Chapter 68
Chapter 68
JESSICA
The cafeteria was loud–but the moment we walked in, it went quiet. Riot didn’t seem to notice. Or maybe he did, and he just didn’t care Inches the about him. He’s so oblivious for someone who is fucking huge. He piled a tray high with meat–rare cuts, blood pooling, slabs of protein that would made mest omegas flinch.
I didn’t sit.
I leaned against the far wall, arms crossed, forcing myself to keep my chin up. I was still bristling. Still hot in the face and chest, still replaying every breath he took near me like I could edit it after the fact.
But my eyes wouldn’t stop tracking him.
And goddess… watching him eat was a fucking experience. He didn’t chew like a civilized person. He ore. Ripped into steak with his teeth, barely using the knife, stuffing mouthful after mouthful like he hadn’t eaten in days. His jaw flexed hard. His throat worked with every swallow. Fingers slick with grease and blood.
What the fuck is wrong with me?
I cleared my throat, voice sharper than I meant. “Where did they lock you, huh? Deep in the woods with the other wolves they couldn’t civilize?”
A line of juice rolled down his wrist. He licked it without breaking eye contact.
I shifted where I stood, hating how my heartbeat ticked faster at that tiny movement.
“Seriously, Riot,” I muttered, arms tightening across my chest. “What do you want with me?”
He finally sat back a little, his tray half–empty, his forearms resting against his spread thighs.
Only then did he look at me-*really* look. I really hated the way it made my back straighten.
“What makes you think I want anything?” he asked, voice casual, almost bored. His tone didn’t match his eyes. His eyes were sharp.
I narrowed mine. “Because I’m not stupid.”
He smiled again. “I didn’t say you were,” he murmured. “But I don’t need to “want something to take it.”
I blinked.
“What does that mean?”
didn’t mean for my voice to drop like that. Lower. A little tighter. But it did. Because something about the way he said it–casual and cruel–made my
chest tighten and my thoughts stutter.
Riot didn’t answer.
He just gave a lazy shrug–shoulders rising and falling like my question hadn’t even scratched the surface–and picked up another piece of meat.
He ate it slowly.
I clenched my jaw. “Riot.”
Still, he didn’t look up. He just devour the damn meat than give me his attention. After he’s done, Riot atleast had the character to clean up his mess before I saw him dropping his head onto the table.
“Can you wake me up in an hour?” he muttered, voice muffled by the crook of his elbow. “I have to meet my father then.”
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Chapter 68
Istared
Is he damn serious fight now?
1blinked, once. Twice.
And for the first time since he walked into this pack like a storm in boots, I felt… off balance)
“What?” I said, slowly. Carefully.
He didn’t lift his head. Just gave the smallest nod.
“An hour,” he repeated, like I hadn’t heard him the first time. “If I don’t wake up, I’ll miss the meeting and then he’ll be pissed, and then I’ll have to deal with “that” on top of everything else, and honestly, I’m already tired.”
His voice trailed off into something that might’ve been a yawn.
I stood there, caught between outrage and disbelief, as this wolf of a man–this smug, scarred, insufferable menace who’d just turned my morning into a living hell–curled over a cafeteria table like a stray mutt who had nowhere else to sleep.
What kind of psychopath pulls the pin on a social grenade, drops it in the middle of the pack’s power structure, and then takes a nap like he didn’t just detonate half my life?
My arms folded tighter across my chest.
I swear to the Moon, if he starts snoring I’m going to stab him with a plastic fork.
I shifted my weight, teeth grit, heat rising again in my neck and chest. I should leave. Let him miss his meeting. Let him deal with the fallout. I didn’t *owe* him anything.
But I didn’t move.
Because somewhere under the irritation and confusion and the building urge to kick the leg of his chair out from under him, he’s my only chance to get out of being a caretaker.
I didn’t mean to stay.
I didn’t mean to sit.
I definitely didn’t mean to drift.
But something about the heaviness in the air–the food, the quiet, the maddening sound of Riot’s breathing slowing beside me–tugged at my spine. My legs had locked from standing too long. My head hurt from clenching my jaw. And Riot…. Riot hadn’t moved an inch since his head hit the table.
It was stupid.
It was dangerous.
But it was also the first time since yesterday that no one was demanding anything from me.
So I slid into the seat across from him–arms crossed, back stiff, like I was just giving my knees a break.
I told myself I’d leave in five minutes.
I didn’t.
Because five minutes turned into ten. Ten into twenty.
And somewhere between glaring at his scar and wondering how a man like that could sleep so deeply with the whole pack watching, my body stopped
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Chapter 68
fighting me.
I blinked once.
And didn’t blink again.
The cafeteria around us dimmed. Voices blurred. Chairs scraped somewhere far away.
And then-
“BANG.
My chair jolted under me, the legs skidding an inch on the stone floor.
I shot upright with a gasp, heart slamming against my ribs, breath caught halfway in my throat.
Riot’s tray clattered to the floor, empty. His head lifted slow, groggy, like he’d only been half asleep.
Grayson stood over us.
His arms were pinned at his sides, fists clenched so hard I thought I could hear the strain in his bones. His jaw was tight, mouth pressed in a line so sharp it could’ve cut me. Fury didn’t just show in his eyes–it radiated off him, thick and hot and *lethal“.
“I need to talk to you,” he said.
Not to Riot. To me.
His voice was rough. Like he hadn’t spoken in hours because he’d been grinding his teeth through the urge to shift.
Across the table, Riot blinked blearily, rubbed his eyes, yawned like this wasn’t already a storm waiting to break.
“Me?” he asked, dragging one hand back through his hair, the strands sticking out in chaotic waves. “Didn’t know we were friends.”
Grayson’s stare didn’t shift.
“Jess,” he said again, eyes snapping to mine. “Please. Let’s talk.”
His voice dropped low on the word *please*. But there was nothing soft about it. It was demand dressed up as politeness.
I opened my mouth–but Riot beat me to it.
He rolled his neck, a loud crack echoing through the space.
Then he shook his head. “No.” The word was flat. Unbothered. “I’m not done with her.”
Grayson’s entire frame went still. Goddess! Don’t tell me they are going to fight here? Fuck. Why did I fall asleep?
Riot leaned forward, elbows on the table, finally turning his head to glance at him. “She’s still under “my” unit, isn’t she?”
“Her shift is over when I say it’s over.” Then he looked at me. Directly. And everything in that look “scorched“. “Come now, Jess.”
I didn’t move. Couldn’t. Not with Riot rising slowly beside me, unfolding from his chair like smoke turning solid. His movement was unhurried,
unbothered–but my entire body locked up anyway. One step from him, one command from Grayson, and I was the rope in a fucking tug–of–war I never agreed to.
Riot stood tall, back straight, head tilted just enough also piss Grayson off. “I said,” he repeated, voice lower, darker, “I’m not done.”
And suddenly I wasn’t between two men.
Both of them predators. Both of them circling.
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Me? I was the prey caught blinking in the middle, trying not to flinch while every pair of eyes in the estéteria latched on like this as the
It’s been years – “years since someone openly challenged Grayson on this territory. Since anyone stood toe to toe with him valllout ferdang
I should’ve felt honored. Terrified, Flattered.
Because it’s my fault.
I brought this tension in with me, strapped to my back like a loaded weapon I didn’t know how to disarm. I wanted to believe I could belong again, that i could fight again, but all I’d done was light a match between brothers who’ve clearly been waiting to burn each other alive.
So I made the choice I could make.
I turned, slow, deliberate, and looked at Riot.
His eyes were already on me, sharp and unreadable, but when I spoke, I saw it. That flash of surprise across his face like I’d cracked his rhythm for the first time since we met.
“Five minutes,” I said, voice even, breath catching. “Can I talk with him for five minutes?”
There. I said it.
The cafeteria didn’t breathe.
Riot didn’t either.
He blinked, once. A slow, deliberate drag of lashes. His lips parted, just slightly, like he wasn’t sure what I’d just done. Like permission wasn’t something he expected me to ask for. Not from *him*.
And maybe I shouldn’t have. Maybe it was weak. Maybe it was humiliating.
But I needed it. I needed to feel like I had control over something–anything.
He stepped forward, just enough to tower. The room leaned in. My heart thudded loud in my chest.
Then he did the last thing I expected.
He nodded. “Okay,” he said, voice rougher than before, quiet enough that only I could hear it. “Do what you want.”
His gaze held mine a beat longer. Something wild pulsed behind it. Then he stepped back, finally giving me space.
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AD
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