“Like… meet again?” I ask.
He leans against the wall, his thick arms folding and drawing my gaze down to his tight white shirt. It’s clean. Crisp.Smells like fresh snowfall on evergreens.
I frown. “I didn’t realize this lair had more than one shower.” In all my visions of this place, I only ever saw a single bedroom with an attached en-suite bathroom, as well as a small living area with a kitchenette and table.
Maybe this isn’t the lair from my visions?I think, glancing around again, frowning.No. No, this is definitely where it all happens…
Grey observes me with his glacial stare. “It doesn’t.”
“Oh.” There’s that word again.Super eloquent, Ash,I mutter to myself.You’re doing great.
“I took a dip outside,” Grey says, still scrutinizing me with his icy gaze. “It was cold, but it got the job done.” He runs his fingers through his damp blond hair, the edges of which reach his massive shoulders. “And no, little riddler. We can’tmeet again.” He pushes away from the wall. “Because we’ve never actuallymet.”
I gape at his back as he heads toward the small table with two chairs. He pulls one out, then glances back at me.
“My name is Grey,” he murmurs. “I’m half V-Clan Alpha, half Z-Clan Alpha. I’m one of Prince Cael’s Elites from Lunar Sector. But, of course, you already know all that. It was on my Alpha candidate card for the mating program.”
He leaves the chair for me and takes the opposite one, his movements reminding me of a stealth panther more than a beastly polar bear.
Which is interesting because Z-Clan Alphas tend to be very large in wolf form—very bearlike. Not catlike.
“Hmm,” I hum, more to myself than to him, because I’m intrigued. I like this Alpha.
Of course, I’ve dreamt of him my whole life, our fates always destined to intertwine.
So I’m slightly biased in my favor.
Still, I appreciate him humoring me.
“I’m Ashlyn, Z-Clan Omega,” I tell him softly as I join him at the table. “I didn’t join the mating program to find a mate, but I suspect you already know that, too.”
“I do,” he murmurs. “Z-Clan wolves rely on fate.” It’s not a question, but a statement.
However, I still feel the need to reply, “Yes.”
He doesn’t immediately comment, instead picking up my bowl and spooning something on it from the pot between us.
Spaghetti, I realize, somewhat amused by his choice.
“You joined the mating pool because you knew something was going to happen to the other Omegas,” he says, again as a statement, not a question. “And to meet me.”
“Yes,” I admit. “But also no.”
That eyebrow of his lifts again, the color the same as his blond hair.
“I participated because I wanted to help the Omegas,” I clarify. “But I didn’t realize you would be there.” That’s why I fell into an icy lake the first time he appeared. That’s not how I predicted we would meet for the first time.
Not that we actually did meet… which he just pointed out.
We barely said anything to each other at all.
He simply jumped into the water and pulled me out of it, then Alpha Cillian escorted me back to the igloos in Glacier Sector.
Maybe that’s our thing, I think.Meeting in ice water.
“Lying is a trait I strongly dislike, Omega,” Grey informs me flatly.
“I’m not lying, Alpha,” I promise him.
