I flopped back onto the pillow, staring at the ceiling. Euan’s hoodie was still wrapped around me, though it was twisted and wrinkled now. I pulled the collar up over my nose. It smelled like detergent and the faint, phantom concept of sesame that my brain supplied even if my nose couldn't verify it.
I felt... lonely.
That was a new frequency. I was used toalone. Alone was professional. Alone was safe. Lonely was a jagged, dissonant minor third that grated on my nerves.
"Right," I whispered to the empty room. "Signal check."
I sat up. The heat in my blood had simmered down to a manageable hum. The suppressant upgrade Rowan had administered combined with the biological grounding from last night had reset my levels. I felt steady. Raw, but steady.
I swung my legs out of the bunk, my feet hitting the plush carpet. I didn't look at the mirror. I knew I looked like a wreck, hair matted, lips probably swollen, eyes shadowed. I pulled the hoodie down, smoothing it over my hips, creating a shield.
I opened the door to the corridor.
The bus was humming, cruising smoothly down the motorway. The air was aggressively scrubbed, smelling of ozone and processed oxygen. Euan’s systems were working overtime.
I walked toward the front lounge. I didn't sneak, but my socks made no sound.
As I got closer, the low murmur of voices drifted through the sliding door.
"—can't just sit on the data," Euan’s voice. Low. Tense. "It's a material fact. Withholding it alters the parameters of her consent."
"If we tell her, she runs," Kit’s voice, heavy as a kick drum. "You saw her eyes when she realized she'd grabbed my shirt in the loading dock. She's terrified of being owned. If we drop this on her? She plays the Exit Card."
"She deserves to know," Alfie snapped. He sounded frantic, pacing. I could hear thescuff-turn-scuffof his boots. "We're scent-bombing her and she thinks it's just... what? Professional courtesy? Friendly cuddles? It's lying by omission."
"It's protecting the asset," Kit argued, though he sounded unconvinced.
"She's not an asset, she's the—" Alfie cut himself off with a frustrated noise that sounded like a growl caught in a throat. "Look, last night wasn't just heat management. You know that. I know that. Even Cal knows that and he's a Beta."
"The statistical probability of a triple match is 0.003%," Euan recited, his voice mechanical but brittle. "It implies a biological imperative that overrides standard contract law. If we disclose, we are essentially telling her she has no choice. That nature has decided for her. That is the exact narrative she ran from in Seattle."
My hand froze on the door handle.
Triple match.
My brain stalled. It was a concept I knew from bad romance novels and obscure medical journals. The idea that pheromones could lock like puzzle pieces. One Alpha and one Omega was rare enough to be celebrated. Two was a tabloid scandal.
Three?
Three was impossible. Three was a glitched session file.
I gripped the handle. I wasn't going to stand in the hallway and let them debate my reality like a committee meeting.
I shoved the door open.
The three of them jerked to attention like I'd fired a starter pistol.
The front lounge was bathed in grey morning light. It looked lived-in, messy in a way the back lounge wasn't.
Alfie was standing by the window, wearing nothing but loose sweatpants, his chest bare and marked with sleep creases. His hair was a golden disaster.
Kit was sitting on the banquette, a mug of coffee in his hand, wearing a grey tank top that showed off the ink sleeves covering his arms.
Euan was at the small table, fully dressed in black, looking like he hadn't slept in a week. He froze mid-gesture, his hand suspended over a tablet.
"Tell me," I said.
My voice was raspy, sleep-rough. I didn't clear it. I stepped into the room, letting the door slide shut behind me.
