“No, no, no,” she said firmly, somehow managing to slip away with a thunk onto the floor.
Oh, hell. Her on her knees next to the bed, looking up at me, with those big green eyes and pink lips parted, was not helping my growing situation.
She pointed a finger at me. “No. Get that look off your face, Remy Holt.”
“What look?” My tone sounded innocent enough, but we both knew my hands were seconds from shredding the sheets I was fisting to keep from grabbing her.
“I’m not having sex with you with my dad on the way and all of our friends downstairs,” she hissed, scrambling to her feet. She backed away from the bed like I still could lunge at any minute and pull her down.
Which wasn't too far off the mark of possible.
“Go take a shower. Alone,” she emphasized when I started to remind her we had showered together last night. “I’m going to … do something that’s not in the room.”
I shrugged. “As long as it’s something and not someone.”
Her jaw dropped. “Cold shower, Remy. Cold.”
“You know that’s actually a false statement, right?”
The little crease that formed between her pinched brows was adorable. “Huh?”
“Cold tightens things. Hardens things,” I added, grinning as her blush traveled down her throat. “Cold shower is the worst thing you can do when you’re turned on.”
She threw up her hands. “Fine. Take a hot shower. Burning hot.”
My eyes lit up. “Hot like when you’re—”
“Oh, my, God!” She whirled and stormed out with a laugh, slamming my door as she went, leaving me half-naked, mostly hard, and totally alone.
“Fuck,” I muttered to myself.
My stomach was growling by the time I made it downstairs, but I should’ve known there was no way this day could stay as good as it had started. The raised voices in the living room called me forward, my instincts going on high alert.
“We’ll make it work,” Katy said adamantly as I entered the room.
“How?” Michael asked. “Katy, I’m all for making it work, but we’re simply running out of places to put people.”
“What people?” I asked as I looked around the room.
Michael and Katy were standing across from each other, almost at different ends of the spectrum while it looked like Rhodes and Skye were trying to help them find a middle ground.
“Six buses,” Skye answered grimly. “Five from new packs, and one from the Flatrock pack that managed to escape. They’d been hiding out until they heard Kevin made it here and joined us.”
“Plus Nikolai’s three planes full of people in a few days,” Michael added with a sigh. “We don’t have the space for all of these people. We just don’t. It’s not even a matter of just housing anymore, Remy. Food and supplies are going to start running low.”
“Then we order more food,” Katy rebutted, eyes flashing.
“It’s not that simple, Kit-Kat,” I murmured. We’d been monitoring the food and supply trucks that came and went from Blackwater to make sure no one came in undetected, but the biggest way to keep someone from slipping inside was to limit the amount of deliveries we had.
Opening up a fully functioning pipeline of supplies could also open up a way for Norwood to get people into the pack lands, and I had read The Odyssey enough to avoid a Trojan Horse situation.
“Are there any packs that we haven’t pulled in on this side of the country?” I asked Dante.
He thumbed his bottom lip thoughtfully before shaking his head. “No. From Canada to Mexico, we control the west coast now. Everyone is part of Blackwater.”
“Then maybe it’s time to start acting like it,” I said slowly.
Skye’s eyes narrowed. “Meaning?”
“Meaning we stop piling everyone into town and what we consider Blackwater territory,” I explained, meeting her gaze. “We reassess where our boundaries really are and work on securing those.”
“That’s a good plan,” Dante replied. “Blackwater is more than this town or the original pack lands. All these former independent packs are part of us now. If we treat it like that, packs don’t need to relocate.”
“We opened the borders to provide a sanctuary, but we’re past that now,” Katy admitted. She started to nod. “It’s a great idea. Especially if Nikolai is willing to let us spread his people out to shore up the packs that don’t have a heavy population.”
“Actually, that’s Skye’s call now,” I reminded her.
Skye’s eyes went big. “Me?”
“You’re their Alpha, babe. It’s your call.”
She shrugged. “I’m on board, but I still want to ask Nikolai