I watch Naomi roll the dice. They tumble across the board and land her neatly on Boardwalk.
Silas’s Boardwalk.
“That’ll be two hundred,” he smirks.
Naomi doesn’t flinch. She just counts out the paper money and slides it across the board, the corner of her mouth tugging up.
She's really enjoying this. Interesting.
Felix rattles the dice cup. “Your turn, Liam!”
I roll. Double sixes. Again. Third time in five minutes.
“He’s on fire,” Felix crows.
Naomi looks over at me. “You do realize that statistically, that’s ridiculous,” she says. “You’re awfully calm for someone cheating probability.”
"Internal satisfaction," I say, letting myself smile just slightly. "Takes less energy than gloating."
Her mouth curves. “Is that so? So what, you just save all your words for when you’re destroying people on the ice?”
I snort quietly. “I mostly just let my game do the talking.”
A small smile tugs on her lips. She holds my gaze a beat longer than necessary, and, for a second, something shifts… almost like we're actually connecting.
“Your parents must’ve loved the quiet,” she adds, moving her little metal car.
“Academics,” I answer. “Both of them. The house was mostly books.”
Her eyes light with interest. “That actually explains a lot.”
“Yeah?” I arch a brow.
“Well, you read like someone who grew up in a library,” she says. “And skate like someone who spent years escaping one.”
Felix laughs. “Whatever his upbringing, Liam's an alpha of many talents,” he says. “He’s got an engineering degree and everything."
Naomi’s gaze flicks between us, assessing. “Of course you do,” she murmurs, almost to herself. Then, a little louder, “Were you three already a pack back then, at uni?”
“We were,” I say, moving my piece. Her thigh presses lightly against mine when she shifts closer to see the board. She doesn’t seem to notice, but I do. “We were best friends in high school. And when we presented as alphas as we were about to enter college, packing up was just… obvious.”
“Huh.” She rolls again. “Must be nice when something is obvious.”
There’s a quiet there I don’t know how to unpack, so I nudge the question back. “What about you?”
She exhales. “My dad’s a surgeon. Mom’s a negotiator.”
Of course. That tracks.
“So high achievement was… expected,” I say.
“You could say that.” She lands on Go To Jail and slides her car to the corner, lips quirking. “I actually wanted to be a ballet dancer for years.”
Uh, interesting.
“What changed?” I ask.
“Pressure. Reality. Ballet doesn’t pay for a Manhattan apartment. Law does.” She lifts a shoulder. “And it turns out I like it. I like winning.”
