Ray got up before anyone else to take his plate to the kitchen. His half-full plate because Alec’s comment about blood and Iesu’s stupid story about his cousin dying a chair red with his own blood had put an end to his appetite. Josh hadn’t been able to eat another bite after that either, blood thrumming with anger and concern. How could they be so careless? Alec had at least noticed, but he would have bet Iesu was completely unaware he’d almost made his omega have a meltdown. Or a flashback.

Josh didn’t know. He wasn’t a shrink and if friendship had been a class, he’d have been scraping by. But he wasn’t going to stop trying. He got up and followed Ray to the kitchen. Normally, he’d have left it at that. He’d be the familiar presence, the safe space where Ray could rest... But it wasn’t enough. He wasn’t enough.

“Let’s get out of here,” he said, trying for casual.

Ray’s plate clinked too hard as he put it in the sink to soak. He turned to Josh, shocked and confused. “What?”

“You need a break,” Josh replied. “We can get ice-cream at Freggo’s.”

“In town?” Ray asked, swallowing.

“It’s Sunday. You can choose who you want to stay with them.”

“They...” Ray started to say, taking Josh’s plate and emptying in the organic bin too—Marisa insisted they have one.

“If you tell me they won’t or that they have plans already, I will punch you in the face,” Josh cut him off. “Anyone in this pack will do it for you if you ask.”

“Yes!” Ray snapped, dropping the plate in dishwasher without looking. His eyes were glued to Josh’s face. “I know that, I’m not stupid. You all feel sorry for me and want me to... to stop this. To stop feeling... to stop being scared all the goddamned time. But I—”

“Sorry?” Josh interrupted. “We don’t feel sorry for you, Raymond. We feel guilty. Because we failed you and we failed the babies. But yes, we do want you to stop suffering, is that so bad?”

“Well, you can’t fix me,” Ray said softly, leaning back against the counter. He was trembling slightly. Pent-up adrenaline, Josh realised. Because Ray was scared.

Josh backtracked so fast he almost choked on the words. “You are not... you know I was... I would never hit you, you know that, right?”

Ray exhaled, but he didn’t relax. “Yes, Josh, I remember. You can’t anymore, can you?”

“And you are upset about it?” Josh asked, disbelieving. “Of all the things... Ray, I know I can’t fix you. The only one who can is you. I just... I want you to try. To keep trying. You have been doing great: yesterday, I had to remind you to go in for lunch. You forg... You trusted them to look after the babies while you worked. That’s good, really good. But it’s just the first step.”

“Just the idea is making me want to throw up,” Ray admitted. He sounded it sick with dread, alright.

“Okay, not town then,” Josh conceded. “Let’s go for a walk, up to the river.”

Ray held on for a moment longer before offering a shaky nod. “I want Alec,” he said, to Josh’s surprise. “Can you...?” He waved in the direction of the dining room, where the other alphas had to be pretending really hard not to hear them fight.

“Yes,” Josh said. “Gimme a minute.”

&

As soon as Josh had walked back into the kitchen, Ray nodded and headed for the front door despite the kitchen door being only a few meters away. And then Josh understood how stupid he was being: it was in the kitchen that Nicholas had cornered Ray. They’d left through that door. He wondered if Gabriel would agree to board it up. Not that he needed to agree, if Ray wanted it done, Josh would go cut the wood from the forest himself.

But, of course, he realised as Ray started speed-walking towards the river, to truly erase that poor excuse for an alpha from their lives, they’d need to change territories.

It just wouldn’t work.

“Ray! Wait up!”

His friend spun around to give him a look. “Why?” he demanded and only gave Josh a few seconds to run up to him before he started up again. “I want to get it done.”

Josh reached out and took hold of his wrist. Ray jerked like he’d burned him. This time he glared instead of apologizing. “You forgot your words? Don’t—” He stopped. Maybe he couldn’t tell his alpha not to touch him, maybe he’d realised he was freaking out over Josh holding his arm.

Josh let go. It didn’t matter to him what rights being Ray’s alpha gave him in the eyes of the pack or the moon; if he could stop himself when Ray asked him, he would.

“Just... slow down,” he asked, intentionally keeping his voice low. “This is supposed to be a walk. If you run, it’s too easy.”

“Easy?” Ray sneered. He looked like he was sorely tempted to hit Josh again—not that he would, not knowing Josh couldn’t hit him back. “This is not fucking easy, Josh!”

“Sorry,” Josh said at once. “I just mean... You have to give yourself time to process what you are doing. You need—”

“I need you to shut up,” Ray said, and Josh saw that he was shaking again. He couldn’t tell if it was terror or fury, but what did it matter? He closed his mouth. Ray inhaled, turning his face away towards the water already visible in the distance. “I thought... I thought I caught his scent.”

It was clear by Ray’s tone that he knew he hadn’t actually smelt a man long dead and buried in a completely different area. He knew it was his brain, playing tricks on him. But it didn’t need to be real to scare him.

“I can only smell you and me,” Josh offered, for lack of anything better. “And a little bit of Iesu and Sergi because they have been doing patrols.”

Ray nodded, rubbing his palms against his jeans. Then nodded again, a little jerkily. “Okay. Let’s walk.”

So they walked, and Josh let the sounds of the afternoon envelop them. There were two or three types of birds, but Josh could only tell apart the kingfishers because he’d always loved their bright blue coats—his fine hearing was no help in naming, the wolf just knew none of them were big enough to eat.

The water was calm, almost inaudible because of the wind whispering with the trees growing to the east... And then he realised Ray’s pulse was too fast for a walk and risked a glance. Ray’s fists were clenched and so was his jaw.

“Can you tell if they are awake?” Josh asked, hoping to distract them both.

Ray stumbled a little, then glanced at him. “Who?”

“The babies,” Josh replied. He’d have thought that was why Ray was freaking out, but maybe he was imagining scents that weren’t there again.

He exhaled and nodded but kept walking, obviously hoping to get through it as fast as possible. “Yeah, I can tell... I can tell if they are awake because they feel things more strongly. And sometimes, if they have a bad night, I can hear that.”

“You can... feel what they feel?” he asked, half in wonder and half in terror. It wasn’t like he’d been trying to hide his own feelings from Ray, but still, to have no control at all over what got out...

Ray saw right through him and shook his head. “They are babies, they need it. And I have to concentrate. I can’t do it with you. I know where you are and I think... maybe I’d know if you were in danger as long as we were both...” He glanced away. “Here.”

“You couldn’t feel us at all?” he dared to ask. “When... when you weren’t here?”

Ray shook his head. “No, but... I was... Maybe I could have, if I had been able to focus. But once we crossed the border it was like I couldn’t hear you anymore.”

Josh swallowed, unable to find any words that would help. Ray didn’t have to say it; his voice revealed how painful the experience must have been well enough. Every part of Josh: man and wolf, friend and lover, wanted to obliterate that pain.

But there was nothing he could do. He’d been too late. He exhaled and noticed they were by the river already. It was a quiet section, the current more of a tickle than a rush, but deep enough. He turned to Ray and felt his attempt at a smile break on his lips. He pushed the words out anyway. “Race you to the other side and back.”

It wasn’t a question and it wasn’t confident enough to be a dare, but Ray only hesitated a moment before shoving his shoes off his feet. Josh hurried to follow, swearing when he saw he was the only one wearing laces. Ray waited anyway, even if only just until Josh got back upright.

They dived in together, fully clothed, and that was the last Josh saw of him until he pushed himself up to breathe in before swimming back. Ray was ahead, almost a third of the way back and Josh didn’t even have time to swear at him and call him a cheat. He submerged again, shoving hard against one of the big rocks on the side, and swam like he was drowning.

He didn’t drown but when he came back out, Ray was already rolling onto the grass, soaked and panting. And laughing a little. He pushed himself out of the water, shivering against the rapidly cooling air and followed his friend’s example and rolled on the ground, hoping to squeeze some of the water out of his clothes.

It was pointless, of course. He wasn’t going to get dry again, so after a few moments he gave up the pretence and took his shirt off, then started on his belt. He didn’t know what made him look up as he finally managed to make the mechanism disengage, but when he did, he found Ray was watching him, on his side and so still he had to be freezing.

“You okay?” he asked, inanely. But he had to say something because he couldn’t look away from the water still clinging to Ray’s eyelashes, making his blue eyes shine in the falling light. “Aren’t you cold?”

Ray blinked, shuddering a little, and sat up, pulling his gaze away towards his own body. He took his shirt off fast enough Josh heard something rip, but he didn’t start on his trousers, instead, he jumped to his feet. “That enough? Have I taken enough steps?”

He sounded a little angry, but maybe he was just cold. Except if he was; why was he still wearing his wet clothes? It wasn’t like Ray to be modest about his body, much... Then Josh’s mind caught up with him and he had to swallow a wave of nausea. Did Ray think that if Josh saw him naked he would...?

“Let’s shift,” he suggested because he was too afraid to say the words. If a part of Ray, maybe the same part that flinched when touched, felt being naked in front of other men was dangerous, it wasn’t something Josh had a right to resent.

“What about our clothes? I’m not carrying my shoes in my mouth,” Ray said, sounding disgusted.

“Let’s just leave them, they’ll dry in the sun. I need my shoes but I’ll shift first and you can tie them around my neck.”

Ray hesitated, but then sighed. “Okay, but I’m getting extra points for this.”

“Sure,” Josh agreed. “You will get ice-cream.”

Ray shot him an annoyed look, arms crossed and still shivering a little, but apparently not intending to undress any time soon. “It’ll be closed now,” he replied moodily.

Josh shrugged. “Could have gone to town,” he said, and undid the button of his jeans, peeling them down his legs with difficulty. “Ugh, gross,” he complained. “We should have taken them off,” he said, but kept his gaze firmly on the ground when Ray didn’t respond.

He turned towards the lake to spread the wet trousers on the ground so the sun would hit them directly in the morning, eyes carefully averted in case Ray had decided to join him. He kept himself turned away as he also took off his underwear. Not that there was anything to hide: even without the cold, there was little as appealing as the idea of Ray’s fear.

He shifted still watching the lake and only then turned to check on his mate. The wolf’s eyes could see well enough in the dark but the wolf didn’t care much what its mate looked like—it was scent that would distract it. And Ray just smelled like Ray; mate, home, omega, mine. He was still wearing his trousers when he went over and tied Josh’s shoes around his neck, rubbing behind his ears in the process and making it impossible not to rumble in satisfaction. No wolf would ever turn down a good head rub and getting it from someone you loved always made it better. There was a reason puppies slept in piles even in summer; they needed the physical contact. Maybe it was simply a mechanism to keep the pack members close to each other because a pack together was nearly indestructible, but whatever the reason, it felt good in a way that went beyond the physical gratification of a good scratch.

Ray snorted. “Okay, okay, that’s enough.”

He turned his back to Josh to undo his trousers, but Josh did him one better and turned tail and started running, ignoring his mate’s shout until he was a good hundred meters away. He turned then, tail wagging and by the time he ran back to Ray, his friend was in fur. Just in time for Josh to tackle him into the ground. Ray snapped his teeth at him in warning and off they were, tugging on ears and playfully shoving at each other until they almost ended up back in the river.

The shoes hadn’t made it to the end of the game attached to Josh’s neck so he’d ended up dragging them with his teeth when they’d finally tired of playing. He spit on the ground as soon as he recovered his human form on the porch. He couldn’t understand how in wolf form the scent of his own feet didn’t turn his stomach but he felt like he needed some tequila to get the scent and taste off his mouth now.

“Come on,” he told Ray, who hadn’t shifted back, and opened the door to let him through. Ray immediately scurried through without looking back. Josh went to the kitchen and got a finger of the liquor their old pack produced for themselves, swashing in in his mouth before swallowing.

“What’s the occasion?” Gabriel asked, appearing silently enough Josh jumped.

“Goddess! Warn a guy!” He put down the glass and shrugged. “Just carried my shoes in my mouth, needed to get the taste off.”

Gabriel snorted. “You should have left them.”

“Well, Sasha ate my other pair, so...”

“Well, you should have put those away,” Gabriel said reasonably.

Josh glared at him. “Thanks, dad,” he said icily. “Any other useless advice?”

Gabriel raised his hands, palms forward, shaking his head. “Did it go alright?”

Josh almost wanted to refuse to answer, but it’d have been petty. Gabriel was honestly worried about Ray. “Yeah, we walked there, swam for a bit. It was nice.”

Gabriel nodded, smiling, but Ray spoke before he could ask anything else. “You can ask me, you know.”

They eyed him warily, neither of them had heard him approach and this was new. He looked rumpled, hair only towel dry and skin a little flushed from the run and the warmth of the house. But the strangest thing were his words: he’d spent the last year telling them that he needed to ignore everything that was happening between them to be able to live with it.

“We can?” Josh asked when Gabriel couldn’t seem to find words.

His friend nodded, then shrugged. “I reserve the right not to answer.”

“So do you like the work? In the beta wing?” Gabriel asked.

Ray nodded, going to the fridge and retrieving some pickles. The pregnancy seemed to have sent his diet in a tailspin from which it’d never quite recovered, pickles on bread was pretty tame, really. “Yeah, more than I thought I would. And I like being close to the house, but not in the house. I was staring at the walls so much, I was starting to think about decorating. Marisa would never forgive me.”

Gabriel dutifully chuckled at that. Josh silently lifted the cheese he was cutting in offer and the other alpha nodded, but Ray shook his head, taking another bite of his pickle. “Well, any time you change your mind...”

“And do what instead?” Ray asked, voice even. No, not even, flat.

“Whatever you want,” Gabriel said.

“I can’t really do much more here.” Ray gestured to the house and Gabriel shot Josh a pleading look.

He would have liked to promise Ray that he could go back to college, or even get a job with Gabriel at the site if he fancied. But it wasn’t the time, and he didn’t think Ray would believe it. “Well, I guess you are not getting that ice-cream from Freggo’s then,” he said instead.

“Hey,” Ray shot back. “That was a deal, you can’t take it back!”