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“Talk to me, Anita.” Micah’s calm voice.

I shook my head. “Food,” I whispered, “just food.”

“Noel is just food,” Micah said.

I nodded, eyes still closed.

“Get up, Noel.” Travis’s voice, unhappy, angry.

“I’m sorry,” Noel said.

I finally opened my eyes, to watch him drag his shirt back over his body. He wouldn’t meet anyone’s eyes, as if he’d failed.

“It’s okay, Noel. Auggie and Pierce are right, Joseph shops for bottoms.”

“He’s not a bottom,” Nathaniel said. “If he had been he’d have enjoyed the biting, and the danger. It might even have been enough to push you from food to sex.” Nathaniel shrugged. “He’s too straightlaced.”

Once I would have argued.

“I would ask one favor,” Travis said.

We looked at him.

“Can you come to me, instead of making me crawl to you?”

I remembered what I’d forgotten to ask, and asked it. “Is the broken arm the worst injury?”

“At least two cracked ribs, maybe a small break. Dr. Lillian said she’d need X-rays to be certain. No concussion, too hardheaded for it, I guess.” He tried to smile and almost made it.

I crawled toward him. Micah moved so I could do it. Nathaniel crawled beside me. I glanced at him. “I don’t think Travis will want company on this.”

“I’m the only submissive you’ve collected. Everybody else is a dominant.”

That stopped me, made me think about it. I actually sat back on my knees. “Damian isn’t a master.”

“No, but he’s submissive because he doesn’t have the power to be dominant. I’m submissive because I like it.”

I frowned at him. “If you have a point, make it.”

“Ask if the pride has anyone who swings more like I do.”

I thought about all the men. Was Nathaniel right? Was everyone else a dominant personality, except for him? Richard, yep; Asher, yes; Jean-Claude, way yes; Micah, yes; Jason, no.

“Jason,” I said.

“You rang?” and it was Jason coming into the hallway. His short blond hair was cut neat and tidy like a junior executive. The body would have qualified, if the executive worked out in the gym enough. He was about my height, short for a man, and boyishly handsome most of the time. But he glanced at Noel getting shakily to his feet, Travis with his obvious wounds, Nathaniel and I so close together and him so very nude. Jason took it all in, and his face changed. I could never put my finger on it, but he looked suddenly older, more grown-up, and his eyes, the color of spring skies, filled up with a knowledge, a weight of intelligence. He hid it most of the time, but there was a very nice mind in that smiling, very nice body.

The look vanished, replaced by his usual smart-ass, flirting look, but I knew him too well, now, to be fooled.

“Jason subs if he wants to, but he’s a top at heart,” Nathaniel said, smiling up at his friend. We were never going to marry, Nathaniel and I, but if we did, I knew who he’d pick for best man.

“Tell me what position you want me in,” Jason said, “and I’m your man.” He wiggled his eyebrows and gave me that grin. That grin that said he was thinking cheerful nefarious thoughts. Most people made sex dark, but not Jason. He was a cheerful lecher.

I had to smile. He just had that effect on me. Hell, he had that effect on most people. “Sorry, I’m shopping for lions today, not wolves.”

“Actually, ma petite, I think we are trying to establish how you react around all your beasts, but lions for now.”

“Looks like I got here just in time,” Jason said.

“You’re not the only wolf in the hallway,” Graham said, sounding sullen.

Jason gave him a look that wasn’t entirely friendly. You didn’t see that from Jason much. “I suppose not.” His tone was dark, almost angry. I wondered what had been happening between the two of them to get that level of animosity from Jason. He was one of the most easygoing people I knew.

“As far as I’m concerned,” I said, “Jason is the only wolf in the hallway.”

“Why is he the only wolf that you fuck besides Richard?” Graham asked.

Ah, now I knew why Graham was pissed. Had he tried to bully the smaller man? Probably. Graham had this backward idea that size and strength were more important than anything else.