Page 59 of Running on Empty

“So Ronan’s balls deep in his mate?” Rusty asked with a wicked grin. “Knew it’d be him first. Chip off the old block, that boy.”

“Hopefully he lasts longer than you,” Donk shot back. “Oh Lois…” he gasped in a breathy voice, then made a rude sound, his gesture mimicking a man ejaculating prematurely.

“Better than you, Donkey Dick,” Rusty shot back. “Our mate just about ran out the door in fear at the sight of your fucking love club.”

“And how she fucking loves it,” Donk replied with a wink.

“Can we stop talking about fucking my mother,” I said with a hiss, tipping the beer back and drinking down the rest. “I need a shower and some sleep—”

“And to get your fucking head out of your arse,” Gun said, leaning forward. They all did. Jax and I looked around the table and realised what this was.

We’d had ‘the talk’ about the birds and the bees early when Stevie revealed as an omega and many more afterwards, making clear what we needed to do to protect her. It’s why we’d been sent out to our grandparents’ farm for her first heat. They knew our teenaged instincts were already kicking our arse around her and at the scent of her heat? The dads had made sure no one came around the house to trouble her, but that included us too. We’d knot her, bite her and claim her without a fucking thought and Mum hadn’t thought that was right.

“Stevie hasn’t had a chance to be herself, living with that mother of hers,” she told us. “Don’t take that away from her as well. Love needs to be something freely given and with your whole heart, not just instincts kicking in. Wait until she’s ready.”

And now she was and it was all too late.

“You’re thinking about what your mum told you,” Blue said with a shake of his head. “She’s a good woman, your mother. You know none of us will say a word against her.” There was a low rumble of agreement around the table. “We’ll never love another woman, but…”

He let out a sigh.

“Your mum was born to be a beta, coming from a nice, normal middle-class family. She never expected to become an omega and part of her resists being one still.” I frowned as I stared at my father, never having heard this before. “She understands the world as a beta, which isn’t always a bad thing.”

“Except now.” Rusty’s fingers peeled the label from his beer bottle, before he looked at me, then Jax, with a slow smile. “Trouble is, we’re not your ordinary garden variety wolf shifter either.”

“You mean what’s wrong with Ronan?” I said, my interest piqued now, the weight of weariness being shrugged off.

“There’s nothing fucking wrong with Ronan,” Rusty insisted.

“So when he beat that kid half the death in our second year of primary school?” I snapped. “When he took on whole groups of beta boys in high school, and then beat the fucking shit out of them for fun? There was nothing wrong with that?”

I remembered going to parent-teacher meetings with Mum, seeing her pale face and eyes red rimmed, as she got the news from the school principal. I remembered coming home, going to her door when I heard her sobbing. I remembered her intense conversations as she told me all the ways I could control Ronan, making me my brother’s keeper.

If I could just keep Ronan from doing what came natural to him, all would be well.

“For the vast majority of history, what Ronan is would be an asset,” Rusty told me, his eyes brightest green as he stared at me. “Boy’s a fucking warrior.”

My dad’s all nodded in agreement at that, awakening yet another ache in my chest. I’d waited for the moment when they described me like that, in those terms, wanting it so fucking much when I was a kid, but nope, their focus was almost always on Ronan. But as if in recognition of that, Rusty nodded to Jax and then me.

“And so are the two of you, if you can get your heads out of your arses. Your mother gave us good advice about Stevie. We wanted to bring her into our house, kick that fucking mother of hers to the curb, but she made clear it’d just be seen as grooming, us serving up a vulnerable girl on a platter for our sons to mate. We thought things could be resolved in Stevie’s first heat, but Lois told us how frightening it can be, how fucking overwhelming and a girl, who’d been shown little kindness in her life, could misconstrue what sending the three of you over the fence would be. But just as we were fucking clueless about how to deal with the situation your omega was living in, your mother has no idea how to be an alpha.”

“Just how to be with an alpha,” Donk said with a wink.

“We’ve stood by and watched you look after Stevie’s place, make sure she’s safe, that she knows how to look after herself,” Rusty continued. “But there’s no technological solution to the situation your mate is in now. Who killed this Snake fucker?”

“She did,” I replied. “So I’m not sure if Stevie needs anything from us.”

“Good girl.” Rusty’s smile was a vicious one. “But this was an easy one. Those Spencers gave up that boy without a fight, the security they had at that house was pathetic and you know it.”

I’d wondered at that, hoping it was just a sign of Snake’s arrogance, eschewing the security measures his fathers insisted on from complacency. But that wasn’t likely when I remembered Jack’s conversation. I relayed the fucker’s words to my dads and watched them react.

“So it seems reasonable to assume that you’d be able to take out the other brothers without too much effort, but that Jack?” Blue stared intently at me. “You’ll need every trick you’ve got up your sleeve to take him out. And some of ours.”

I knew what he was talking about. Like a lot of kids that had been nagged by their parents over and over about the same thing, I stiffened, straightening up in my chair, prepared to stare my father’s down.

“I know what you’re fucking thinking,” Blue said, holding out his hands as if to ward off my complaints. Before I’d even got a chance to voice them, again. “It didn’t go well before and you boys were a bit young for it. You’re softer than we were at the same age.”

Because my fathers had grown up under the draconian rule of our grandfathers, that was the way they told it, while we had it easy. I snorted at that, reaching for my beer, then remembering it was empty.

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