Tilly

Luca

“Howdiditgo?” Cruz asked Jackson as he nursed a cup of steaming black coffee. Cruz pushed a plate of eggs benedict to me and one to Jackson.

“Let me eat this food,” Jackson hissed, rubbing his eyes as he shovelled a mouthful of food into mouth.

“Breakfast, what’s with you making it?” I asked Cruz.

He was getting very domesticated. I knew it was his coping mechanism, the one that had heightened since Tilly came into our lives. Because he used to be the one pacing the kitchen, looking agitated.

“Just making an effort,” Cruz said, sipping at his mug of coffee.

I raised my eyes at Cruz before I turned my attention back to Jackson. “You look fucked,” I said.

“Cheers, I am. She has nightmares. You need to tell her everything that happened that night and why you were there, otherwise we aren’t getting anywhere in the long term. At least not as a pack.” Jackson pointed his stare at Cruz and I wasn’t sure if underneath his tone there was a threat. “Luckily, she doesn’t have a supply at the moment,” he said with a smirk on his face. “She drove me wild with her perfume. I was struggling.”

“You didn’t take advantage of her state. She’s vulnerable at the moment,” Cruz hissed.

“She took advantage of me.”

Cruz grinned at that. “Perfect. She wants you, she wants this pack. She knows it’s us.”

“What was she like, her omega without the crap?” I asked. Her suppressants had waned the day in the steam room, but she wasn’t fully omega. Not being able to take my knot proved that.

“She is the perfect omega without the suppressants. She’s much more vulnerable than I first expected her to be, but she’s sweet and we know she’s intelligent. Fuck, she’s just perfect.”

“Perfect for our pack?” I asked. Not sure why I asked when I thought she was.

Jackson grinned and nodded.

“But we have to be careful of other alphas around her now. Without the suppressants, she has the qualities any alpha pack will want and some will take regardless of if she was theirs to claim,” Cruz said. “And I didn’t wait this long to have her stolen from us at the last hurdle.”

“Yes, she mentioned something about Sandy, but stopped telling me. Which means you need to be honest with her and tell her everything before other packs realise,” I said.

Cruz puffed out a large breath and nodded.

Give Cruz his due. He knew the moment he scented her, saw her. It was love at first sight, according to him. Cruz couldn’t get her out of his mind and he couldn’t stop her perfume from coating an imprint on his brain.

He waited for her because he knew she was his.

“Talking of suppressants.” Jackson hesitated. “She makes them herself, and she is making another batch as we speak.”

“Shit, Jackson, why did you leave her alone?” Cruz shouted.

“Because I was five seconds from wanting to claim her,” he yelled back. “She is so fucking perfect for me. I wanted to mark her last night. She drives me to distraction with the suppressants and hiding who she is, but she drives me wild.”

Cruz and I gawped at Jackson.

“We spoke about everything. She won’t take her suppressants for a while. She wants to explore this,” Jackson said, circling his finger between us.

“Told you,” Cruz finally said, with a shit-eating grin on his face. “But back to the suppressants. That means she knows her mother’s recipe.”

“She’s smarter than anyone gives her credit for, which I love. There is nothing sexier than an intelligent woman,” I said. “The fact she’s gorgeous is a bonus. And that is why you need to tell her.” I hesitated as I stared at Cruz. “She knows, she keeps asking about you. I told her you were protecting her that night, but I don’t think she believes it.”

”As far as she is concerned, she is an orphan and has no family?” Jackson said, shrugging a shoulder at Cruz.

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll tell her everything.”

“At least she doesn’t think it’s the three of us,” I said.

“I’m sure she wondered in the beginning, but she would have run away,” Cruz replied. “Do you think she is ready to hear everything?”

“I think she needs to hear it. She will only move forward with us as a pack if she learns what happened that night. And yes, it’s going to be hard for her, but we’ll be there for her,” I said.

“Did you find out the name of the person who drugged her in the nightclub?” Jackson asked. “I told Tilly it was James.”

“It was James.” Cruz sighed. “The cameras showed she was fine walking into the bathrooms but was rubbing her hip when she left. But we also know two members of the gang that took her sister were inside the club. We interrogated one of them and he refused to talk about their plans for Tilly or give us information on Georgie, so I erased him.”

“Two dead, two possibly three to go,” Jackson said.

“And there’s only one way he found out who she is,” Cruz said. “Because she hid behind a door and he won’t have a scent match with her.”

“James?” Jackson hissed. “I knew he’d double crossed us. I’m going to kill him.”

“Taken care of,” Cruz said. “And I have security looking over the footage for more clues because I dread to think what would have happened if she choose to go with James that night.”

“Why do they still want her? I mean... why Tilly?”

Cruz shook his head. “Back then she was being sold, but now, I don’t know. It’s possible they want an unbonded omega to still sell on and they think Tilly was who they should have taken that night. Or they want her for themselves.” He slammed his head in his hands.

“Because they now want what they thought they missed out on that night?” I said.

Cruz nodded. “She needs to be told, but I’m not ready. I need more time.” He turned to me. “Bring her back here. She needs to be under our protection.”