Chapter 24

Aria

A little while later, we pulled up to the expensive supermarket downtown—you know, the type of supermarket where only the rich and people who are pretending to be rich but are really putting themselves into debt go to shop.

Already, I felt a little out of place as we stepped out of the car and headed inside. I did look somewhat professional since I was still wearing my work clothes—a white button-down tucked into a pencil skirt, boots, and a peacoat over the top—but considering that everything was thrifted, I felt like I stuck out here like a sore thumb.

Especially with a man who looked like he just stepped out of an issue of GQ walking beside me.

“This shouldn’t take long,” Darren said, reaching for a cart. “I usually just zip through the produce section and meat department—”

Before he could finish, Lucas blurted out, “Can I ride in this one?”

We both turned to see that Lucas had already planted himself firmly in one of the carts that had a little car in the front for kids. He was grinning from ear to ear, gripping the steering wheel like a racecar driver.

I couldn’t help but grin. “Man, I wish I fit in one of those,” I teased.

Darren’s eyebrows shot up as he glanced back and forth between the plain metal cart he already had and the colorful one that Lucas was sitting in. “I…” He shook his head. “I already picked one out, Lucas. Besides, aren’t you a little old for silly stuff like that?”

“Old?” I quipped, already grabbing the cart that Lucas was in. “He’s five.”

“But—”

“Look, if you’re embarrassed, then I’ll be the one to push it,” I said, already whisking past him. “But we’re taking this cart.”

I wasn’t sure what Darren’s reaction was, because I was already heading into the store with Lucas. The kid squealed with glee as I pushed him down the produce aisle, making racecar sounds as he whipped the steering wheel back and forth.

“Faster!” Lucas cried out between fits of giggles. “Faster, Mommy!”

I grinned and pushed the cart faster, hopping onto the back bar with one foot. We glided easily down the aisle, where I picked up a bag of apples as we passed a display.

Darren finally caught up to us when we stopped at the end. His cheeks were red from obvious embarrassment, especially with other shoppers looking at us.

“You could crash that thing,” he said quietly, his eyebrows knitting together.

I shook my head and tucked a strand of hair that had come loose from its bun behind my ear. “I know I messed up with the sugar thing, but I’m not going to crash a shopping cart,” I said. I inspected an orange and plopped it into the cart. “Besides, look how much fun he’s having. Contained fun.”

Indeed, a glance at Lucas revealed that he was happily playing in the little car, not running off and shifting into his wolf form in the middle of the store.

That alone seemed to shut Darren up.

We made our way around the store, picking up the essentials: fruit, vegetables, milk and eggs, cheese and meat. Darren revealed that he baked his own bread, so we stopped in the baking aisle to pick up a bag of flour and some yeast.

“I’ve never baked bread before,” I mused as I watched him puzzle over which brand of flour to get. “You might have to show me if you’ll want me to cook for Lucas more often.”

Darren glanced up at me from the bag in his hands. “I… could do that,” he said, dropping it into the cart.

I resisted the urge to think about him with his sleeves rolled up to the elbows, skin dusted with flour.

“Okay,” Darren said, turning, “now we just need—”

“Oooh… What’s that?” Lucas pointed a little finger at a nearby box of pancake mix.

“That’s pancake mix,” I said, picking up the box and letting Lucas look at it. “Have you ever tried pancakes?” Lucas shook his head, which was no surprise to me. I turned to Darren. “Breakfast for dinner tonight?”

Darren stiffened at the thought. “There’s a lot of sugar in that,” he said quietly.

I glanced at the box, checking the ingredients. Darren was right; this particular one had a lot of sugar, especially since it was a colorful box designed to intrigue children. “There are sugar free versions,” I suggested. “We could also make our own whipped cream and have fruit on the side. No syrup or anything like that.”

The CEO was silent for a moment as he studied the cart. Lucas had already picked out a couple other things he wanted to try: pre-popped popcorn, frozen dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets, and french fries.

Finally, Darren shook his head. “Sorry, Lucas, but no. You’ve already picked out a bunch of things tonight.”

Lucas climbed out of his car, pulling out those big saucer eyes of his that had worked so well on me before. “P-Please?” he begged, clasping his hands together. “Can’t I try pancakes?”

“Not today,” Darren replied, clearly unfazed by the waterworks. “I’ve already let you pick out a bunch of stuff already.”

Maybe it was the sugar leaving his system or the exhaustion from our long day, but that seemed to make Lucas snap. Before Darren or I could even react, he was suddenly plopping down right there on the tile floor, big crocodile tears streaming down his cheeks.

“But… But…” he whined, tiny hands balling up into fists. “Whyyy?”

Darren shook his head, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Lucas, get up off the floor,” he half-whispered. Other shoppers were already looking at us. Again.

“But I can’t choose!” Lucas whimpered, sniffling miserably. “I want to try them all!”

Darren, clearly exasperated, looked at me. I shot him a withering glance before I crouched and gently touched one of Lucas’s shoulders.

“Hey, buddy. Look at me.”

Lucas sniffled, wiping a big gob of snot off his nose with his sleeve, and looked at me. “I’m tired of meat. I want to try pancakes…”

“I know you do, bud,” I offered with a small smile. “Tell you what. If you really want them, why don’t we put back the other stuff where we found it and just get pancakes?”

Lucas blinked, thinking deeply. “R-Really…? We could do that?”

I nodded. “Yeah, we could. It’ll be fun! We’ll even make them shaped like animals.”

The little boy’s eyes widened at that. Suddenly, he was on his feet, grinning from ear to ear. “Ooh, I want mine shaped like a whale!” he exclaimed.

With that settled, I ruffled his hair and got him situated in his car again. While he was distracted, I slyly replaced the pancake mix with a healthier version—sugar-free, high protein, and made with oats.

Darren looked impressed. “You handled that well,” he said quietly as we made our way around the store to put the other stuff back. “Thanks.”

I offered him a small smile, although I couldn’t help but feel surprised by his praise. “It was nothing, really.”

“It’s not nothing. Lucas really listens to you. Liam told me how he came right back to you today when you called to him.”

I stopped just as I was putting the popcorn back. Inexplicably, my heart stuttered in my chest. I told myself that it was just nice to hear the compliment, but maybe it was more than that. Maybe it was something that I didn’t want to admit, not even to myself.

Once we put the food back, we picked up a few other things to go with tonight’s meal: heavy cream to make whipped cream, strawberries and blueberries, and even a package of bacon. We made our way to the checkout after that, where the kind old man scanning our things commented on how cool Lucas looked in his car.

Darren studied the pancake mix and cream as he placed them on the conveyer belt, a furrow to his brow.

“Don’t tell me you’ve never tried pancakes, either,” I teased.

To my surprise, the CEO shook his head, an almost puppyish look crossing those eyes of his. “I haven’t. But not for the same reasons as Lucas.”

“Oh? Are you allergic?”

“No. It’s just unhealthy,” he explained as he pulled out his credit card. “I’m on a strict diet. Alph—I mean, men like me need to stay in shape.”

In shape, I thought wryly as the image of him, shirtless, muscles glistening as he did pull-ups with ease on a tree branch, sprang to mind.

If he looked like that at his age, I wondered what other Alphas looked like. Something told me that Darren was in the upper echelon of attractive men in the werewolf world, if he was so strict with himself. Surely not everyone was as strict as that, and I doubted that werewolves were that much less susceptible to weight gain than the rest of us.

“Well,” I said, turning away so he couldn’t see the sudden redness in my cheeks, “it’s your loss if you won’t be joining us for dinner tonight.”