Page 79 of The Butcher

I take another deep breath and open the closet, kick off my boots, then step into my nest before I turn to face them.

Nash looks around, his eyes taking in the dim lights and dark tapestries, all of the pillows and blankets, the thick, pillowymattress on the floor. “Are you sure? I mean, this is your nest, and?—“

“It’s my nest, my first ever nest that the two of you helped me build.” I have to keep myself from wringing my hands, my nerves swirling in my stomach like a mini tornado because this really is huge. I can’t believe I’m about to do this. Or that I really want to. “This is my nest… The two of you are mine… It makes sense for you to be in here, right?”

Clayton’s entire face lights up as he looks between me and his alpha. “You hear that, Nashy?”

He nods, a shy smile pulling at his lips. “I did.”

“We’re yours, huh, pretty girl?” Clay grins. “Is that a fact?”

Chewing the inside of my cheek, I can feel my blush as it creeps up my neck, and I shrug. “Seems like it.”

“You know what that means, though, right?” The alpha who’s blushing behind his beard asks. “Big picture?”

“Bramley is mine, too. Even if he’s an enormous jackass and refuses to accept it.”

Nash snorts while Clay pumps his fist in the air. “Oh, she got the full Bramley Ambrose treatment.” Then he tilts his head to the side and looks me up and down. “You got the full treatment and you didn’t back down, or decide you want nothing to do with him. I’m impressed.”

“Can we talk about all of this in there?” I nod to my nest again. “I didn’t back down, but I have a lot of feelings I need to sort through, and I want to do that with you, in here.”

“You’re sure?” The sweetest alpha I have ever met scrubs a hand over his hair and pushes his glasses up his nose. “I mean, this is a big deal from what Nan says, and, I mean, shit’s weird with Bramley, I wouldn’t want you to make some knee jerk decision, then regret it later.”

I smile as I step further in, making room for them to follow. “That’s exactly why I won’t. I want you both in my space, I havefor a while, I was just trying not to be completely out of line because I wasn’t sure what was going on between all of us, or how you feel about it.”

“Pretty girl, rip the band aid off, let's go. I have a basket full of Nash’s dirty hoodies I’ve been saving for this very moment,” Clay says as he grabs our alpha’s hand, who looks shocked and appalled by that statement, and they take their first step inside. “You say the word, I’ll bring it down.”

“Yours too?” I ask, embarrassed, even if after all of this, I have no reason to be anymore.

He levels me with the brightest smile I have yet to see on his face as he says, “Indigo Rae, are you asking for my nasty clothes?”

I bite my lip and nod.

“I might not be some big, bad, knotted alpha, but goddamn, what that does to me.” He puffs his chest out as he drags Nash the rest of the way inside. “You got it.”

After a few awkward moments of two very large men trying to get situated in my nest with me, we’re finally all seated comfortably, ready to get into what just happened with the missing piece of this perfect little puzzle we’re attempting to put together.

Perfect. That really is how this feels, or, at least it would, if that idiot in town was here with us, and I can tell Nash and Clay are thinking the same thing.

Asshole.

Rubbingmy hand over my chest, I ignore the little voice inside my head, nagging the fuck out of me over what just happened with Indy.

She didn’t deserve that.

I said things, made accusations, and outright lied to her, and for what? Why?

Because I’m a real son of a bitch. I guess that’s why.

Having an omega can’t be all bad. Hell, after watching my dads fall over my mom, how she was with them in return, I used to think finding my omega was something I wanted. I thought it was something that would make me happy. It seemed like such a good thing. Bringing the pack together, having the focal point that truly converged all bonds and relationships, and melding them into one.

I wanted that. Badly, and because I was a little concerned that everything that was wrong with me would keep it from happening, I wanted it even more.

Until I watched my brothers grow into the psychotic assholes they are, then I realized all that shit was genetics, and not even an omega would change it.

But I still wanted to find mine.

Biologically, all alphas do. Instincts. Primal urges. That’s all wrapped up in our DNA as well, and since I’d embraced the more murdery side of my chromosomes, I figured I should do the same with the stupidly romanticized side, too.

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