Page 21 of Tempting Frey
“I don’t want Beauville infested with some sleazy money grabbers.”
Infuriating, stubborn alpha! “C’mon, Frey, you sound like you’re from the fifties.”
“I’m old! So what?”
“You’re forty-one. That’s not old!” We’d regressed back to middle school.Wonderful.
Frey balled his hands into fists, rising before me in all his six feet nine glory. The room seemed to darken around him. “I’vebeen protecting my town from bullshit like this for a decade. I’m not going to stop now.”
Except I grew up with a scary alpha bear for a father and saw my omega dad handle worse macho displays than this.
“And what are you going to do, huh? Grab a pitchfork? This is not a siege. This is management, for heaven’s sake. And it’s notyourtown. It’s ours! Everybody in Beauville should have a say in this. People here need work, Frey! We need new businesses and opportunities coming in. We can’t all chop trees for a living!”
Yep, I yelled at my boss. Three days into my new employment.
Frey looked steaming mad.
My heart pounding against my ribs, I put my hand over my mouth. Maybe I wasn’t so tough after all.
He glared at me, his eyes wide and dark. Really dark. His pupils were like saucers.
He took another step closer to me, and I stared into those dark depths like he’d hypnotized me.
His nostrils flared. He was so close. I was about to push him away. That was why I put my palm against his chest. Why else?
But then I froze.
With my face tilted up, I gaped at him, my lips parted. His scent enveloped me, and a shudder went through me. I felt his chest expand under my hand.
He was so close. Inches away. Bent over me, he seemed to surround me, and I felt tiny and weak. Why did that make me ache? A torturous, hollow ache in my core.
His lips were right there.
“Oliver,” he rasped. Was it a warning? Or something else?
A knock on the door made me jump.
Frey spun around, and in a split second, he was behind his desk. How could anyone of his size move so fast?
“Yes?” Frey called, his voice breaking. He coughed and cleared his throat.
My dad, of all people, barged into the room. In full uniform, hat on and his gun in the holster, he looked his most intimidating. He hooked his thumbs into his belt and looked from Frey to me and back.
“I heard Hughes sold his forest to some schmucks from the city. What are we going to do?”
Ugh! Now there were two of them.
“Shoot them all,” I muttered, and walked out.
“What’s with him?” I heard my dad ask from behind me.
I didn’t linger in the hall to hear Frey’s reply. I closed myself in my office and pulled up the county’s official site. It wouldn’t hurt to call them and start asking around.
Calvin brought homemade blueberry pie and vanilla ice cream, and we ate it sitting on my mattress on the floor. As housewarming parties went, it was tame, but my tiny new home couldn’t fit more people.
“How did you even get the mattress and dresser up here?” Calvin asked. “I’ve never seen stairs so narrow.”
“Through the balcony,” I said.
