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I was halfway through putting new sheets on the bed when I felt the presence of someone behind me. A simple inhale of tangy citrus let me know it was Crew who’d come to find me.
Keeping my back to him, I finished making the bed up, thankful that Calla and Elizabeth had the foresight to buy extras of everything. I didn’t need quite the nest I’d had during my heat, but this one was shaping up nicely with a variety of textures and colors that made me feel calmer.
“Baby, you’re killing me,” Crew whispered. “I need to know you’re all right.”
I turned slowly. “Um, I think so.”
Crew’s fingers were nervously twitching at his sides, his chest heaving while his gaze devoured me, looking for what was wrong. His scent was sharp, edged with anger and slightly soured by worry.
“I’m okay,” I said, this time with more certainty.
“You weren’t downstairs when we came in, and then we heard you up here… Jude said he didn’t see you, and Kellan’s acting weird as shit, even for that fucker.” Frustration bled into his tone as his breaths came in quick bursts.
I was moving across the space between us before I even realized I’d taken a step. I didn’t stop until I was close enough to fling myself at his chest. He caught me easily, helping me climb up his body and smashing my nose against his throat where his scent was strongest.
His arms gripped me tight, wrapping around my back as his hands dug into my ass. His lips pressed against my neck, and I gave myself a second to let fifteen-year-old me freak out that Crew Dutton was holding me, kissing me, claiming me.
“Is Kellan okay?” My words came out muffled against his skin.
“Kellan’s always okay,” he replied.
I pulled back, my hands linked behind his neck. “Not always. Not now. Something’s off.”
A tiny V formed between his brows. “I’ll talk to him.”
Sighing, I shook my head. “We all need to talk. Dr. Berthand said something that I think we need to discuss.”
Thunder filled his face. “What the fuck did he say to you?” The hands on my butt tightened, probably giving me bruises I would happily wear if it meant I got to stay like this forever.
“Nothing bad. He was nice. I got the impression he hated what he was doing,” I confessed.
“Then why work for OS?”
I considered that. “I mean, I’d rather him work for OS than have someone really mean like Agent Carson checking me over.”
“He’s such a cunt,” Crew spat.
I covered his lips with my fingers. “Hey, no hating on the vagina.”
The edges of his mouth twitched with humor. “Sorry, baby.”
A delicious shiver zipped down my spine as warmth pooled low in my belly. “If you only knew how many nights I spent as a teenager, hoping you’d call me that.”
He quirked a single, cocky as hell brow.
Giving into instinct, I leaned forward and rested my forehead against his, breathing his air and letting myself fall into this moment of bliss.
Which, of course, was shattered when I heard loud male voices arguing downstairs. I tried to wiggle free from Crew, but he simply shifted my weight around to carry me down the stairs.
“I can walk,” I hissed.
“I’m aware,” was all he said as we hit the landing and crossed over the hallway to the other part of the upstairs floor where the bedrooms were.
When we got to where Jude and Rhett were standing outside of Kellan’s door, Crew stopped and let me glide down his body.
“What’s going on?” I asked, peering around Rhett’s shoulder to see Kellan storming back and forth in his room, throwing things into an open gym bag on his bed.
My heart crashed to the floor. “You’re leaving?” Iron bands wrapped around my chest, squeezing the air from my lungs. My knees buckled and I dropped to the ground with a keening cry as I watched him toss another shirt in the bag.
