Escaping Death
Chapter 22

Ace

Solana walks into the kitchen wearing indecently short shorts and one of my shirts which is so long on her it covers the shorts and makes it look like she’s wearing nothing underneath. While my wolf reaps sick satisfaction from my scent on her, he’s also irritated at how delectable she looks in front of so many hungry eyes. All of which I can only assume are imagining serving her for dinner and feasting on her sweetness.

Tate sets the table as Dean and Solana bring over the food, Eli has already gotten everyone a drink so we’re just waiting for everyone to sit down so we can eat. I don’t have many rules for our pack. We carry no secrets and we never miss pack dinner. It’s easy for us to get swept up in jobs and, especially as our pack expanded to include Eli and Hunter, easy for us to seclude ourselves and get lost in our own demons. Bringing us all together at the table helps keep us from falling apart on our own.

“Are we still on for tomorrow?” I ask the table but really it’s directed at Tate and Hunter.

“Yup, Tate confirmed it yesterday.” Hunter responds.

Solana fidgets in her seat. Her cheeks are stained pink and she is uncharacteristically quiet, no sarcastic remarks, no scowling at anyone from across the table, just hyper-focused on her food.

“Good. Solana is going with you.” That should get her attention.

I don’t think that’s a good idea. Hunter immediately links me.

It’s time to bury the hatchet somewhere other than each other’s skulls. My command slips out across the entire table and I only notice it when I pick up on Solana’s delicate whimper. I reel in my aura, catching Hunter’s silent plea in my periphery.

The guys are hesitant at first but eventually conversation relaxes into normal topics – well, normal for us. Hunting, fighting, Underdark business. Solana remains quiet, she doesn’t contribute to any of the conversation, she doesn’t even lift her head. I can only watch her stare at her untouched food for so long. Add to that the increasing buzzing tinnitus in my ears, I’m quickly losing my patience.

I stare at her staring at her food, studying her features to give me some kind of clue as to what is going on inside that mischievous little mind of hers. Her face is pale but her cheeks are flushed with heat, and her breaths are quick and shallow. I swear I can smell her arousal. If the others smell her too they don’t show it outwardly. In fact, Eli and Hunter are already digging into their second plates talking about adding an extension on the back deck since it needs to be re-built anyway.

The only one who seems to notice Sol’s lack of appetite besides me is Dean.

“Not hungry, Sol?” He asks her kindly.

“Hm? Oh, no it’s not that. My sister won’t stop calling, so my mind is just elsewhere.”

“Go call her now, I’ll keep your plate safe from the wolves.” Dean suggests while Eli and Hunter growl and sneer at his playful comments.

She bolts from the kitchen so fast you’d swear the devil himself was chasing after her. I swallow my urge to follow her and continue with dinner as if I’m not completely consumed by the fireball upstairs.

Tate’s chair scrapes across the floor as he rises to stand and the other guys give him knowing smirks.

“Sit your ass down, Tate,” I bark.

“Nature calls,” he shrugs. “Or would you prefer I piss in the sink?” He makes a show of unzipping his fly as he walks towards the sink.

“Go,” my eyes roll at his transparent attempt to go after her himself, “but you leave her the fuck alone.”

His eyes alight with mischief as his grin broadens, “Yes, Alpha.” He shoots me a wink and takes off upstairs.

“Alright, man, spill,” Eli says with a mouthful of pasta. “What’s with you and Sol?”

This ought to be good.

“Either you two have history, or you’re both into some freaky foreplay.” Dean’s joke earns him a glare from Hunter and a growl from me.

Dean throws his palms up in defense of himself, “hey, we all have our kinks.”

Hunter’s shoulders slump as he releases a long sigh, “you remember four years ago? The girl I was with in the Grove?”

“Your mate?” Eli asks innocently but that doesn’t stop Hunter from leveling him with an exasperated look before understanding crosses Eli’s horror struck face.

“Wait… you mean…”

“I feel like I’m missing something,” Dean admits.

“…so when I said that thing about…”

“Fucking her?” Hunter snarls.

“…she’s your…”

“Wait, Solana’s your fiancé?” Dean throws his head back, roaring with laughter when Eli punches him in the arm.

“Fuck, man, why didn’t you say something sooner?” Eli asks.

“Ex-fiancé,” Hunter sulks, “and I didn’t say anything because it doesn’t matter.”

At this Hunter chances a glance at me and I know it’s because of what I said to them when she first came here — she’s off limits. Not only because it’s a conflict of interest to be fucking a client, but because at the end of the day she’s still my mate and, try as I might, the primal urge to mark what’s mine is impossible to kill.

“I can’t wait to see the look on T’s face when he finds out he’s been fantasizing about tying up Hunter’s girl,” Eli quips, not reading the room before opening his mouth.

Both Hunter and I snarl at his comment which successfully wipes the grin right off of his face.

Several beats pass in tense silence before Eli opens his idiot mouth again, “so…just so I’m clear, does what you said about dicking her first still apply?”

Hunter nearly flips the table as he pushes to stand. His anger is palpable as he storms out of the house.

“You’re a goddamn idiot, Eli, do you know that?” Dean chuckles.

A few seconds later an arrow breaks through the kitchen window, slicing the top of Eli’s ear before embedding in the wall behind him. Dean loses it and starts laughing uncontrollably at Eli’s expense.

“For fuck’s sake,” I grumble and stalk off to find Solana, leaving a dumbstruck Eli and hysterical Dean in the kitchen.

***

“I said I’d think about it, didn’t I?” Solana says with no small amount of attitude to who I presume is her sister on the other side of Tate and Dean’s bedroom door.

When I hear her phone land on the bed I push the door open and let myself in. Sol is laid out on her back on Tate’s bed, one arm hanging off the side of the bed, the other draped over her eyes.

“Everything okay with your sister?” I prop myself up against Tate’s dresser and stuff my hands in my pockets to keep myself from reaching out for her.

“Eh, status quo. Queenie throws a royal fit every time something doesn’t go her way.”

A deep crease forms between my scrunched brows, “your sister’s name is Queenie?”

The lower half of Sol’s face, the part not covered by her arm, lights up in a brilliant and genuine smile before laughter ripples down her body. She sits up so she’s facing me and tucks her crossed legs under her.

“No,” she laughs, “her name is Calla. But since she’s the heir to the grove and sometimes acts like an entitled brat, we’ve taken to calling her Queenie.”

“Who’s ‘we’?”

The smile slips from Sol’s face and her eyes drop to her lap where she begins to pick at her nails. “Mostly Hunter and me, sometimes Cole, her twin.”

I nod quietly but inside my blood begins to boil. It feels like we can’t have a single conversation without Hunter’s name coming up, and every time it does I see the pain in her eyes that she is so desperate to hide.

When our job here is done and Sol goes back home I need her and Hunter to have gotten whatever closure they were denied so that she can move on and live a happy life, and he can finally let her go.

“What did she want?” I ask to keep the conversation going and conceal any visible anger I feel at the mere mention of their shared history.

“She’s mad I didn’t see her when I had gone home. And then she not so casually reminded me that her and my brother’s centennial is coming up.”

I take a few cautious steps towards her until I’m standing directly in front of her. She keeps her head down so I lift her chin with two fingers so she’s forced to meet my eye. “You want to go home for their birthday?”

She shrugs and drops her gaze once more, “I haven’t given it much thought. If I did go I’d probably spend most of my time in the shadows, which I can’t do with an entourage.” She lifts a challenging brow at me with a smirk to match.

It’s hard to tell what she really wants or what is really stopping her from going after what she wants, but if this is truly important to her then I don’t want this job to factor into her decision.

“What if it was just me? No entourage.”

“That’s a bad idea and you know it.” She deadpans rather quickly.

I rest my fists on the bed on either side of her hips and lean over her with darkening eyes. “Actually, I don’t know that. You afraid I’ll draw too much attention to you?”

She rests back on her hands and lifts her chin up defiantly, our mouths a breath apart.

“My parents will figure you — us — out immediately. Besides, they’d probably smell Hunter on us and shit would hit the fan.”

“What happened Sol?” At this point I’m begging her to tell me, from what I’ve heard from Hunter it doesn’t make complete sense.

“That’s a bedtime story for another time,” she whispers against my lips, the featherlight contact sending sparks down my spine.

My wolf surges forward but I manage to rip myself away from her before he could devour her and probably claim her. I make a mental note to get Tate to check in with her dads about their progress on her bounty. The sooner they kill the source the sooner all of our lives return to normal.

I barge down the stairs and storm outside, preparing to do something I haven’t had to do in a while. I shift into my wolf and race into the woods in search of something to prey on. With any luck I’ll find Hunter and drag him back to the house.

It’s late when I return. Tate is still up at work on his computer and Hunter is passed out on the couch. I shower quickly, brush my teeth, and head to my room where my wolf is relieved to find Solana curled up and sleeping soundly.

I climb into bed and assume my usual position behind her, but I recoil when something smells off. She’s still wearing my shirt and when I run my nose against her skin all I get is her sweet Vetiver scent. It’s not until my head hits the pillow that I realize what’s off.

She’s sleeping on Tate’s pillow. She stole his pillow and brought it into my bed. When I try to remove it from under her and replace it with mine she growls softly in her sleep. Ignoring her adorable rage, I slip the pillow out from under her but before I can get my pillow in place, she lays her head down in the crook of my arm. I’m too busy trying to keep my composure to stop her from pulling Tate’s pillow into her arms and hugging it to her chest.

And that’s how we spent the night, with her wrapped around his pillow and me wrapped around her. My last thought before sleep takes me is how I’m going to miss sleeping with her like this when she leaves.

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