Page 67 of Running on Empty

“Or what?”

I liked that low, throaty growl even more and as per usual, I couldn’t just let that shit go. So when his hand slid down my stomach, anchoring my hips down onto his, not letting me move a centimetre more, I felt a sharp burst of pleasure.

“Or you’ll be dealing with the consequences of your actions.”

“What? Like you spreading me out across this very nice table and each one of you eating your fill, of me, not the food, of course. We could be doing that, Ash, just like your dads are no doubt doing to your mother right now, but you had to play a really shitty game of alpha knows best, so we can’t.” I tipped my hips then, resisting his grip and very, very deliberately rubbing my hot, wet pussy along the thick lump in his pants. “Pity.”

“Gods save me from mouthy omegas,” Ash growled, but I just grinned at his brothers, hearing his voice grow ragged, betraying just how he was responding.

He reached for something on the plate, but I shifted then until the head of his cock snagged in the dip of my underwear, the cotton and him pushing part the way into me, forcing a little moan out. I circled my hips purely on instinct, as if I was getting to know the most elemental part of Ash, while the man remained largely mysterious.

“Fuck…” he groaned, hands clawing at me to stop, or was it to keep going? I decided for him, going limp in his lap and then bending over to snag a piece of toast and crunch on it nonchalantly.

“Shit, omega,” Ronan said with a grin. “I had all this shit to put my brother through, but I think you’ve got this sorted. If you make him cum in his pants I’ll lick you to two orgasms before you’ve finished your breakfast.”

“You would anyway,” I shot back and that made his smile widen.

“Too fucking right—”

“So is this the way it is?” Jax asked, looking from me to Ronan, then Ash. “Stevie tortures us and then it's all better?”

Ash’s hands grabbed my waist as I leaned over then, propping one elbow onto the table before drawing Jax forward. And he came, like a bee to a flower, his eyelids dropping to half mast the closer he got. I brushed my mouth across his because his lips fell open as soon as I did, his breath coming faster, his hands forming fists to stop himself from grabbing at me.

And I waited for the day when he wouldn’t bother to hold himself back.

But right now we enjoyed a very soft, sweet kiss, one that made my heart ache more than it should’ve, and that made pulling away torture for both of us, but I stared into his eyes then.

“We work it out, together this time, Three Musketeers style. I, of course, am d’Artagnan.”

“Fuck, Stevie with a sword in her hand?” Ronan groaned. “Now I’m fucking hard.”

“That is something we need to explore further,” I said, eyeing the steak knife by his plate. “That whole knife thing? I need to know more about that.”

“So we just meander through this, going wherever our noses lead us?”

Ash couldn’t have sounded less on board if he tried. Time to remind him why he would bother doing as I asked. I wrapped my arm around his neck, knowing it would force my spine to arch, my tits pushing up through the shirt. His hands slid up my ribs without even thinking.

“Maybe it's about surrendering control to others,” I said, the effect ruined by the fact my voice was all breathy right now. His hands went around my wrists, becoming tight manacles.

“And perhaps you need to accept that you have mates that are never going to lie down and take direction easily.” He moved in, his mouth so close to my neck I could feel that electrical frisson all the way through my body. “Now, eat, omega.”

He handed me another piece of toast to eat, but jokes on him. Lois had made this bread while we were off being murderous, so it was delicious. Just like they were. I looked around the table with greedy eyes, for the first time feeling like I might have a chance at getting everything I needed.

Of course, right when you’re feeling cocky, that’s when fate fucks you in the arse dry, right?

Chapter40

“I have to assume that Jack Spencer is leaving his brothers unprotected,” Ash said, standing in front of his bloody data projector again.

Only he could turn a murderous rampage into a carefully constructed mission that was planned down to the last minute. The man was so fucking anal… I shifted restlessly in my seat, the mental image that came hot on the heels of that thought making something clench tight, of him and one of his brothers pushing into me and—. The wolf panted hard inside my head.Yeah, me too,Wolfie, I thought.Me too.

“Rock has been seen around town in a mostly inebriated state,” Ash said, flicking to the next slide where surveillance footage had been taken of the man who… I swallowed hard, but before I could even stiffen, a hand took mine. Jax looked me over carefully, trying to get a read on my reaction. But I was still trying to work that out myself.

When the Spencers rolled up outside my workplace, it’d been all cool car and tattoos. They looked like the mother fucking business. But that illusion was well and truly shattered now. Drunk Rock, Rock spewing in the gutter, Rock swinging an ineffectual punch at some poor onlooker. He looked like… nothing. I squeezed Jax’s hand because I liked the feel of it, the weight, because he would never use his hands the way this fuckhead had, because some poor omega was destined to mate with this fuck, but mostly? I turned and stared into Jax’s eyes, glad that the man I was fated to be with was worth a thousand of that fuck.

“So let's get the show on the road,” I said, feeling irritation more than anything. “Knock this fucker on the head and move on.” I frowned slightly and Ash caught every second of that. “I’m ready to move on.”

“Atta girl,” Rusty said with a wink.

---