Sitting across from Syrus at the small patio table, I let myself take a deep breath of his scent. I’m taking the best scent blockers money can buy, and I’m still grateful for the slick wicking boxers I’m wearing.
I can feel it slide down my cock, and my asshole clenches as I shift in place. My natural scent is sweet and very strong. I’ve diluted it to the point where it’s barely there. So many sacrifices, I hardly remember it until I go off my blockers.
Get it together, Izzy.Fuck. I need to remember what’s at stake, and why I’m here to begin with.
I want to spill my story to this steadfast beta that gazes at me with patience and suspicion, but that might compromise my mission. There are too many people counting on my team to figure this out. The omegas that keep going missing deserve to be found, and I can’t fuck this up.
So instead, I plan to tell him just enough for him to be intrigued.
Syrus
Isidro’s nostrils flare as he stares at me before he forces himselfto take a bite of the cake in front of him.
Was he smelling me just now?That’s weird, right?
He ignores me as he chews the bite he pulled off his fork with his teeth, and his low groan as the flavors hit his tongue makes my dick twitch.
Nope, not interested.The beta in front of me is trouble. There’s too many unknown factors, and I’m focused on that. I’ll compartmentalize and then send him and his friends on their way once I know what their impact will be on my town.
I can’t help my possessive thoughts, it’s why I have to rein myself in so hard when it comes to Silva. I don’t need a distraction. As hot as Isidro is, that’s what he is.
“Stop fucking the cake with your tongue and talk,” I grunt, sliding my fork through the dessert and taking a bite.
Goddamn, Mrs. Hall really does know how to bake a cake. Fuck that’s good.
“Your eyes just crossed, asshole,” Isidro chuckles darkly. “Don’t tease me about how fucking good this is.”
“Mrs. Hall is a treasure,” I grunt, cracking open the lid of a bottle of water and taking a sip. “So why our town? We’re out of the way of all the tourist towns. Fuck, we’re barely on the map at all.”
“I noticed,” he mutters. “Look, you kind of mentioned there were lower crime rates here than other places, so I’m going to go out on a limb and assume you worked as a cop once in a larger city.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Seattle chewed me up and spit me out. I worked on the force there for six years, and left with a healthy amount of distrust for just about everyone I worked with. If you had enough money, it talked loud enough to get you out of anything.”
“I’m not part of an organization or police department due to the corruption I’ve seen previously. I’d rather work with a small team to track down leads and find justice,” Isidro says.
He keeps his eyes on his emotional support dessert, pushing the words out with effort. I let him avoid eye contact as he tells me his story, filling in the gaps myself. If he’s rogue, that could bring trouble here.
I know first hand that law enforcement doesn’t like when people poke their noses in places it doesn’t belong.
“And what kind of justice is that?” I ask, indulging in another bite of cake.
I have a lot of questions I don’t have answers to, and I can’t bombard him with all of them or I’ll spook him. The best option I have is to keep my mouth busy…with dessert.
“The one where the people responsible disappear,” Isidro shrugs, his dark eyes filled with humor as he flicks his gaze up to me. “Sometimes, the issue is following the breadcrumbs of a case gone cold. That’s why we work on it in the background, hoping that we’ll get a chance to warm it up enough to follow a trail.”
“And let me guess, this so-called case is bringing you here?” I scoff.
Nerves twist my stomach, and I think about Silva and the founders of Widows Peak. Does this have something to do with them
“It did,” he admits. “I don’t have any credentials to prove this since we’re ghosts in the system, but I am telling the truth.”
“Is there a reason you don’t have a scent?” I ask, changing the subject to make him off balance. “Hiding your scent definitely doesn’t help your case.”
“I’m not doing that,” Isidro says, confusion moving across his features. It feels feigned in a way, though with the wind blowing in my direction, I can faintly smell gingerbread and pumpkin.
We’re too early in the season for gingerbread, but Mrs. Hall is still baking pumpkin desserts. Isidro is an enigma, because he can’t entirely blame the bakery for what I’m smelling.
If anything, his reason for being here makes me even more likely to overthink everything about him.
