Page 31 of Wolf Found

Ash’s eyes went soft and glassy, and he nodded. “I mean, I hope so. Sawyer wasn’t wrong. I just want to find the right person and have a life together. I’m not looking for excitement.”

Graham licked his lips and smiled down at Ash, grinding their hips together and making them both gasp. “Well, maybe a little excitement.”

Ash nodded breathlessly. “Maybe a little.”

After a little longer, Graham managed to wrench himself away and stand up. “I’d like to go to bed now.”

“I’m just gonna grab a bottle of water from the kitchen,” Ash told him. “I’ll be right back. Don’t—don’t go anywhere.”

“Wasn’t planning on it.”

Ash dashed upstairs, and Graham stood there alone for a second before looking around. He wondered if he should go into the bedroom. Maybe he should wait to go in there until Ash showed it to him, like a surprise. How surprising could Ash’s bedroom be?

He turned to the door, but that was when he heard something upstairs. Ash’s voice, quiet and muffled by distance. “. . . didn’t realize you were up here.”

“I was hungry,” Joseph answered, and for some reason, hearing the two of them together made Graham’s stomach flip.

No, not some reason. Graham wasn’t a child, and he wasn’t unobservant. The way Ash looked at Joseph, and the way Joseph looked back. If they hadn’t been involved, at the very least, Joseph had wanted to be. There was something in the way Ash reacted to it that made Graham think it had been more. If it had been like Graham’s crush, Ash wouldn’t be so uncomfortable with him.

Without realizing what he was doing, Graham had drifted over to the stairs, as though Ash might need his help fending off the scary beta.

“You don’t have to leave,” Joseph murmured. “It’s... it’s been good to see you again.”

Graham could hear Ash snort from all the way in the kitchen. “Couldn’t prove it by me, the way you keep avoiding everyone.”

“I don’t know them, Ash.” There was a pleading note in the man’s voice.

Graham was torn. Did he want to help Joseph, or find the nearest blunt object and hit him over the head with it? Yes, omegas were supposed to go in for hair pulling and scratching in fights, but that was a ridiculous stereotype, and Graham was not playing around. Ash said they were something. Joseph wasn’t going to interfere with that.

“You don’t know anyone on the outside, Joey. Remember? That’s what you told me when I asked you to leave with me. You didn’t know how to not be in the pack, and you weren’t willing to try.”

“But I’m here now,” the man protested, and the anguish in his voice was real enough, but something about the whole argument bothered Graham.

They had been involved. Obviously, they had been involved. But if the end of things bothered Joseph so much, if he was so broken up over it, why hadn’t he followed Ash years ago? Graham couldn’t imagine walking away from a chance at forever with Ash and spending the next eight years following Amos Martingale around, following his every demand and cringing when he raised his voice.

Ever dealing with Amos was more than enough; being his shadow sounded like the worst punishment imaginable. Not for the first time, Graham was happy his had been the kitchen.

“I hope that you can find whatever it is you’re looking for. I really do. I wish you the very best.” The fridge opened and closed, Ash retrieving his water bottle, no doubt. “I’m happy you worked up the nerve to walk away from the pack.”

“But you know what I want, Ash,” Joseph’s voice had lowered, not to a whisper, but to a seductive kind of purr. Graham scanned the room for a baseball bat, or a tire iron, or—“It’s the same thing I’ve always wanted. You liked it too, if you’ll remember.”

“I did,” Ash agreed, and Graham’s stomach twisted. But no, he refused to believe that. They’d just been talking about how they were something, and Ash wouldn’t. “Eight years ago, I’d have done anything to get you to come with me. I thought you were my future. But you decided you weren’t.”

“But I’m here now,” Joseph insisted, like maybe Ash hadn’t heard or realized.

“I don’t want to be a dick, but I don’t need you now. I needed you then, and you weren’t there.” Ash’s voice got closer to the stairs, and Graham took a step back to give him room, if not to pretend he hadn’t been listening. “It’s fine. I get it. It was scary. But I moved on, Joey. You need to do the same.”

“You moved on,” Joseph sneered, mood turning on a dime and almost giving Graham whiplash. “You moved on to a little kid.”

Ash paused, and Graham could almost taste his worry about their ages. It was a real thing, and Graham’s old childish crush on Ash did nothing but complicate their current situation, but he couldn’t fix the past.

After a gut-wrenching silence, Ash’s voice came again, more resolute than before. “No. That’s not gonna work either. Graham’s twenty, and he chose to be here more than you did. He left the enclave of his own free will because his best friend needed him, without any idea what was waiting for him. If that’s not being an adult, I don’t know what is. You only left because you were already on the outside and got a sweetheart offer of a stable pack with no risk to yourself.” Ash started walking, but a few steps down, he paused again. “We need to talk to Gavin about getting you placed with a different pack. You’re never going to be happy here.”

When he reached the bottom of the stairs and found Graham standing there worrying his lip and watching the stairs, he held out his arms. Graham rushed into them, and they stood there together for a long time before Ash ushered him into the bedroom, in which there were no surprises unless one counted a bed big enough to sleep five people comfortably.

Graham didn’t mind that one bit, since they ended up snuggled together in the middle.

18

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