Heat Race - Tanya Chris Page 0,4

claim Jack Henry if Jack Henry didn’t want him, but he didn’t want anyone else. He was looking at a lifetime alone, but hopefully a lifetime where he and Jack Henry were still friends, where they got to have their talks and play their games. Maybe they could even snuggle a little now and then. But probably not. Probably Jack Henry’s alpha wouldn’t like it.

He shouldn’t have come. He’d just hoped that… sometimes he thought that… but no. There’d been no sign from Jack Henry, no sign at all.

Elias heaved a sigh of resignation as he turned away from the starting line to find another alpha standing there watching him—a stranger in black leather with long hair and rings through his ears and eyebrows.

“Why aren’t you running?” the stranger asked.

“Why should I?”

“I thought you liked Jack Henry.”

Elias didn’t know who this guy was or how he knew anything about him, but he couldn’t deny liking Jack Henry. “Like him too much to claim him if that’s not what he wants.”

“Huh.” The stranger looked in the direction Jack Henry had run, then back at Elias, as if he wasn’t in any hurry to get to wherever he needed to be. “We’ve got a problem then.”

“We who? I don’t even know who you are.”

“Name’s Jasper, and by we I mean me and Jack Henry. You were supposed to lead me to him.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because you don’t want him to end up with that thug, Lon.”

“Oh.” That was true. Elias had given up on having Jack Henry for himself, but he wanted Jack Henry to be happy, which he definitely wouldn’t be if Lon got to him. Lon only wanted Jack Henry because he was pretty. He didn’t know a thing about him, like what kind of donut to buy him on a coffee run or how to rub his feet when they ached from ballet practice. Lon wouldn’t bother to find those things out either. He would just fuck Jack Henry when he was horny and parade him around like a trophy the rest of the time.

“What’s that got to do with you though?” Elias asked.

“I’m the one your little friend wants. Lead me to him and I’ll claim him, keep him happy.”

Elias gave Jasper a long once-over, trying to insinuate he had doubts about his ability to keep an omega happy, but he didn’t really. Jasper was exactly the kind of danger-stud Jack Henry’s room was decorated with posters of—posters that had told Elias long before this evening’s brush-off that Jack Henry didn’t want him. Jack Henry might like being cuddled and coddled and caressed, but he also wanted that—black leather and a perpetual sneer.

Still, Jack Henry had never said anything about this particular stranger—it was Saul Elias had always caught him ogling—and it wasn’t his decision to make anyway. Either Jack Henry would figure out how to stack the deck in favor of the alpha he’d chosen, or fate would have its way. Elias just hoped fate didn’t decide to be a bitch about it.

“You should get moving,” he prompted. “Jack Henry’s been gone a while, and Lon’s got a good jump on you. To the swiftest go the spoils.”

“To the swiftest or the smartest?”

“You think you’re the smartest?”

“Nope.” Jasper grinned, a grin so smoothly wicked Elias could feel the power of it himself. “I think you’re the smartest. Maybe the smartest of all the alphas here, but definitely the smartest when it comes to Jack Henry. I’m just smart enough to use the tools I’ve got, which is you. Come with me, Elias. Help me find him.”

Elias imagined watching this handsome devil claim his childhood sweetheart. Jack Henry would be so pleased. And so gorgeous in his pleasure. But Elias would be so devastated.

“What’s in it for me?”

“Unfettered access to him,” Jasper answered promptly, proving he was pretty smart, after all, by honing in on what Elias wanted most. “I can take care of Jack Henry’s physical needs and then some, but an omega’s a whole person, not just an ass. I won’t get in the way of what you two mean to each other. Help me find him, let me claim him, and I’ll share him with you.”

Elias shivered as the word share stirred up another vision of Jasper claiming Jack Henry, only this time he was part of it. But that wasn’t what Jasper meant. He meant Elias could have Jack Henry’s time and company—non-sex things. Maybe that was enough, and maybe it wasn’t, but