Chapter 33

CHAPTER 33

IZZY

" S unshine! Just the woman I was looking for!" Archer grins at me over Levi's shoulder as he saunters over to us.

Levi sighs deeply before pressing a kiss to the top of my head. "I'll let you have your time with the pup, little raven. But we will be finishing this later."

My eyes widen at the heat I see in his gaze. At his promise, arousal snakes up my spine and pools in my core. Before I have a chance to respond, Levi is striding back to the house.

When I shake myself out of my horny fog, I see Archer standing right in front of me. "Hey, sunny boy."

He gives me a wide smile that lights up his eyes at the nickname. "Wanna come to the lake with me?"

I can't help my grin at his question. "Abso-fucking-lutely!"

Archer chuckles at my enthusiasm. He grabs one of my hands and leads me into the forest. We don't talk as we walk through the trees. I'm too busy admiring the pretty fall leaves and the cute wildlife to say anything.

After around ten minutes of walking in companionable silence, we reach the end of the wooded area. A sparkling blue lake stretches as far as I can see in all directions. I can just make out the bank on the other side. The lake is way bigger than I thought from my peek of it earlier.

We veer to the left toward a wooden dock. Archer walks us to the end of the dock, then drops my hand to kneel down and unlace his black skate shoes. Once he peels off his matching black socks and rolls up his jeans, Archer sits on the edge of the dock and dips his feet into the water.

"Isn't it cold?" I ask. It is October. While the days can be warm enough, the nights get chilly. I'd imagine the water isn't balmy, like it would be in the summer.

He tilts his head back to grin at me. "Shifters run hot, so it's not cold to me. If you're not too much of a scaredy-cat, you can try dipping your feet in to see."

I glare at the frustrating wolf because he knows exactly what he's doing. I have a really hard time backing down when I'm challenged. While I'd like to blame that personality flaw on my magic, I'm pretty sure most of it's just me.

After I toe off my unlaced white Chucks, I pull my white ankle socks off and hesitantly approach Archer. Sitting down on the edge, I reluctantly lower my legs until my toes dip into the chilly water. "Fuck me, that's cold!"

Archer snorts at my reaction. "It's not that cold, sunshine."

I'm too busy tucking my now freezing toes under my legs to say anything. For a few minutes, we sit quietly, absorbing the peace of the water and the nature around us. The sun is sitting low on the horizon, making the sky bleed orange, yellow, and purple.

I break our peaceful quiet when I ask, "You're not going to try to pry into my feelings about the whole ghost debacle?"

He huffs out a laugh. "Nah. I figured you got enough of that from Luca and Bishop."

"And Cain," I mumble.

"Really? Cain?" When I look over at him, Archer's brows are sky-high in surprise.

"Yeah. I don't know why you're surprised. Cain's the sweet one who always wants to talk about my feelings." My lips tip up slightly, thinking about the thoughtful wolf. While he's gruff and quiet on the outside, he has a gooey marshmallow center.

Archer looks at me for a moment before bursting out laughing. He doubles over, he's laughing so hard. I just stare at him, wondering if he's lost his mind. Eventually, Archer gets his laughter under control. He turns to me with a wide smile. "Cain, sweet? That's fucking hilarious. I don't think he's ever been called sweet in his life. Unhinged? Definitely. Terrifying? That's more like it. Sweet? Absolutely not."

"What're you talking about? He's definitely the sweetest out of all of you, no offense or anything."

"Oh, babycakes, you're adorable. I'm not sure how he convinced you he's sweet, but he's not. You can ask anyone in the pack who the most unhinged member is, and they'll all say Cain." I look at Archer skeptically. While I don't have a problem with Cain being unhinged, I don't really see it. Archer sighs. "You heard of the Reaper?"

"Yeah." I only know of the Reaper because I do stuff for Elemental.

The Reaper is some psycho who goes around dolling out vigilante justice in extremely violent and gruesome ways. Rhys and Bishop are so jealous of him. While the Reaper gets to annihilate any supernatural scumbags they want, my brother and Bishop are stuck taking clients that pay. Elemental is a business, after all.

"That's Cain."

I whip my head around to stare at Archer in surprise. "No way. Cain's not old enough to have been doing that for, like, fifteen years."

"Cain's the same age as Luca, but he started taking out shitty people when he was fifteen."

"Why?"

Archer blows out a breath and turns to stare at the rippling surface of the lake. After deliberating what to say for a moment, Archer tells me, "Cain was going through some stuff. It's not really my place to tell you about it, sunshine."

"That's fair." Even though I want to know everything about Cain, I respect Archer not telling me things that aren't his to share. My heart hurts for Cain, though. He must've been full of so much anger and pain to start taking out bad guys as a teen.

"Summer or winter?" Archer asks me out of nowhere.

"Fall." I can't help the grin at picking neither of the answers. It's fun to be difficult.

But fall is my favorite season. I love the chilly mornings and warm afternoons, the colorful leaves, any excuse to wear one of Bishop's flannels, and all the pumpkin things I can bake.

"Movies or TV shows?"

"Books." I'll happily watch good TV or movies, but I love reading. Books transport you to another world in a way nothing else really can.

"Batman or Superman?"

"Iron Man." I'd choose Tony Stark over Bruce Wayne or Clark Kent any day. Archer grins at my answers.

I shiver a little now that the sun's set. Even though I'm wearing Luca's sweatshirt, I only have shorts and a bra under it. Despite being a bit cold, I don't want to go in yet. "Tell me something no one else knows about you."

Instead of the silly response I expect, Archer thinks for a second before answering quietly. "I resented Luca for the longest time. He's the perfect one. Luca's effortlessly good at everything he does, and everybody loves him. Our parents, teachers, the pack, and women. I was always the second choice, just Luca's shadow."

"What changed?" I whisper, unused to seeing the playful wolf so serious.

"Well, the first thing that changed it was that I got into Muay Thai at fourteen. I've never been very good at school. Teachers would always get frustrated with me struggling with the material. But Muay Thai and other martial arts were so easy to pick up. After a few months of practicing, I was winning against fully grown shifters. While Luca's good at MMA now, he had a much harder time learning it than I did. It was the first time I ever felt good at anything. It also taught me discipline."

Archer pauses for a moment, lost in his thoughts.

"I'd love to watch you fight sometime," I tell him earnestly.

A ghost of a smile crosses his lips before he shakes himself out of his thoughts. "Losing our parents was also a wake-up call. While we both lost our dads and mom, Luca was the only one who was expected to have it all together. The pack expected him to have all the answers. At twenty-five, Luca had to lead nine hundred people, while having no time to grieve for losing most of our family.

"I realized then why Luca was always perfect. He had to be. As the future alpha, everyone held him to higher standards than the rest of us. All this time, I'd been resenting my perfect older brother when he likely resented me, the goofy fuckup. Unlike him, I at least had some freedom to do what I wanted. Since then, I've been trying to pick up the slack. I want him to have more time to just be Luca, not Alpha Nightshade."

When Archer finishes speaking, I can't resist the urge to hug him. In a clumsy move that makes an exorcism look smooth, I straddle the wolf and wrap my arms around him. "I'm sorry, sunny boy, about all of it. Coming in second your whole life and losing your parents are both awful in different ways."

My lips are pressed against the smooth skin of his throat, making my voice come out muffled.

He laughs softly while hugging me back. One of his hands spears through my blonde hair to hold my face to him. "It's not your fault, sunshine."

"I know. I'm still sorry, though. You should know, sunny boy, that anyone who couldn't see how awesome you are is stupid. Your joy and exuberance and zest for life is contagious. You know how to cheer me up, even when I'm at my lowest. You make any situation so much better and all the bad parts of life easier. While you may not see it, you add so much to your pack and to my life. Everything would be miserable and dull and gray without you."

"Fuck, Izzy," Archer rasps as he buries his face in my neck. I put one of my hands on the back of his neck and run my fingers through the silky strands at the nape of his neck. "Who knew you were so sweet under your thorns?"

"Tell anyone about it, and I'll kill you." I can't have anyone knowing I have a sappy side.

He snorts. "There's my girl." My heart beats a little harder in my chest at being called Archer's anything.

I stay on his lap for a while, soaking up his warmth and his vanilla citrus scent. We don't talk, content to sit in silence with each other. Eventually, I start shivering too hard to hide from Archer. "Sorry," I manage to get out through my chattering teeth.

"You cold, sunshine?"

"Just a little." It would be more convincing if I weren't shivering so hard my voice comes out wobbly.

"Let's get you inside, then." He waits for me to nod before standing. I squeak, expecting to fall. Archer's strong arms hold me effortlessly as he straightens. He lets me down, so we can both put on our shoes. Archer then picks me up again, and he wraps my legs around his waist before turning to the forest. With one arm under my ass and the other around my back, I feel secure in his arms.

As he starts walking to the forest, I remind him, "I have legs that work. I can walk."

"I'm aware, sunshine. Lemme hold you. Please?" His voice wavers on the last word, and my resolve to do it myself crumbles. I nod into his neck, and we walk the rest of the way back to the house like that.

I expect Archer to put me down when we reach their mansion. Instead, he supports me with one arm and opens the back door with the other. I'm impressed that he's able to carry me to the stairs, up them, and to Luca's room without even a huff or a puff.

He shuts the door behind us and lets me slide down him. When I turn around, I suck in a surprised breath at seeing my other four mates shirtless. Luca is in a pair of gray sweatpants at his desk. Levi is sitting on the edge of the bed in only basketball shorts. Cain and Bishop are whispering about something on the sofa but stop as soon as they see me. They're both in just sweats as well.

All of them are looking at me. "Um, hi?"

I glance behind me at Archer for some idea of what I'm supposed to do. But I find him stripping down to his boxers. He is one fine specimen of a man, all tanned skin, defined pecs, and rock-hard abs. My eyes momentarily snag on the wolf tattoo on his chest that both Luca and Cain have. It must have something to do with their pack if they all have it.

When I turn around, I'm startled by Luca standing right in front of me. I jump and press my hand to my racing heart. "Jesus, fuck! Make some fucking noise, dude!" I need to put bells on the wolves. That way, they won't be able to sneak up on me.

Luca just chuckles at me, the asshole. "I made plenty of noise, wildcat. You just weren't paying attention." While he's talking, Luca puts his hands on my waist and pulls me tight against his front. I fight the urge to lean into the big wolf. "Are you ready for bed?"

As soon as he mentions sleeping, I realize just how tired I am. I woke up a few hours ago, but I'm already drained. I'm usually low on energy for a few days after using up all my magic, so it makes sense. "Yeah," I manage to answer around a big yawn. "Where am I sleeping?"

"In here. We all are."

I raise my eyebrows at him and turn to look at his king-size bed that definitely won't fit six people. Only, I don't see a king bed. Instead, there's a massive one taking up a sizable portion of Luca's huge room. A very smug-looking Levi is staring back at me.

"Is making beds massive a perk of being older than time itself?"

After snorting, Levi shakes his head at me. "I'm not that old, little raven. And it's a perk of my magic. It has nothing to do with age."

I guess that means I'll never get cool powers like him. Lame. I want a refund on my super uncool powers. Maybe there's a magic manager I can speak with to fix it.

While I'm lost in my tired thoughts, Luca lets go of me. He walks into his closet and comes out a moment later holding a deep blue T-shirt. It's slightly faded and looks super soft. Luca hands it to me. "You can sleep in this tonight. Go change in my bathroom, then we'll get you to bed."

Too tired to argue with him, I do as he says, much to his surprise. When I walk back into the room, I see all of them already in the bed. There's a space in the middle between Luca and Cain that I'm guessing is for me.

Padding over to it, I knee walk toward the head of the bed. Luca holds the covers open for me. Once I'm under them, Luca turns me to face Cain and starts spooning me. Cain snags one of my hands, and someone else turns out the light.

"'Night, boys," I mumble, my eyes already feeling heavy.

I get a chorus of good nights from all my mates. My eyes then slip shut, and I fall into a deep, dreamless sleep, safe in between all of them.