Page 107 of Tides of Fate

“Gideon. Fuck. Where do I start? You alone aren’t responsible for protecting this pack. If anyone is, it’s me.No, wait.” Jay holds up a hand before Gideon can interrupt with more self-recrimination. “You listen. So they circumvented the system. We couldn’t have anticipated that, and we thought Hayes was contained.”

It hits him then—this hasn’t been about Hayes at all. It’s been too slick. Too professional. “But this isn’t about him, is it?”

Gideon just shakes his head. “No.”

Shit. Jay had been afraid of that—because anything Jay knew about Hayes was that he was a hands-on guy.Well, fucking-fuck.

Jay drops his pants before chucking them into the hamper, then sits his damp ass beside his mate. Sighing, he braces to ask a question he’s not entirely sure he wants the answer to.

“Do you have anything you want to share with the class?”

Jay watches him, waiting. Gideon’s jaw flexes. His fingers twitch, restless against his knee, but he says nothing.

Jay wants to press. Every instinct has him wanting to demand answers because, as he’d said, it ishisjob to protect his pack, but he also trusts Gideon. Trusts him to tell him when he’s done unraveling this mess.

“Okay. But you’ll let me know when you do?”

“Yeah, but you shouldn’t trust me not to screw this up. This whole day could have been fucked all to hell.”

“Yeah, it could have—but none of it lies solely with you, and we are all still here. We’re tucked up safely in our beds for another night. You have to let this go, Gideon.”

“Do you think that boy’s family is going to let it go? Or that Nix isn’t avoiding you and Leo because he’s ashamed of killing someone—becauseIgot distracted for one second? Do you think Nix is letting it go?”

Jay’s fingers flex where they rest on his knee, itching to touch—but Gideon looks like he might shatter if he does.

He replays the night in his memory—how Nix avoided his comfort and Leo’s, too.But why?“Shit, did I do something?”

But no,Leohad done nothing except hold a cuddly Luca most of the night.

Gideon chuckles darkly, crawling up the bed to climb under the covers. “It’s guilt and shame because he thinks he did a terrible thing—and he did it like a fucking badass. There’s no one more morally upright than the two ofyou.”

Jay joins him under the covers but doesn’t lie down. “But I wouldn’t—fuck Icouldn’tbe angry at him for doing what he had to do. I would have done the same fucking thing—”

“Go to bed, Alpha. I’m tired, and we have to be up in a few hours.” Gideon exhales slowly. “I’ll get over myself, just…it’s not worth losing sleep over,” Gideon says flatly before rolling away his back to Jay.

Jay isn’t going to let that slide.Gideon thinks his feelings aren’t worth losing sleep over, and all Jay can hear is that Gideon thinks he’s not worthy. Well, fuck that—and the horse it rode in on (Damn Leo and his cowboy fetish).

Quickly, so as not to give Gideon a chance to slide out of bed, Jay grabs his shoulder and pushes him flat on his back.

Gideon grunts as Jay throws a leg over and sits on his mate’s belly.

There’s an exaggeratedoof,and Gideon bucks to unseat him. “Get off, you buffoon.”

Buffoon? It wasn’t the first time Gideon had called him that, and Goddess willing, it won’t be the last.

“Are you saying no, Gideon?” Jay asks with a raised eyebrow, asking for explicit consent—because Jay is about to show Gideon Carnell just how much his feelingsdomatter.

Gideon goes still, then bucks his hips up again. “Are you kidding?Now?”

“Look, you think your feelings don’t matter—they do. You’re not listening to a word I say, and, well, maybe I’m speaking a language you don’t understand. So, I’ll ask you again—yes?”

Jay just sits, most of his weight carried by his thighs.

Gideon flushes, as Jay scoots back until he can feel his mate’s dick hardening under his ass.

“I need the word, babe.”

“Piss off,” Gideon says through gritted teeth. His mate rarely asks for what he needs when it’s just for him, but tonight has been rough, and Jay doesn’t play without explicit consent.

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