Page 133 of Savage Surrender

“Did I?” Megan drums her thumb against the steering wheel. “Are you resource guarding the tacos now? Is there one or not?”

I open the bag. Four tacos. I pick the least shattered one, peel back the paper, and squeeze sauce across the top. My fingers are greasy, and the packet squirts onto my thumb.

I fold the paper around the base and pass it between the seats. Megan takes it without looking away from the road.

“I feel like a bottomless pit. How can I still be hungry?”

“Your body is preparing for heat hibernation.”

“Is that the technical term?”

She takes a bite and chews, her knee bouncing beneath the steering wheel hard enough to shake the keys.

“Ez will be okay,” I reassure her, hoping like fuck I’m right.

The ache beneath my skin yanks at theirs. Please let me feel you.

A sharp cramp tugs low in my stomach.

Fuckity fuck fuck.

I shift more into Freddie’s lap, tacos abandoned.

“I think my heat is coming.”

Megan turns her head just far enough for me to catch one green eye. Really, bitch? Now?

“The suppressant should’ve given us more time.” She looks at me again, longer this time, until the car drifts toward the rumble strip and Freddie reaches forward to touch her shoulder. Megan jerks the wheel straight. “Maybe the stress burned through it. Drowning and then the separation probably didn’t help. How bad?”

“Manageable for now.”

“Okay.” She crushes the taco wrapper in her fist and throws it on the passenger seat. “Okay. That’s something.”

What happens if they aren’t back before it starts?

What if something happens to them when I’m out of it?

Freddie’s breath catches, and only then do I notice I’m rubbing against his thigh like a horny cat. He holds my hips without pushing me away.

“Baby. Does it hurt?”

“Everything hurts a little.”

His arm tightens around me. I can’t subject Megan to this, so I reach for another taco before my brain can do the math on how to get rid of some of the pain.

I dump two packets of sauce across it and take a bite so large it barely fits in my mouth. The shell cracks, and a sharp piece stabs the roof of my mouth. “Ow!”

“Whoa, slow down,” Freddie murmurs. “You’re going to fucking choke.”

I look directly at him, take another big bite, and chew as obnoxiously as I can.

Alphas are always telling me what to do now. Apparently I like it sometimes, which has only encouraged them.

Freddie watches until I swallow, then wipes sauce from my cheek with his thumb. He offers me the drink, holding the straw against my mouth until I take several long pulls. His hand goes back to my spine and works a slow circle above my waistband.

After the highway spills us onto a divided road, Megan checks her phone at the next light, her thumb moving through messages while Freddie scans the cars around us. The same blue sedan follows us through two turns, but when Megan takes the next on-ramp, it continues straight.

“Anything?” I ask.