Page 46 of The Alpha: Part Three
“That would be me.” I glance at Ben then Seth. “But I think we should all go down and see how it works. Even you.” I raise a brow at Desie.
She sighs, but it ends up turning into a yawn. “That's a lot of stairs you're asking me to go down and then right back up. Besides, if I can run the desk at the hospital, I can do this. You guys go on down there. I'm going to go find a bed, all the way upstairs, and collapse into it for about six days. You can show me how to navigate the security system later.” She pulls Seth's cheek down to kiss it because he's the one next to her then she goes off to find a bed.
The security system isn't all that complicated to work with, but setting it up must have been a nightmare. Every inch of the interior and exterior of the house is covered on two different feeds, as well as a feed that shows the property from so many angles that it’s almost overwhelming. I'm trying to wrap my head around how many cameras must be installed everywhere when Kaleb tells us about the drones.
“Nathan will probably want to come by in the next few days to take you on a walk-through of the property. Seth already knows the layout, but after everything that's happened and everything that's still happening, all of us need to be as prepared and knowledgeable as possible. He'll bring the drones, too. He wants at least two here.”
Ben's eyes sparkle at the mention of them. “Drones?”
“Yeah,” Kaleb smirks. “Fancy shit. Just let us know when you're settled enough to get into all that.”
I clear my voice and ask a question I probably don't really want to know the answer to, but need and want are two different things. “Why so much security? Don't get me wrong, I love it and I'm thrilled to have it; but places don't have this much security unless something happened.”
Kaleb closes his eyes for a moment, taking a breath. “The short of it is that before our pack joined with Corso's, there were several attempts to take Jasper. The last attempt likely would have been successful if not for Talia. I can't talk about what happened to her right now, today has been good and I don't like thinking about it, and if she wants you to know she'll tell you herself. But something terrible happened, and then after the packs joined there was another very serious invasion,” he pauses to glance at Seth, “and more terrible things happened. Corso is terrified that Dutch will outrun all of us one day and if he were to touch the fence with the voltage we have set it to, it would kill him. I'd like to think that Dutch can't get away from us long enough to get to the property lines, but you've met him. So, cameras. Drones. Us. It has to be enough.”
He smiled a little while talking about Dutch, but Corso's right. Dutch is little now and we can catch him easily enough if he actually manages to get away from all of us. Once he gets older it might be a challenge; and by then there will be more children to keep up with and keep safe. If they're anything like Ben and me, we've all got our work laid out for us.
“We're here with you now,” Ben says, his voice hard. “It will be enough.”
After Kaleb leaves, we go looking for Desie. We're exhausted. Days of driving, all the stress of the trip, and the unexpected rescue of a van-load of omegas has taken its toll on all of us. She claimed the bed at the end of the hall. There are two windows on one wall that present a beautiful view of the woods. It's more soothing than I expected.
The bed is massive. Jasper said it was, but seeing it in person is way different from hearing about it. I know what's going to happen, though. The three of us are all going to curl around Desie in a tangled knot in the center of the bed. This is probably going to be our room. We won't need the three other bedrooms for ourselves anyway. We're going to need them for the kids we're going to fill this house with.
Desie is still sleeping after three hours, but I have to get up. I woke up starving. Seth is awake too, and we slide out of bed as stealthily as we can and head down to the kitchen. Kaleb said there was food in the fridge that we can just heat up and I'm going to eat at least half of it.
“Are you alright?” Seth asks as he starts spooning food onto plates.
I shrug. “I guess. We're here and we were okay enough for all of us to fall asleep at the same time, so I guess I'm alright. I'm glad she's still asleep. She needs it. I've been worried since we pulled off the curb back home that the trip was going to throw her into early labor. Then all that shit in the middle. I'm just glad to be here. I don't want to deal with another stressful thing until her water breaks.”
Seth nods and puts a plate filled with three different types of casserole in front of me and hands me a fork, then puts a glass of water next to my plate. He does that, serves us. Without discussion, Seth has fallen into the lead alpha position, which is exactly what Ben and I need. Rafe would have been our lead alpha. Rafe made sure we ate before him, exactly the way Seth does. I've seen packs where the lead alpha is waited on by everyone. I can only imagine how it would go if we tried to wait on Seth.
“Yeah,” he agrees, sitting down to dig into his own plate of food. “I would really prefer that everything stays good and calm for a long minute. I don't think I'm lucky enough for an indefinite calm, but I'll take as much as I can get.”
It isn't quite the middle of the night, but it's gotten late enough that I need Desie and Ben to get up and eat something. They can go back to sleep after, but neither of them have had so much as a snack since we had lunch a couple hours before we got here. I finish my food and wash the plate, then head back upstairs to wake them up.
A strip of light from the hallway falls across the middle of the bed. Desie's eyes are closed but she isn't asleep, and the rhythmic movement under the blankets lets me know that Ben is also awake. Desie groans and Ben's muffled laugh makes me smile as I walk through the door.
“I was coming to wake you up, but I can see that was unnecessary.”
Ben throws the blankets off and props up on his elbows. “I beat you to it. Where's Seth?”
“Downstairs, probably putting together some food to bring up.” I lean against the dresser and watch a pout pull at Desie's face when Ben continues the conversation instead of what he was doing before I interrupted.
“Is it very late?”
I bite back another smile. Ben doesn't care how late it is, he just wants to tease Desie. “Not very, but it is late. You woke up just in time to go to bed.”
“We're already in bed,” Ben purrs.
Desie lifts her head to glare down at him. “I'm going to kick you out of it if you don't finish what you were doing.”
“I'm going to finish,” he smirks. “Don't you worry. Michael's going to come help me.”
“Seth, too,” she says.
“If he gets up here in time,” I say, crawling into the bed.
Desie grabs the back of my neck when I get close enough and pulls me down to kiss her, gasping against my mouth when Ben resumes his attention. For a few minutes it feels like it did before everything fell apart, back when it was just us and Desie. Before Flores. Before Lopez. I kiss down her neck, dragging my teeth across Seth's mark. She turns her head to the side, encouraging me to focus on the pleasure that mark brings her and an unsettling feeling clouds around me, polluting the warmth of the moment.
