don’t have to shower together, right? There’s enough hot water to go around.”

Actually, there isn’t. I had to take a cold one this morning.

“Where’s Austin?” I ask Lily. I’m pretty sure two of the Primordials shouting upstairs are his charges. “And where are the others?” There should be more people here with so many Primordials, not just Ellis, because Lily’s here and Lily is easily scared.

“There’s a situation,” Lily says in a small voice, and throws away a half-eaten package of raw chicken. “Cahal’s missing and they think he stole a human woman. Beau and a few of the others are out tracking them.”

Oh, jesus. I rub my forehead. Of course Cahal did. Like most of the Primordials, he’s hungry for a mate and we’re trying to integrate them into society slowly. I’ve been worried that one day they’ll be tired of slow and just take matters into their own hands.

Seems like today is that day.

The utter chaos in the house crawls over me like irritation, and I clutch my belly as my baby kicks in protest. Babies. Whatever. I thought I wouldn’t mind the Primordials living with us. After all, I’ve lived in a house with all my cousins ever since I was in high school and it’s never bothered me. But there’s mass chaos that seems to follow the Primordials around wherever they go, and there’s no rest here.

It makes me tired just being around them.

I think of the extra set of keys in my purse. The address is two towns over, but not a long drive. “Hey, Lily? Want to get away from here?”

She straightens, and the moment she does, a bloodcurdling scream of outrage erupts upstairs, followed by howls of laughter.

“Dammit, Bevan! When I said he should give you the soap I didn’t mean that you should attack him with it!” Ellis’s voice is a full-fledged shout now.

Lily cringes and nods at me. “I want to leave.”

“Cool. Get your purse and go wait in my car. I’ll tell Ellis I’m rescuing you.”

She nods and races out of the room, relief on her face. Poor Lily. People freak her out, especially noisy people. Noisy shifter people are pretty much her worst nightmare. Something about some PTSD from being locked in a vampire’s basement for six months. Only Ellis knows the full story, and he’s so protective of his mate that he won’t share details. I head halfway up the stairs and yell up to Ellis. “Lily and I are going out!”

“Tell her I’ll text her later,” Ellis shouts back. “Thank you!”

I head out to find Lily waiting in my car. I get in and start the car, noticing the stressed lines on Lily’s face are already disappearing.

“So where are we going?” She asks.

“First, we’re getting something to eat,” I tell her, and my stomach rumbles in response. “Then, we are checking out a house.”

“A house?”

“Yeah. Someone gave me one as a gift,” I say, and dangle the keys.

“Do you want to live in a free house?”

“Today? Or in general?” I give her a wry look. “Because today? If it means I don’t have to go back to that madness? Yes, yes I do.”

Lily’s soft smile is whisper-thin. “You have a point.”

* * *

A
half hour later
, Lily and I have scarfed some fast food and are parked in front of a gated farm entrance.

“Is this the place?” Lily asks.

“We’ll find out soon enough,” I tell her, and get out to open the gate, leaving the car running. No one comes out to chase us off, so I double-check the address on the mailbox and yup, it’s the same place.

Okay, then. I expected some small house in the suburbs. The fact that it’s a private property with some land gives me a prickle of excitement or two. I get back in the car and drive forward, trying not to get too excited at the winding driveway that snakes through the trees.

“This is nice,” Lily breathes, peering out the window. “Where’s the house?”

“Somewhere around here, I think.” I’m peering too, trying to see everything I can. There are mimosa trees lining the driveway, their pink blossoms raining down. I love mimosas. Actually, this entire place is pretty. Pretty and secluded….and not close to the Anderson land at all. They’re on the other end of the metroplex.

This place, however, is close to
my
family.