"I hate that she’s your scent match."
"That too," Drake allows. "You're allowed to feel that."
"Ragon says I'm not allowed to feel anything unless it's respectful."
"Ragon is scared shitless," he says. "Doesn't excuse him. Just explains some things."
"Do you think she's going to like him?" I ask, viciously curious. "Your terrifying head alpha?"
Drake huffs a genuine laugh. "She already called him 'Alpha' by accident. He looked like someone slapped him with a warm blanket."
I picture it. The tiny, soft omega looking up at him with big eyes and calling him Alpha. Something ugly moves under my skin.
"Great," I mutter. "I'll start embroidering the wedding napkins."
Drake drops his hands and steps back, rubbing theback of his neck. "We're not bonding anyone today. Today is just day one."
Day one.
Of what, I don't know.
All I know is the house smells different now. And no matter how many times they sayyou're staying, I can't shake the fear that I've just watched the beginning of my own phasing out.
I lift the cold tea to my lips and swallow, grimacing.
It tastes like sugar and bitterness and the faintest hint of jasmine.
Chapter 4
Consciousness comes slowly, carrying with it the sweet ache of being thoroughly wanted.
Not hurt. Not damaged. Just that deep, everywhere soreness that says someone reminded me exactly how much they needed me. Twice, if memory serves—Eli's knot locking us together in the dark while I shook apart in his arms.
For a few precious seconds, I exist in that hazy space between sleep and waking where nothing else matters. No Marie down the hall. No reshuffled future. No scent match waiting to eclipse me.
Just warmth at my back and an arm around my waist, breath slow and even against my neck.
I let myself float.
His scent wraps around me—tea and linen and that quiet sweetness that's always meant safety. My body, traitorous thing, melts into him the way it always does, muscles unknotting despite the pleasant ache in my thighs.
We didn't plan what happened last night. Or maybe we did. Maybe we were already halfway there the moment he climbed into my nest to hold me while I fell apart.
It wasn't gentle, what we did. But it wasn't rough either. Desperate, maybe. A wordlessargument against the idea that I'm already half-replaced. Stubborn, physical proof that someone here still wants me badly enough to forget how to breathe.
I'm not naive enough to read promises into sex. Not anymore. But I'm petty enough to cling to the fact that when everything felt like it was crumbling, Eli chose my bed.
He's warm. Heavy. Real.
I shift slightly and a muscle protests. "Ow."
"Sorry," he mumbles, voice thick with sleep. His arm tightens briefly before loosening. "Did I squish you?"
"Just reminding me I have thighs."
A soft laugh tickles my neck. "I like your thighs."
Heat floods my cheeks. My instincts preen, rolling in the praise like cats in sunshine.
