“I spoke when I entered the room.”
His nose crinkled. “Didn’t hear that. I have to finish this.”
He tried to turn back to the computer, once again cycling through windows at a ridiculous pace. My fingers dug into his shoulder. “I want you to explain why you smell like my omega.”
“I’m in the middle of something.”
His voice went higher, spiking with irritation. I growled low in my throat. “It’s not important. Do you realize it’s like three a.m.? Whatever it is can wait until morning.”
“No. It has to be done now.”
Paying more attention, I noticed his leg was bouncing and his hands had a hint of a shake in them. His shoulder was rolling sporadically where I held it, trying to shake off my touch. With the day weighing me down, I wasn’t sure what to make of him. He was known to have mood swings. I got the feeling if I interrupted him again, he would snap.
That kind of spat wasn’t something I could afford at the moment, no matter how annoyed I was at his close contact with what belonged to me.
The soft creak of the door opening again had me stepping back. Mercury took one look at Dash and sighed, placing a plate of cut fruit and a bottle of water on the desk beside him. His packmate glanced over at the sustenance, grunted a ‘thanks,’ and ignored the food.
When Mercury left I followed him out and back into the kitchen, grateful to see my tea already brewing on the counter. “Do you know what he’s working on?” I asked.
Mercury shrugged. “Not a clue. He gets like that, though. If you interrupt him, it’s not a good time for anyone involved and he tends to forget to eat, drink, and sleep.”
“How long does it go on for?”
“However long he needs to finish what he’s doing, or until the hyperfixation runs out. It kind of depends. There have been a couple times where he hasn’t surfaced for a month.”
My lips parted. “Amonth?”
“His body forces him to sleep after a couple of days, and we keep him fed with foods he can pick at sporadically when he remembers.”
“What was he doing for the month?”
“During one of the month-long stints, he paid a hacker to teach him everything he knows and grade assignments like it was a university course.”
Hacking made a lot of sense considering what I just saw him doing on that computer. It couldn’t be legal.
“Should I be worried that he’s currently on a computer in my house? Am I going to have the cops busting down my door again?”
Snorting, Mercury pulled the tea bags from both of our cups and gave them a stir. “Doubt it. I don’t know much about code and the dark web, but he seriously learned from the best. He’s not going to get caught.”
“Better not,” I muttered, looking over my shoulder at the closed door.
Mercury pressed the warm mug of chamomile into my hands, and I sucked in a deep breath of the calming fragrance. I got hit with his scent too. It bothered me how his cinnamon was almost more calming than the chamomile. He smelled like an old library with cinnamon buns baking amidst it all.
I took a tiny sip, the hot liquid burning my tongue.
“I’m going to sleep on the couch, if you don’t mind,” he said, tilting his head toward the living room.
Oddly, I didn’t. These men had invaded my space—so had Kiara, for that matter. Having them here didn’t feel cramped or overwhelming, though. It made the well-equipped apartment I’d lived in for so long actually feel like a home.
“Go ahead. Doubt I could get rid of you,” I said.
The mug warmed my hands as we leaned against opposite counters in companionable silence. When we’d each sipped our way through half the mug, I pushed off and headed into the master suite without another word.
* * *
I woke up covered in omega.
Kiara’s leg was thrown over mine, one arm draped over my chest as her nose pressed to my neck. I couldn’t tell if she was a hundred percent awake, but she was grinding her clit down on my hip, slick drenching me. Little moans broke the mid-morning silence.
