Page 55 of Breathe Again

Kyle looked visibly relieved. He blew out a breath he must have been holding. “Okay, good. We can work with that, and of course I’ll have you for as long as possible.”

Cole put his arm around me and squeezed. I could feel the tension rolling off of him.

Thought you were going to discuss this with him, I scolded.

I was, the right time just hadn’t come up yet. I’ve sort of been a little busy lately,he said and pushed memories of the two of us in bed together into my mind.

“Okay, enough of that. Creeps me out,” Luke confessed.

He knows?Cole asked.

He guessed. I didn’t lie about it.

“So where do we go from here?” Kyle asked.

“Crap, I forgot to call Thomas. Should I still do that, or fill him in later?” I asked feeling guilty that I’d dropped the ball on that when Cole had asked.

“Something tells me a Larken isn’t supposed to be in the middle of Collier. I’d say let’s head over to the Alpha house and talk to him, but if that’s the case, it would probably be safest for Luke if we called Thomas to come over here instead,” Kyle advised.

I nodded in agreement and got up to make the call in the bedroom. He picked up on the second ring.

“Hey, Lizzy, what’s up?”

“You busy?”

“Uh, yeah, sort of a big day coming up. Lots to do.”

“Kyle and Cole would really appreciate it if you could take some time and come over to my place.”

“Kyle’s there? I thought they were coming straight back here. I’ve been waiting for him.” Thomas sounded a little irritated and there was some rustling on his end of the line. “Lily wants to know if Kelsey and the boys are there, too.”

“Yes, they’re all here. And we have a guest that you need to meet with also, which is why they are here.”

“I’m free to speak. Why are you being so cryptic?”

I sighed. “Luke Larken is here and has some information you need to hear regarding a potential disturbance during your Alpha ceremony. So if you could just hurry over, they’re waiting for you.”

“Well why didn’t you just say so? Now come and answer your door already.”

I stomped across the apartment to the door, and sure enough Thomas and Lily were there waiting.

He grinned the crooked little smile that always got him his way. “Kyle texted and said to come over just before you called, so we were already in route.”

Luke stiffened as Thomas entered the room and the testosterone level shot up a few notches.

Cole stood and stared Luke down. “We’re not going to have any issues here, are we clear? For the moment this is neutral territory.”

“He is once again trespassing on my land,” Thomas reminded us all.

“He risked his hide to get you this information. Don’t be a dick, Thomas,” I warned him.

Lily started to pipe in, then caught herself and stopped, then started to say it anyway, but stopped herself and finally shook her head. Thomas rolled his eyes at her. We all knew she was about to proclaim he wasn’t a dick, just the biggest douchebag on the planet.

Instead she turned to Kelsey and there was some squealing and hugs for a few minutes, until they calmed back down, and Lily stole her tiny nephew who somehow managed to sleep through everything.

Cole quickly gave Thomas the short story and need-to-know facts that Luke had relayed. “Now, what are we going to do about this? We need a plan.”

“I’ll heighten patrols. All deputies are already on duty, but we’ll brief them on what to watch for. The trouble is, I don’t have security in place like Patrick was describing he’s setting up in Westin. We’ve pulled in all patrols to help with the event as it is,” Thomas said.

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