“Borrowed them?” Jared snarled. “You know what we do to people who borrow without permission.”
I clenched my hands into fists. If I lost a finger today, well, I guess that would just be how it went. It was better than the Archiva pack having a vendetta against us—because that would be the end of our pack.
Hopefully, I could talk my way out of this.
“She’s new,” I said.
Tyler scoffed. “She stole from us.”
“If it was stealing, I wouldn’t be here giving them back.”
Jared lost it, surging forward to slam a fist against my cheek. The coppery taste of blood filled my mouth, my lip splitting beneath the force. I grunted and took a couple of steps back but didn’t retaliate, despite my instincts burning through me and begging me to start a fight for once. I waved a hand at Lucian and Finnian so they didn’t do anything stupid.
“You think I want to fucking be here?” I asked. “If we’d stolen them intentionally, we would’ve waited until you found out who’d taken them.” I spat out a glob of blood, teeth gritted. “You didn’t know it was us.”
Tyler reached out to grab Jared, pulling the alpha back until he could settle with his arms around him. The darkness in Jared’s eyes receded from the closeness of his omega, and I pulled my aura back to match his.
“Wewouldhave,” Tyler growled.
“Yeah, but we haven’t got long left down here. If we wanted your fucking keys, we would’ve just kept them.”
The tension in the air was electric, and I didn’t know if playing hardball was doing me any favours.
Would I keep my pinkies or not? It felt like some sick game show as I waited for the ding telling me I'd been the correct amount of assertive—or the ‘wah wah wah’ noise that signalled I’d failed masterfully.
Tyler and Jared glanced at each other, communicating without words. One day I’d be able to look at Crescent like that and know exactly what she was thinking.
So far, I was stuck trying to puzzle her out.
“Bring back those books we lent you,” Tyler said eventually.
I sighed. “She’s already done reading them, anyway. Anything else?”
Tyler’s eyes flashed. “Wait, she’s done? All of them?”
“Yeah.”
“There were six, and they weren’t short.”
“She’s a fast reader. I was surprised too.”
Jared was still red-cheeked and pissed, but Tyler looked more intrigued than angry now.
“Bring her by when you return the books.”
I narrowed my eyes, nodding, but I didn’t think I’d be bringing her—my cheek still ached from the punch.
“Don’t you think, this close to your appeal, you might be being a bit soft?” Finnian asked, when we were halfway down the hall.
“What does that mean?” I asked, turning to see him picking at a crusting patch of blue paint on his thumb. “This is not exactly a walk in the park for an omega.”
His eyes flicked up to me for a moment. “If I had to manage two omegas in this place with the appeal so close, I wouldn’t be allowing them so much leash.”
I scowled. I wasn’t in the mood for the creepy vibes the Wakefield pack gave off. My paranoia was through the roof after the Leo pack had been killed, and I hadn’t needed these two pricks to come with me.
“Especially not when the Redgrave pack is openly meeting with the Decker pack in the square.”
I spun on him, my mind racing. “What?”