Page 33 of Vegas Baby!

Mom had been Team Andrew from the start, eager for me to be with someone who could give me a comfortable life. Mom had always had dreams of being a lady of leisure like the ones she saw on TV: philanthropists’ wives and socialite omegas. I’d never cared about any of that, but it was what she wanted for me.

I didn’t know exactly what I wanted for myself, but I sure as hell knew it wasn’t a life with Andrew.

“Nervous flier?”

Ava had a death grip on my hand as the plane started to taxi down the runway. “A bit.”

I’d lowered the barrier between our seats as soon as we got to them, and with the way she was holding on to me, I was pretty sure Ava would’ve preferred to crawl directly into my lap if the flight attendant would’ve allowed it.

“Come here.” I tucked her head against my shoulder and cupped her cheek, leaning my head on top of hers. “Deep breaths for me. We’ll be there before you know it.”

I counted down the inhalations and exhalations for her, feeling her warm breath against my skin, letting her steep in my scent.

“That’s my good girl.”

She squeaked as the plane ascended, her little nails digging into my hand.

“You’re okay. Keep breathing.”

Ava tucked as close to me as she could get while still wearing her seatbelt. Bryce held her hand across the aisle. Micah was too far to reach her, but once we were in the air and the seat belt sign was turned off, he wedged himself in next to me, offering her one of the fruit snacks he had packed.

She let him feed them to her, and by the time the package was empty, her grip on me had loosened.

“Feeling better, sweetness?” I asked.

Ava nodded without speaking.

“Do you want to try sleeping for the flight?” Micah asked.

“Not a terrible idea.”

Trying to keep out of the way of the flight attendants, we got Ava bundled into her seat with the blankets we had each packed for her. She didn’t have a ton of room to curl up, but we got her comfortable enough that she fell asleep quickly.

Bryce looked totally at ease on the plane. Since he was at a conference, I could only assume he was pretty familiar with air travel.

“Do you travel a lot for work?” I asked.

“At least once a month. Sometimes more. They’re not going to be happy if I have to stick close for a while.”

“Probably even less happy with you going on parental leave on such short notice,” Micah added.

“Pretty good chance I won’t have a job when I get off it,” Bryce replied.

“That’s illegal,” I pointed out.

Bryce shrugged. “They’ll cite poor performance when I get back, less commitment to the job. Or they’ll have a fake restructuring. But they’ll be paying me for a year either way and I’ve been there long enough I’ll get a good severance package.”

“You sound weirdly okay with that,” said Micah.

“A couple days ago it would’ve devastated me. My work was basically my entire identity, but my priorities have changed pretty drastically this weekend. I’m not going to sideline Ava and the baby if my job can’t see my value.”

I had to respect the hell out of that.

“Between all our incomes,” I said, “we should have no problem taking care of Ava and however many kids she wants to have.”

“I have money outside of my job,” Bryce explained. “The odds of us ever having to worry are slim to none. Short of my father finding a way to undo my trust fund, we’ll be fine.”

I had grown up solidly middle-class, and Micah closer to the upper portion of that. Luke had started middle-class and slid down that slope the longer his mother’s addiction ruled their lives. I could see why he might be threatened by someone like Bryce rolling up with a bank account full of more money than Luke had probably ever seen. He needed to stop seeing Bryce as competition and more as part of the pack. Ava wasn’t going to love Bryce more because of his money, but she might love him more if Luke couldn’t get his shitty attitude under control. He would always be her scent match, but that didn’t guarantee him a place in the pack if he was going to clash with a bonded member.

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