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His answering grin is wicked. "Oh. Just the Hog sandwich and an iced tea, please." I nod, scribbling down his order and moving to Brooklyn next without making eye contact with Mason again.
"For you?"
"Your hot honey chicken, extra side of honey, and a hot tea with honey." Her eyes sparkle with amused delight as my cheeks pink even further. They're really playing with fire. They may not know my heat is a week away—give or take a few days—but they can smell my perfume that says I'm getting more turned on by the second. I can't smell my own scent, but I've been told by Pack Monroe—because I refuse to call them my pack anymore—that I smell like honey and nutmeg. Ava said the combination reminds her of her grandma's gingerbread cookies.
Ignoring Brooklyn's teasing and heated grin, I move on the Hudson.
He's smiling like he's trying to hold in his laugh at my expense. Instead of continuing with Brooklyn and Mason's game, he takes a different approach. "Two of your deluxe bacon burgers, a side of fries, and water," he says, and I almost breathe a sigh of relief. Then he continues, "and your number, please." The grin he gives me can only be described as shit-eating.
I can't even respond before Brooklyn and Mason make outraged noises. "If that's an option, then I want that one. I don't need the cookies," Mason says, frowning, and then he rethinks his answer. "Actually, I want both, please."
"I'll take your number, too. You can keep the tea, I didn't really want it anyway," Brooklyn agrees, nodding at Mason.
I stand there gaping with my mouth open at them. I don't even get a word in before Mav interjects with his two cents. "If anyone needs her number, I think it's the person taking her on a date Saturday," he grins at them with an air of smug satisfaction. I don't understand it until I look at Mason, Brooklyn, and Hudson to see them staring at Maverick with stunned looks on their faces.
"When did you ask her out?" Brooklyn demands.
"Yesterday," he says proudly, and I can't help but smile at it. He's not at all ashamed of going out with me. Two years with Pack Monroe, and the three of them still chose staying in with me over going out to public places. At first it seemed like they just wanted me to themselves, and I thought it was sweet. Then they seemed hesitant to introduce me when we were out, and it seemed like something else entirely. Embarrassment.
"Why didn't you tell us?" Hudson asks Maverick, frowning at him. Maverick just shrugs at him. Mason doesn't let it go though. Instead, he rolls his eyes and answers Hudson.
"He didn't want us swooping in to take her out before he could." My brows raise at that, sure he's got it wrong. I look at Maverick and wait for him to contradict Mason, but he's just glaring at him, and I realize Mason was right.
Huh. Well that is...flattering, I think. I can't tell if I'm upset or not that he was, in a way, controlling my choices, so I decide to shove away the thought and enjoy the compliment it is.
"Well, then I want the next date," Hudson declares.
"Maybe ask her if she even wants a date with you, doofus," Brooklyn scoffs at him. "You know,woo her."The way she says 'woo' sounds like she's talking about something else, but I don't have time to pick her wording to death because suddenly Hudson is throwing some very impressive puppy dog eyes my way.
I know I've been giving myself pep talks about moving on, and I really do mean them in the moment, but now that I'm faced with an established pack's flirtation, I pause. Am I really ready for dating four people? Assuming they're being serious and not teasing me, that is. Great. Now I've got two insecurities rolling around in my head. Do they really want to date me or is this a competition thing? If they are, can I handle that? That would be four people—four strangers—I have to explain my story to when they see my claiming marks. Besides Doctor Tanner who told me I was drugged to begin with, nobody knows my history, and I definitely haven't thought about airing it out yet. Nobody except Ava, that is. But even she doesn’t know the full story. All she knows is I have three claiming marks, which she saw as I was undressing and trying on clothes in front of her. But, being the astute woman she is, she cataloged them and then pretended she never saw them in the first place.
"Excuse me?" Someone down at the other end of the bar waves her hand, trying to flag me down. I nod to her.
"Saved by the bell," I mutter and walk to take her order. I hear a thwack behind me that sounds suspiciously like a slap, followed by annoyed muttering. I smile to myself.
Maybe I'll just take it one day—one date—at a time.
Seventeen
Summer
The restof my shift last night went by as fast as a shift can when you close a bar down after working all day. Brooklyn, Mason, Maverick, and Hudson all stayed for a couple hours, eating their food and then talking to me when I got a free minute. They dropped the date conversation but still took every opportunity to make me blush with all the flirtation and compliments they gave, or laugh at the jokes they made—often at the expense of one of their packmates. Hudson had the most stories about everyone, and it became clear he is the outgoing, class-clown type. Brooklyn was content to sit back and watch her packmates rib on each other, but certainly didn't take it lying down when the tables were turned on her.
One thing I found odd was Mason and Maverick; they didn't interact a lot with each other. I'm not sure if it is because they were sitting on opposite ends of each other or not, but they seemed to be avoiding eye contact as much as possible, too. Which really confused me because when I first saw them on St. Patty's Day, they seemed like a couple. But it's none of my business, so I stayed out of it.
They left The Hog's Head around eight or nine, and the shift seemed slower after that. My mood was directly related to their presence, so as soon as they left, my smile seemed to drop a little, and I was finally able to feel that my cheeks felt stiff and achy from overuse. Oddly enough, my tips were also directly related to the amount I'd smiled, because as soon as Pack Whitlock left, my tips got smaller. My mood picked back up as I was leaving though, because Ava stopped me on my way out and handed me a large gift bag with decorative gift paper sticking out the top. I’d raised my eyes at it when she told me to open it and then felt immediately teary eyed as I did. She’d gotten me the matching pillows from the store where I got my blanket.
“I get it,” she had said on a shrug, when I asked why after thanking her profusely. Being an omega, I’m sure she does. She saw the claiming marks I have, knew I’m about to go through a heat without a pack, and did what she could to make that a little easier. We also made plans to drink wine and watch a horror movie marathon the next night, since she gave herself Friday off.
All that being said, it was a good night.
Which is why I'm trying not to be grumpy this morning, sipping my black coffee, bags under my eyes, as I'm trying to function on four hours of sleep. The copious amounts of concealer under my eyes do little to hide the swelling, but at least I don't look like I have bruises under my eyes that allude to me being punched in the face. I log on to my computer as a yawn big enough to let a bird fly into my mouth breaks free.
"None of that, Summer. We've got a big day ahead of us! Mainline that coffee and let's get started," Jerrick shouts from across the room, heading my way with a skip in his step and a big, happy smile on his face. It makes me want to scowl at him and flip him a different kind of bird. "Come on, chop chop!" he says, clapping his hands and breezing past me into his office.
This is going to be a long day.
* * *
