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I swallowed the urge to drive my fist into Rhett’s pretty-boy face. “Don’t say that.”
Rhett gave me a disgusted look. “Seriously? This is the chick you’ve decided to get your dick in a knot for? Come on, brother.”
“Rhett, chill,” Crew chastised, his tone light. He shot me a warning look, telling me silently to back off.
But they needed to know.
“Do you seriously not get it?” I stared at Crew first, then Rhett, with wide eyes. I knew I looked more than a little unhinged. “She’s our mate.”
“Mate?” Crew jerked back like he’d been sucker punched.
Rhett snarled and got to his feet. He jabbed a finger toward the waiting room door. “Jude is in surgery fighting for his life because of her, and you’re saying she’s our mate? Have you lost your damn mind?”
I reached behind my head, retwisting my hair into a knot I secured with an elastic. “Come on, man, I know you felt it, too.”
He glared at me. “What I felt was the man I love getting shot protecting her scrawny ass. She’s the reason he’s hurt.”
Crew grunted. “Rhett, you know it isn’t her fault.”
Rhett rounded on him. “So, you’re on her side?”
“There’s no fucking side, bro,” I snapped. “She’s it. She’s our omega. The one we’ve all been waiting for.”
Crew shot me a look of disbelief and annoyance. “Kell?—”
I held up a hand. “Don’t, okay? You didn’t feel what I felt, Crew. You weren’t there.”
He flinched and rocked back on his heels.
Fuck me.
Sighing, I shook my head. “I didn’t mean you weren’t there for Jude.”
“Who wouldn’t have needed anyone to be there if she hadn’t gotten him into this mess,” Rhett argued, stubbornly refusing to budge.
“Enough,” Crew told him, giving him a sharp look. “Any one of us would’ve taken that bullet to protect any innocent person, omega or not.” He looked at me. “Mate or not.”
“Agreed,” I replied before glancing at Rhett. “Jude is one of the best men I know, Rhett. It didn’t matter who she was—he would have gone after them.”
A shudder rippled down Rhett’s spine, and he dropped into the closest chair. “I’ve worried about this moment since I met him,” he confessed. “That he’d be hurt and I wouldn’t be there to protect him.”
Crew grimaced and leaned forward in his seat, his elbows on his knees and hands dangling between his legs. “Don’t think that because your relationship with Jude is more intimate that it means Kellan and I care any less about him. Jude is my brother. He’s pack. I’d take a bullet for him. For any of you.”
“Same,” I murmured with a nod, setting aside the bone-deep need I had for the omega somewhere in this hospital to sit with my brothers. I took the chair on Rhett’s other side.
Rhett buried his face in his hands for a second. “I can’t lose him.”
“You won’t,” Crew said, his tone giving zero room for argument.
I snorted, leaning back in my chair and crossing my legs at the ankle in front of me. “Please. Jude is one of the toughest assholes I know. It’s gonna take more than a bullet to keep him down.”
The corner of Rhett’s mouth hooked up. “You’re right.”
I took a deep breath. “You know what else I’m right about?”
Instantly, Rhett shut down, his face going cold and hard. “I can’t hear this right now.”
“Maybe now isn’t the time,” Crew agreed, giving me a sideways look.
