Page 131 of Just One Bite
“That’s fine. You don’t have to. Can’t stop me from talking to you though. We’re still friends, right? No hard feelings?”
Her mouth falls open, then she closes it, nodding. She actually believes me.
It doesn’t look like she’s had much instruction other than to meet at the ferry. She follows me up to the line while we wait to board. All the attention on her shifts when the others see me towering over her. I make eye contact with all of them.
After a few minutes of standing, Olivia moves her neck side to side and reaches back to her left shoulder to massage the muscle there. It’s strange that Ican feel it when I focus on her intensely, right where that knot in her muscle is. I take my hand and softly clamp it over her shoulder. She gasps but submits to my touch as I work my thumb into the muscle.
It’s partly to help her relax, and just so happens to simultaneously mark her in more ways than I already have.
She smells like me. Check.
She’s got my mark on her neck. Check.
She leans into and thoughtfully sighs at my touch. Fucking check.
I work the knot in her shoulder as the line moves forward. Her heart responds in a rapid cadence, but her anxious scent calms. I don’t stop until the knot relaxes under my thumb and she sighs.
“Better?”
Her jaw clenches and she keeps her eyes forward.
“How’d you sleep?” I ask.
She stares at the line of heads in front of us, and there are dark circles under her eyes, which tells me very little.
“No talking. Got it.” I smile, the challenge blooming under my skin.
I’m just looking for opportunities to get her to talk to me when I remember morning Parker already prepared for such a thing.
“I brought you this. Not eating while you’re anxious is making my stomach hurt.”
I hand her a protein bar, and she takes it, nibbling the edge of it as we wait.
The whole lot is buzzing. I look at my phone to see a surge of notifications.
Here we go.Olivia checks her phone, and her eyes widen as she scrolls through the news.
“You did this?”
“Yep.”
“They’re going to be angry.”
“Let them. I’m not scared.”
She shakes her head and picks at the skin of her nails.
“I won’t let them touch you. Just trust me.”
That fidgeting doesn’t stop. What did they threaten her with? Surely, it’s got to do with ballet. Maybe they’re trying to bar her from the IBCE unless she goes through with The Hunt.
Some of the alphas around me move toward Olivia like they want to talk toher, and I stare them down in warning. It’s going to be a long fucking weekend.
I keep close. A comfortable distance to not worry her but close enough that I’m behind her as we board the ferry.
I’ve been on this ferry before, and the familiar scent of the mildew in the icebox and the snack bar floods my senses. There are rows of seats lining the windows inside, and a section to sit in the middle with tables.
She goes to sit next to someone. A Were I’m not the least intimated by, but that doesn’t mean I want him sitting with my girl. I press my fingers into the small of her back. It’s hidden, not breaking any rules, and I usher her into the empty seat behind and take the spot next to her.
