Page 29 of Wolf Found

Not that Ash liked to think of anyone using Graham, let alone Ezekiel Martingale. He’d spent his whole life using people. He didn’t get to have Graham too.

Ash only wished there were something he could do about all the others.

“On that note,” Gavin announced, “I’m just gonna head for home. You guys have fun. Please don’t have sex in the kitchen. Or if you do, bleach things afterward. All the things.”

Graham pulled away from the kiss, flushed and breathless and looking a tiny bit embarrassed. He turned to where Gavin was retreating. “What about dinner?”

Gavin turned back and gave him an astounded look. “You just spent all day cooking. I’m gonna go ahead and pick up a dozen pizzas. Meet you at home, and don’t take too long if you like your pizza hot.” The door jingled as he let himself out and locked it behind him.

“What’s pizza?” Graham asked.

Ash groaned and let his head fall onto Graham’s shoulder. “Really?” Of course he didn’t know what pizza was. It wasn’t like they ever had it in the enclave when Ash was a kid, why would Graham know? He sighed and pulled himself up. “Okay, we can kiss for ten minutes, but then we have to get home so you can have pizza.”

Graham beamed like Ash had given him a gift. “We can?”

Ash leaned their foreheads together and stared into those perfect green eyes. “Yeah. We can. I mean, we don’t have to if you don’t want—” He didn’t even manage to finish the sentence in his head before Graham’s lips were back on his.

Graham was the definition of the old adage about enthusiasm making up for a lack of experience. Also, he caught on quick. Before long, he was twining his tongue against Ash’s, one long leg wrapped around Ash’s hips, grinding their cocks together through layers of underwear and pants.

Ash grabbed his ass with both hands and held on for dear life; it was all he could do to keep from falling over as Graham ran his hands through his hair, his knuckles along his cheek, and stared into his eyes.

“This is real,” he whispered when he finally pulled away. “Twelve-year-old me didn’t dream this up.”

“Ancestors, I hope not. That makes me a terrible person, I think.” Ash leaned up and captured those soft lips for another kiss, nipping Graham’s swollen lower lip as he pulled away, breathless.

“Nope,” Graham denied, shaking his head. “It just means that twelve-year-old me already knew what he wanted. It’s not like you were interested back then.” He bit his lip and blushed. “I was kind of inappropriate. That was why your father put me in the kitchens.”

Ash froze. His father. He’d stopped at the enclave school when he was twelve, they’d said. He pulled Graham in tight. “Do you want to go back to school?”

“What? No, why?”

“I just... the pack will cover it. I’ll cover it. I don’t want you to be sorry you didn’t—”

Graham grabbed Ash by the back of his neck, like he was the alpha schooling an unruly child, and pressed their lips together, claiming Ash’s mouth with his tongue, pushing his way in and demanding everything Ash had. When he finally pulled away, Ash had to pant.

“You and Gavin and Dez and Sawyer have been so, so clear,” Graham told him, and thank goodness he was also struggling to breathe. “You’ll send me to school. You’ll let me cook. You’ll get me a different job. You’ll let me sit around that giant mansion and eat cookies all day. You don’t understand. I have what I want. Right here. You. This kitchen. A job I’m going to love. Being something to the pack other than just the omega who doesn’t ever leave the kitchen.”

“You’re choosing not to leave the kitchen,” Ash pointed out.

Graham nodded, clutching Ash’s cheeks. “That’s exactly it. You all let me choose that because I wanted it. You didn’t tell me it was what I was going to do.”

That, Ash couldn’t deny. Graham had said it was what he wanted. And if Ash didn’t respect the choices Graham made, then he might as well be his father. He wasn’t going to do that.

Instead, he hefted Graham into his arms and headed out of the kitchen. He snatched up what was left of his muffin with the hand under Graham’s legs and gave a pitiful look until the man laughed, plucked it from his fingers, and fed it to him bit by bit as he got them out of the shop.

Graham also managed to set the alarm, wiggle his fingers into Ash’s pocket and find the keys to lock up, and just generally do all the little detailed things Ash was always so mediocre at. Graham was a detail person, and Ash, well... who cared what Ash was? He did okay, and for the first time in a long while, he felt like maybe he was going to get that happy ending he’d always wanted.

Maybe he wasn’t Prince Charming, but it was what he’d spent his childhood fantasizing about being. Maybe he’d just needed to find the right person to play the role for.

17

thank u, next

Pizza was the most perfect thing ever invented. Dough, sauce, cheese, and a wild array of unusual toppings, from Gavin’s artichokes and spinach, to Dez’s plain Italian sausage. Graham had to find out how it was made and try his hand at it.

Joseph didn’t come.

Every evening, he slunk around the house for a little while, trying to be, if not friendly, then not unfriendly. Anyone could tell he was uncomfortable. And every evening, he disappeared before the communal pack dinner.

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