The spread was incredible. There were three different chocolate fountains, and I was absolutely going to risk disaster in my white dress by eating from all three. There were hot dishes and cold cuts, and pretty much anything you could want. Except pizza. I might need to text Liam to get another one for when I got home.
Esme went stiff in front of the table, eyes going wide and bright. “Fuck, do you smell that? I need a cupcake.”
I glanced down the table, but that was another thing that was missing. There weren’t any baked goods like that. “What? There aren’t any cupcakes here.”
“Then Dante must have been wrong because I smell cupcakes and now it’s all I can think about.” She turned on her heel, searching for the smell she craved.
“Esme,” I laughed. “You’re having food hallucinations right now.”
“It’s because I’m so hungry.” She was still moving, pushing toward the front of the room and closer to the dance floor. Her voice grew quieter and she looked back at me. “It’ll be fine. Just one and my brain will be back to normal.”
Oh shit. My twin wasn’t watching where she was going and this was going to be bad. I ran forward. “Esme?—”
Too late.
She smacked into the man who’d been bending over a table with a man’s wrist in one hand and a tattoo machine in the other.
Fuck.
He looked so startled, and so did she. But there wasn’t any yelling or anger. Just surprise. Hopefully the tattoo was okay.
I wove through the crowd, getting closer, when I heard Esme speak. “You,” she said, “are not a cupcake.”
The man smirked. “No, I’m not.”
Wait…
A jolt of electricity ran down my spine that felt suspiciously likedeja vu.
Me, running around backstage at the DCAs, begging Jasmine to find a candle that didn’t exist. I was the only one who could smell it. And in this room? Nothing smelled like cupcakes to me.
Esme was still frozen, so I stepped up beside her and tried to break the tension and pull the attention away from her for a second so she could recover. “He may not be a cupcake, but he does have someseriouscake, if you know what I mean.”
She turned her head to me slowly, looking like she might stab me. I just smiled. “He can hear you, Eva.”
It was then I realized that the man we stood in front of wasn’t just any tattoo artist. He wasthetattoo artist. I’d been following his art forever, and I would do a lot of things in order to be tattooed by him. Just had to make sure it wouldn’t ruin my career first. “Holy shit. You’re Bennett Gray.”
He stood. “Guilty as charged.”
I desperately hoped that neither of them could tell how much I wasfreaking the fuck outbecause Esme had just experienced R.A.S. She was scent matching right in front of me. I knew the way Bennett was looking at her, because it was the way my Alpha’s had looked at me that night. Complete and utterawe. Like they’d been struck by lightning.
The way they looked at each other made me realize how glad I was that Jasmine had my back at the DCAs. So now, that was me. I would have Esme’s back here, because it was about fucking time.
Holy hell, I’d wanted to help Esme by coming to the party, I just didn’t realize I’d be helping her likethis.
Esme stared at him. “You’re still not a cupcake.”
I stifled a laugh. “He knows, Esme.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her lift her wrist to her nose—where she’d rolled on the scent canceller—and I saw the second she realized that she wasn’t hallucinating treats from a bakery. The scent she was locked in on came from the man in front of her.
I was close enough to smell the change of her scent to pure terror.
“Um,” Esme cleared her throat and looked down at the floor. “I hope I didn’t fuck up your tattoo.”
The Alpha laughed. “You got lucky. I was about to grab more ink. So no, you didn’t fuck it up.” He looked her up and down, as if trying to memorize every piece of her. Good thing I made her wear the dress. Bennett Gray looked at my sister like he wanted to eat her. Like she was the cupcake and he was about to lick the icing off.
Under the music, I heard it. He’d started to purr out of pure instinct. Esme heard it too and cleared her throat again.
