Page 58 of Bookish Girl’s Emergency Contact Is a Lycan King

“Us. This. What we did last night.” I gesture vaguely at our tangled bodies. “I don’t know what it means.”

“It means I want you.” His hand spreads across my stomach, warm and grounding, and some of the spiral quiets. “It means you want me. That’s all it has to be right now.”

“But I don’t understand…”

“You don’t have to understand everything.” His thumb strokes a gentle arc below my navel. “We can figure it out as we go.”

“That’s very zen of you.”

“I’ve had three hundred years to practice patience.”

He’s leaning down to kiss me, I can see it in his eyes, the intent, when three sharp knocks echo up from the shop below.

We both freeze.

“What…” I start.

“Stay here.” His voice has changed. Harder. More alert. He’s already pulling away, looking around for, right, he’s still naked. We’re both still naked, actually, which is information my brain files away for later panic.

He grabs a towel from somewhere (the bathroom? when did he go to the bathroom?) and wraps it around his waist.

“Orion, wait, you can’t just…”

“Stay here,” he repeats, and then he’s gone, bare feet silent on my stairs.

Oh, for the love of…

I scramble for clothes, grabbing the first things I can find, his shirt, inexplicably, must have materialized overnight, and wrap it around myself. It falls to my thighs, big enough to be a dress, smelling like pine and him and last night.

I creep to the top of the staircase.

The back door has been replaced. When did that happen? The one Orion destroyed yesterday is gone, and there’s a new door in its place, sturdier, actually, with a better lock than the original.

He opens it now, and I see three figures standing in my stockroom.

The first is massive. Shaved head, kind eyes, the general dimensions of a refrigerator with feelings. He’s wearing flannel and work boots and an expression of careful neutrality.

The second is a woman, maybe fifty, with silver-streaked hair and a face that suggests she’s seen everything and finds most of it disappointing.

The third is a younger man, mid-twenties, who looks like he’s trying very, very hard not to laugh about something.

They all look up at once.

They all sniff.

Oh no. Oh no no no.

They can smell what we did. They can smell me on him. They’re going to know that we…

The younger one’s lips twitch.

My face goes nuclear.

“Theo.” Orion’s voice is flat. Controlled. Giving nothing away. “This is unexpected.”

“Apologies for the intrusion, my king.” The massive man, Theo, inclines his head in what is almost a bow. “But you weren’t at the house. Weren’t answering the bond. There were concerns.”

“My whereabouts are my own business.”