Several days later, I was working in my office, trying to sort through the massive problems that we’d apparently run into with the omega housing project.
A knock on the door made me look up. Jasmine entered, smiling as she put my lunch pack on the desk. “You forgot this.”
“Thanks. I’ve just been distracted with the omega project.”
Jasmine rounded the desk and leaned against me. “What’s wrong?”
“The troublemakers we ran into at the bar left the territory, but their pack pulled out entirely. We were sourcing our lumber from them, so now we have to find a new source, but we picked them because they were in our budget,” I explained.
“Why don’t I look into this?” Jasmine said, looking over the numbers I’d been crunching. “I can talk with Penny and see if maybe Burgess has a portable mill that we can use to make our own lumber. I’m sure that if she asked her alphas for a discount, they’d be happy to help out.”
A slow smile spread over my face. “You’d do that for me?”
Jasmine bumped her shoulder into mine. “Well, it’s not entirely for you. I mean, I am also looking to take care of the other omegas, right?”
“You’ll also be taking a load off my plate.”
She smiled, her eyes brightening. “And I’m happy to help.”
And she did. With her connection to Penny, Burgess not only lent us a portable mill, through which we were able to produce a good amount of the lumber, but the rest of it we purchased from them at a steep discount, with the arrangement that the Burgess pack would be granted access to our periphery territory for one month to forage different plants.
In the process, Penny and Jasmine arranged a time when they would do their foraging together, both of them thrilled at the prospect.
The next week went by with little difficulty. Killian and Renz grew more optimistic that it was stress and not the darkness making them act off.
Even after they started to slowly take on more work, Jasmine insisted that she continue to help. As it turned out, she was amazing with numbers and took over auditing several of the budgets. Remarkably, she found an extra few thousand dollars that had been earmarked for a project that never ended up happening, and then she saved us a bundle on her town gardening project by inspiring pack members from all the different orders to volunteer their time.
Things were looking up, although we had an unusual number of pack members getting colds this year. Jasmine strove extra hard with her gardens, planting herbs and tending to other plants. She picked a lot of herbs and dried them, then made various teas for the sick pack members.
We were all out with her at the garden boxes—which we’d put together little by little in our spare time—one evening, working in the soil. I had to move slowly, still unsure of which plants were herbs and which were weeds. Meanwhile, Jasmine moved swiftly, tending, pruning, digging in the dirt.
“It’s amazing watching you,” Killian said. “You really know your stuff, don’t you?”
“I’ve been gardening all my life,” Jasmine answered.
I smiled at my own garden box, then hesitated. Were those fine, feathery sprouts chamomile or something I should yank out?
“Ouch!” Jasmine cried. My head jerked up in time to see her shears hit the ground. She held her finger in one hand and grimaced at it.
I rushed over to see a swell of blood appear in a thin, long cut the length of her finger. My wolf growled, and I quickly seized her hand and pulled her toward the house.
“We need the first aid kit,” I said.
Killian rushed on ahead as Owen and Renz hastily picked up our tools so they wouldn’t rust.
“It’s not that bad,” Jasmine protested.
I swept her into my arms and carried her to the common room, ignoring the way she huffed and sighed as though we were making a big deal out of nothing. Killian brought the first aid kit, and we all gathered around her. Renz stroked her calf while I cleaned the cut. Owen held her other hand, whispering reassurances. Killian made sure everything was ready before I needed it.
“You are all being ridiculous,” Jasmine huffed. “It’s not that bad.”
Renz took off her shoes and started to massage her feet. “Let us take care of you, Jasmine.”
Owen rubbed her shoulders, and Jasmine leaned into them both, sighing as her eyes fluttered shut. I finished putting the bandage on and kissed over it, then the middle of her palm. She tasted of dirt from the garden.
I couldn’t help it and kissed her wrist, up her arm, and to her elbow. Jasmine’s eyes opened again, and she stared at me with heated eyes.
“We should shower first,” Killian said.
