Chapter 289

The next morning, I shuffle down in my dirty clothes to the garage and retrieve my laundry. Blessedly, it is dry. So I take it back upstairs to fold.

It’s so nice to wear my own panties again. And clean clothes on top of that! Actual bliss. I feel like I could take on anything now.

When I start to hear others awake, I head down to the living room and find Mom setting the table with way too much breakfast.

She must have been up for hours. There’s fresh muffins and scrambled eggs, fruit salad, waffles and pancakes, two different kinds of coffee plus decaf for Isaac, and then a separate mushed-up breakfast for Mia.

Beau is helping her by filling orange juice into everyone’s juice glasses. He winks when he sees me. I look away with a grunt, pretending like my cheeks aren’t heating up.

Soon, the others come down the stairs and everyone sits together at the table for breakfast. It’s only slightly awkward.

No one talks at first, instead just trading glances with each other.

But then Isaac clears his throat and clears the air. “After speaking with Wyatt and Neil,” Isaac says, “I’ve agreed to stay home for a few days.”

Ah. Good. So he finally understood the full scope of the danger he was in.

“However,” he says. He looks around the table from Neil to Archer to Steven to Beau. “None of us can stay hidden forever. Eventually, we will have to reenter the world.”

“What is happening now is temporary,” Neil says. He sounds confident, but Isaac, patient though he may be, does not seem to fully believe him.

“How temporary?” Isaac asks.

“We just need to lay low until the Alpha King loses the upcoming election,” Neil says. “Then, when he’s lost all of his power, he wouldn’t be able to hurt any of us, even if he wanted to. No one will follow him.”

“You underestimate him,” Isaac says. “You make this all sound so easy. You make it seem like a given that you father will lose the election, when we both know that’s not likely to be the case. He has immense support. Your actions against him have not been enough.”

“Our actions so far,” Beau adds.

Isaac gives him a withering look. “You must all know that I am not overly fond of this situation, nor the danger it has brought to my door. We live a peaceful life here. We do not fight those that could so easily squash us under their boot heel.”

“I’m sorry, Isaac,” I say, lowering my head. “It’s me that brought you and Mom into this.”

“You should be sorry,” Wyatt grumbles.

Isaac sighs. “I didn’t mean to cast blame, Chloe.” Gods, he is a more patient man than I deserve in my life. I never had a father, but Isaac makes me want to accept him as my own. Isaac looks at Wyatt a moment. Then he sighs again, deeper. “I simply do not wish to involve my family in this drama.”

“We’ll keep you and yours out of it as much as we are able,” Neil says, which isn’t terribly reassuring. We’d already botched keeping them safe, just by showing up. Who knew how much worse things would be now?

Mom, meanwhile, is utterly oblivious to the entire conversation. She’s far too busy making cooing sounds at Mia in her high chair, and trying to mimic an airplane with her spoon.

“Coming in for a landing!” she says as she brings the spoon to Mia’s open mouth.

It eases the tension a little, watching her. Eventually, we move the conversation onwards to safer topics like the weather and the latest car models. Isaac seems satisfied that his point has been made.

Wyatt, however, is still glaring at me. That’s nothing new though, so I ignore him.

When we’ve finished with breakfast, I collect the dirty plates and carry them into the kitchen to clean them.

I plug the bottom of the sink and then start to fill it with soap water. Grabbing the sponge, I lather up one of the dirty plates.

There are still some others on the table. I’m hoping someone will bring me the rest. Someone does, blessedly, and places them beside me on the counter.

I don’t really see who it is, but I can tell… somehow… that it’s Archer.

I’m not sure how I can tell. His scent maybe? I don’t know, it’s more of a feeling. Like he’s giving off a specific aura that only I can really feel.

It’s hard to explain. Especially when I don’t understand it at all myself.

My confusion matters even less when Archer wraps his arms around my middle and steps into the space directly behind me. The hard lines of his torso press into my back and I sigh in contentment at the warmth of his body and the insistence of his touch.

I forget what I’m doing for a moment and very nearly drop the plate I’m holding. I remember at the last moment that I’m doing the dishes and grip tightly.

Archer leans and kisses the side of my neck. “You let your guard down,” he whispers against my skin. “I could have been an enemy, here to kill you.”

“I knew it was you,” I say.

“Oh?”

He wants an explanation. We both know he can move silently when he wants to.

I’m not closer to being able to explain how I knew than I was two minutes ago, so I avoid the whole subject by saying, “Bad guys don’t usually bring me the rest of the dirty dishes.”

Archer grunts in annoyance. It’s not the answer he wanted. It’s not the one I wanted to give either, but it’s the only one I have right now. Everything else is too confusing.

Still, he lets it go. His arms tighten around me and his kisses linger on my neck.

“Archer…” I mumble. This really isn’t the place for anything like this. Someone could come in at any moment.

Archer is persistent though, gently sucking in marks up and down the column of my neck. “You smell like them. They’ve all had their fill.” His voice lowers to a deep growl. “It’s my turn.”

I shiver in his arms. “I need to do these dishes,” I say.

“Then do them. I’m not constraining your arms.”

“But, Archer…”

His hand slips down the front of my waist, crossing over my abdomen and down down to the apex of my thighs.

“Do you want me to stop?” he asks.

Oh, this smug, arrogant asshole. He knows very well I don’t want him to stop.

“You’ll keep an ear out,” I whisper. I lean back into him, pressing myself into his front. “If someone is coming, you’ll stop.”

He growls. “I’ll stop when you are coming.”

Oh my Gods. Just like that, my newly cleaned panties are damp.

What is it about these brothers? All they have to do is glance at me or even suggest something sexual and I’m ready to rip my own pants off and present.

“Chloe,” Archer says. He presses his fingers more insistently, pushing my pants and panties straight up against my clit.

I gasp and the plate falls this time. But fuck it.

“More,” I whisper. “More, Archer, please.”