She frowned. If only she had a clue what that meant. Just as she was beginning to lament her inability to think of something, the door swung open and they were greeted by Dante's way too gorgeous smile. Which of course gave her the light bulb moment she was looking for.
Rebel.
Her friend Rebel always had some scheme brewing and she was mated to Dante so she couldn't possibly be looking forward to the entire pack becoming deeper embroiled in this retaliation madness. If anyone could come up with a solution and help her implement it, it was Rebel. With a renewed sense of hope flaring to life inside her, she pasted on a smile for Dante and followed Creed into the house.
"What the hell took you so long?" Dante still wasn't smiling.
Dani held her breath, both afraid of what Dante seemed so angry about and the fact that Creed was about to humiliate her.
"Why? What's wrong?"
She slowly released the breath she held and mentally fist bumped Creed for deflecting Dante's question.
"You said twenty-four to forty-eight hours before we moved. There's still some time on the clock."
She froze. What the hell was Creed talking about?
Dante shook his head and lowered his voice. "Plans have changed. We've got new problems."
"What kind of problems?" Creed did not lower his voice. In fact, his anger turned palpable to the point it ricocheted through her brain.
"Ones that don't include little humans." Dante lifted his chin in her direction. "Even if they are mates." A little smile lifted the edge of his lips and Dani finally breathed a real sigh of relief.
"I wouldn't go quite that far," she said.
Creed tightened his hand wrapped around her waist. "I would."
His flair of possessiveness both intrigued and annoyed her. Time to change things up.
"Is Rebel here?" she asked.
"Yep. Her and Allison are out on the back deck. I think they are staging a coup or a revolt or something. I'm sure they'd love for you to join them."
Creed glanced at her, confusion written all over his face.
Good. Make him wonder. "Thanks, I think I'll do that." She wiggled free from Creed's grasp and made her way through the living room that she already knew opened up to a deck that extended out above the garage and all the way around the house. It was the perfect entertaining space and Diego and Dante were well known for their wild pack parties here.
Rebel jumped to her feet and rushed over the minute she saw Dani emerge onto the deck. "Oh my God, are your ears burning? We were just talking about you. I've been dying for you to get here."
They pulled a third lounge chair over to theirs and practically placed her in it. "Why would you be talking about me?"
Rebel rolled her eyes. "Duh. You almost died in the fire, then an attempted kidnapping all with a secret baby on board. What did you think? Although I'm a little bummed I can't even see a baby bump yet. If you stay that tiny the whole time I'm going to throw up."
Dani looked down at her stomach at the same time her hand curled protectively over it. "I'm sure I'll look like I swallowed a beach ball soon enough. And no one would ever call me tiny."
"Tiny is relative around here." Allison shoved a tortilla chip in her mouth. "If you were tiny by human standards you wouldn't be here. Look around, Dani." She waved her hand across her own curvy figure. "Shifters like a woman with meat on her bones."
She was about to ask Allison to elaborate when she caught sight of Creed from the corner of her eye. She turned and looked through the glass at him, Dante and now Damien in an obvious heated argument. She couldn't hear a word they were saying from out here, but it was easy to tell the way hands and arms were waving around and faces twisted in anger, that this discussion was heated.
"What's going on in there?" She titled her head at the window.
Both Allison and Rebel swiveled around and took a quick peek at the men before turning back to face her.
"They're pissed that they can't go hunting. They're behaving like caged animals who can smell blood just outside the door." Allison whispered.
Dani was kind of shocked to hear Allison talk about them like that. Especially since her and Diego were together. She may not understand much about their DNA yet, but they didn't deserve to be referred to like that.
"You're just pissed that you have to sit out here with 'the girls' instead of being in there with the boys stirring up trouble," Rebel said.
Allison frowned. "I don't have to do anything. I choose to be out here while they freak out. When they're cooled off and ready to deal with the problems logically, then I'll get involved. Right now they are in reactive mode instead of proactive. They've got several layers of anger to burn through before they can actually be useful." She took another sip of her drink and settled back in her chair.