But Juniper was following closely on Bryce’s heels, her hooves clopping lightly on the wood floors as she held up the pastry bag. “I just wanted to drop these off. I’ve got rehearsal in …” She fished her phone from the pocket of her tight black leggings. “Oh shit. Now. Bye, B.” She rushed to the door, chucking the pastry bag on the table with impressive aim.
“Good luck—call me later,” Bryce said, already going to inspect her friend’s peace offering.
Juniper lingered in the doorway long enough to say to him, “Do your job, Umbra.”
Then she was gone.
Bryce slid into one of the white leather chairs at the glass table and sighed as she pulled out a chocolate croissant. She bit in and moaned. “Do legionaries eat croissants?”
He remained leaning against the counter. “Is that an actual question?”
Crunch-munch-swallow. “Why are you up so early?”
“It’s nearly seven thirty. Hardly early by anyone’s count. But your chimera nearly sat on my face, so how could I not be up? And how many people, exactly, have keys to this place?”
She finished off her croissant. “My parents, Juniper, and the doorman. Speaking of which … I need to give those keys back—and get another copy made.”
“And get me a set.”
The second croissant was halfway to her mouth when she set it down. “Not going to happen.”
He held her stare. “Yes, it is. And you’ll change the enchantments so I can get access—”
She bit into the croissant. “Isn’t it exhausting to be an alphahole all the time? Do you guys have a handbook for it? Maybe secret support groups?”
“An alpha-what?”
“Alphahole. Possessive and aggressive.” She waved a hand at his bare torso. “You know—you males who rip your shirt off at the slightest provocation, who know how to kill people in twenty different ways, who have females falling over themselves to be with you; and when you finally bang one, you go full-on mating-frenzy with her, refusing to let another male look at or talk to her, deciding what and when she needs to eat, what she should wear, when she sees her friends—”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Your favorite hobbies are brooding, fighting, and roaring; you’ve perfected about thirty different types of snarls and growls; you’ve got a cabal of hot friends, and the moment one of you mates, the others fall like dominoes, too, and gods help you when you all start having babies—”
He snatched the croissant out of her hand. That shut her up.
Bryce gaped at him, then at the pastry, and Hunt wondered if she’d bite him as he lifted it to his mouth. Damn, but it was good.
“One,” he told her, yanking over a chair and turning it backward for him to straddle. “The last thing I want to do is fuck you, so we can take the whole Sex, Mating, and Baby option off the table. Two, I don’t have friends, so there sure as fuck will be no couples-retreat lifestyle anytime soon. Three, if we’re complaining about people who are clothing-optional …” He finished the croissant and gave her a pointed look. “I’m not the one who parades around this apartment in a bra and underwear every morning while getting dressed.”
He’d worked hard to forget that particular detail. How after her morning run, she did her hair and makeup in a routine that took her more than an hour from start to finish. Wearing only what seemed to be an extensive, and rather spectacular, assortment of lingerie.
Hunt supposed if he looked the way she did, he’d wear that shit, too.
Bryce only glared at him—his mouth, his hand—and grumbled, “That was my croissant.”
The coffee machine beeped, but he kept his ass planted in the chair. “You’re going to get me a new set of keys. And add me to the enchantments. Because it’s part of my job, and being assertive isn’t the first sign of being an alphahole—it’s a sign of me wanting to make sure you don’t wind up dead.”
“Stop cursing so much. You’re upsetting Syrinx.”
He leaned close enough to note gold flecks in her amber eyes. “You have the dirtiest mouth I’ve ever heard, sweetheart. And from the way you act, I think you might be the alphahole here.”
She hissed.
“See?” he drawled. “What was it you said? An assortment of snarls and growls?” He waved a hand. “Well, there you go.”
She tapped her dusk-sky nails on the glass table. “Don’t ever eat my croissant again. And stop calling me sweetheart.”