Three alphas. A pack. It’s not what I planned. It’s not organized or controllable or anything like the careful life I’ve built.
But do they actually want that life? Do they wantme—the real me? The one with the clipboard and the lists and the color-coded anxiety?
Or do they just want the heat-desperate omega who begged them to knot her for four days straight?
Because those are two very different people. And I need to know which one they’re signing up for before I let myself want this.
I’m not running anymore. But I’m not ready to run toward them either.
Not yet.
Outside, the sun is setting, painting the snow in shades of pink and gold. Tomorrow I’ll go back to work. Tomorrow I’ll deal with festival chaos and small-town gossip and the three alphas I can’t stop thinking about.
But tonight, I’m going to sit here in my perfectly organized apartment and feel my feelings like a normal human being.
It’s annoying. It’s inconvenient. It’s completely outside my control.
I’ll figure it out tomorrow.
Chapter 20
Tessa
Friday morning, I’m drowning.
My desk is covered in lists. The vendor spreadsheet is open on my laptop, half the cells highlighted in angry red because confirmations are overdue. My phone keeps buzzing with texts I don’t have time to answer. The Valentine’s fundraiser is one week away, and I lost four days to a blizzard and a heat and three alphas who?—
Nope. Not thinking about that.
I take a sip of my third coffee of the morning and pull up the bachelor auction checklist. Eight bachelors confirmed—including Nate Thorn, who I managed to recruit during that awkward truck ride on. Programs need to be printed by Wednesday. The caterer still hasn’t sent the final menu. The sound system rental company hasn’t returned my calls. And I still need to coordinate with the decorating committee about the stage setup, which should have happened two days ago but didn’t because I was?—
Not. Thinking. About. It.
My phone buzzes again. I glance at the screen.
Milo:Checking in. How are you doing?
I flip the phone face-down without responding. I’ll text him back later. When I have time. When I can figure out what to say.
The knock on my office door makes me jump so hard I nearly spill coffee all over my keyboard.
“Come in,” I call, assuming it’s someone from the events committee. Linda Patterson was supposed to stop by with the stage diagrams, and she’s already twenty minutes late.
Ben Wilson walks through the door.
My whole body goes still.
He’s in his usual work clothes—jeans, flannel, boots that have seen better days. There’s a smudge of grease on his jaw he probably doesn’t know about, and his hair is doing that thing where it sticks up in the back like he’s been running his hands through it. He’s holding my car keys in one hand and a paper bag from Maeve’s bakery in the other.
“Special delivery.” He dangles the keys from one finger, that familiar grin spreading across his face. “One Honda, fully repaired, detailed inside and out. You’re welcome.”
I stare at him.
Two days ago, I bolted out of his cabin without explanation. Two days of silence—no calls, no texts, nothing. And now he’s standing in my office like nothing happened, grinning at me like we’re just... normal. Like I didn’t spend four days in his bed. Like I didn’t run away without looking back.
What is he doing?
My heart does something complicated in my chest. “Ben. I— thank you. What was wrong with it?”
