“Hey, you were all warm and relaxed but you’re all tensed up now.” Tracy kissed his shoulder and he turned over to face her. “You want to talk about it?”

“You’re far too distracting there naked and delicious and smelling like sex. Let’s clean up and meet in the living room in a few minutes. I’ll make some tea and we’ll hash this situation with Pacific out.”

Tracy sat up and climbed over him and sent them both a look back over her shoulder. “If you say so.

But I might be lonely in there all by myself.” And swayed her naked ass right into the connecting bath.

Gabe looked at Nick and they both laughed and got up to follow.

* * * * *

An hour later they stumbled into the kitchen and rustled up some tea and sandwiches for the discussion. Each one of them moved around each other with a kind of ease and rhythm that you don’t get until you’ve known a person for some time.

Already their scents had begun to marry, to mix into one unique scent that would brand their sealed tri-mate bond. It teased Tracy’s senses even as it warmed her insides.

Settling into the living room, Tracy sat in the big club chair near the fireplace and tucked her feet under her while she drank her tea.

“You wanna tell me what the hell happened tonight? I mean, is it normal behavior for the Pack to be so wild when you get a new member?”

Nick sighed heavily and leaned his head back against the couch. “We don’t get new members very often but it’s never been like this. I’m still totally shocked. Jo, the wolf who attacked you, she’s not…she’s not prone to attacking anyone. I don’t understand.”

“Let me guess, blondie, Jo, whatever-the-fuck, she’s a friend of Sarah’s.”

Nick took a deep breath and nodded. “Jesus, you don’t think?”

“That your bitchy, precious Sarah planned to try and f**k me over from the first moment she heard of me and enlisted that low-rent skank to try and start shit?”

Gabe burst out laughing and then sobered, wiping the tears from his eyes. He got up and moved to Tracy, kissing her and sitting back down. “Darling, you really must learn to express yourself better. Don’t hold back.”

Nick rubbed the bridge of his nose and smiled. “You think her apology was a fake?” He held up his hand. “No, don’t answer that. I know it was. I’m sorry. You were right. I don’t know how I could have been so wrong about her.”

Tracy got out of the chair and came to kneel before Nick. She cradled his head between her hands.

“Nick, you’ve known her all these years and she used that to manipulate you. I’d be lying if I said I was happy that you called her the way you did, but I understand why you did it. And she betrayed that.”

He kissed the tip of her nose. “Thank you, baby. But I have a hard time believing that that entire thing tonight was out of simple jealousy that you are my mate.”

“I’m with you on that, Nick. That scene tonight was way more complicated than mere jealousy. And in any case, Ben was agitated about something and it wasn’t just a room full of alphas.” Gabe had been around a lot of wolves with things to hide for the last twenty years and he was sure that Ben Lawrence

was hiding something, and most likely either for or with the knowledge of Sarah.

“What’s been going on lately?” Tracy climbed up into Nick’s lap and Gabe took her legs, absently massaging her calves and feet as they spoke.

“Nothing, really. Our profits are down, but so are everyone’s, the economy is crap right now. I’ve had to break up some fights, deal with inter-Pack stuff, but we haven’t beefed with Cascadia. That whole buffer thing was just routine stuff.”

“How long have you known you could be Alpha?” Tracy asked, looking straight into his eyes.

He sighed. “Years. But I haven’t wanted to be Alpha. I liked my life well enough. I certainly liked my privacy and not having to live at the Pack house. Ben is much older than I am. I was fifteen when he took over Pacific. I could have challenged him even then,” he shrugged, “but why? Ben wanted it, he was good with the Pack. And seven years ago he met Sarah and seemed to stabilize even more with a mate.

The Pack seemed to like having a mated pair at the helm and I was only twenty-three then anyway.”

“You anchored her at twenty-three? No wonder you were so close to her, Nick. Babe, that’s a pretty impressionable age to have something so deep happen to you.”

Gabe laughed. “Sweetheart, you did say you were twenty-five?”

She tossed her hair back and gave him an imperious look. “Iamtwenty-five. But shit, after a few hours with Sarah, those are like dog years, I think. She’s very immature for an Alpha female. And petty. And she needs to wax her chin.”

Gabe burst out laughing again and Nick hid a smile beneath his hand. “Remind me to never piss you off.”

“And to always deal with unsightly body hair.” Nick grinned and kissed her shoulder.

“Okay, first of all, you will piss me off. You are a man and an alpha male, ergo, you will turn into an ass**le of epic proportions and I will have to smack you down for it. Deal. And yes, please, I promise to keep the three-inch hairs from my chin if you’ll keep your balls nice and smooth for me. They may even get licked that way.”

Nick closed his eyes and groaned. “Okay, let’s keep focused here or I’m going to lose it. No more talking about licking my anything until we finish here.”