I purse my lips to keep from blurting out my order. Giving me the chance to settle my excitement and to savour the experience. I knew this could happen—everyone does—I just never expected to meet my scent-matched Alpha in the middle of my favourite coffee shop.
“Name?” Ayden asks, looking at me. His voice is as rich and deep as his brown eyes. Shockingly, he blushes too—how freaking perfect can he be?
A small lick of colour settles on his cheeks and has me locking my knees to stop a full-blown tremble rattling through me. A chance to touch him is the only thing holding me together.
“Heidi.” I offer my hand. “Heidi Holmes.”
My heart gallops as his hand wraps around mine. His skin is warm, his hold firm. He completely bamboozles me, and it’s only when the man waiting behind me releases a loud frustrated sigh that I remember where I am. But before my guards can get over-the-top protective and before I get lost in Ayden’s presence again, I order and pay in a rush of words before moving to the waiting area. I feel like I have to, to get my pulse to settle down so I don’t hyperventilate or faint.
I never really believed in love at first sight. My parents would argue it’s never been scientifically proven, but meeting Ayden it’s pretty obvious I might need to research the concept.
Life keeps happening around me, and I don’t worry at all when my security team splits up to do their customary checks. While they do, I keep trailing my fingers—still covered in his scent—over my lips, making them tingle.
Ayden appears in front of me like a mirage, minus his cute apron.
“Did you quit already?” I ask, trying for funny, but my voice comes out strangely husky.
The colour of his brown eyes deepens before they flare, like he’s not getting what I’m saying while another tint of colour hits his cheeks. I like thinking he’s feeling out of sorts like me; it’s confirmation I’m not making this up.
I get a little distracted by the size of his hands again. As with the apron earlier, seeing him holding my regular coffee cup resembles a giant holding a thimble.
He moves at the same time I do, and our hands act like they have a mind of their own, so it’s more than a brush.
“Heidi… I—” His voice gets drowned out by the surging and erratic beat of my heart.
I can’t talk, I can only feel. The noise in my ears, the buzz of static over my body, the growing fuzz in my senses all but confirms what I was hoping I wasn’t imagining.
Ayden leans closer when I don’t answer. His breath fans over my face, and my mouth waters at his unique delicious scent, a mix of musk and earth, with crisp cedar thrown in to make me completely obsessed. Everything about him screams how right an Alpha he is for me, and I swear we both move like magnets closing more of the distance between us.
The sweet moment is blown out of the water when Bradley rushes inside looking like he swallowed a Habanero chilli. “We need to go.”
I’m well versed in how to act under the direction of a security team. More experienced in what to do in an emergency than how to act in front of a scent-matched Alpha. My reaction is automatic, and I’m spinning to leave without being aware of what I’m doing, but he nabs my retreating hand.
And that has me smiling wide, like at the end of a rom-com.
“Will you please come tomorrow? Same time,” he asks, walking me towards the door, his eyes fill with that sweet stuff Alphas are born with: dominance. And I feel myself responding, which isn’t at all confusing or troubling, it’s nature in its truest form—we’re genetically compatible after all.
“We’ll see,” I answer, throwing a cheeky wink.
“Heidi, you’ll be there. I’ll mark it reserved.” He points his finger towards a table in the corner.
His sharp request makes me go crossed-eyed as I melt under his Alpha tone.
“I guess we’re having a date then,” I reply, smiling before I let Bradley sweep me away.
I promise myself I’ll get better at being around him.
ChapterTwo
Marquee becomes immortalised as the place I fell in love. I mean, I’m no expert in falling in love, and I’m younger than I thought I would be when it happened, but if you go by all the cues explained to us by romance authors around the world, it’s happening.
My stomach twists and turns with a hundred fluttering butterflies whenever I think of Ayden. I say his name and I can see his features, smell his cedar inspired scent, and hear his voice. And each time I see him, I feel tipsy like the first time I drank champagne. Even after a couple of weeks I already know that he is the one. All my thoughts leap past us getting to know each other more and straight to the end of our story, because he feels so damn right.
Our secret love affair is a precious gift. And as much as Ayden doesn’t want me telling anyone, I don’t want to share the smallest part of us with anyone either. I wouldn’t say our relationship is a secret, more I think we’re caught up in this beautiful, intense romance that is all about him and me, the rest of the world keeps happening around us but we’re focusing on us.
No one at Verdune asks if I’m in love or if I’ve met my compatible Alpha because no one I work with is interested in anything about me. Margot and Allan are so busy doing what they always do, I swear sometimes they don’t even know I’m in the same room.
I can vividly remember how anxious I was when I walked in one night only a few weeks ago and both my parents were already seated and waiting in our formal dining room. I completely freaked out, wondering if they’d be able to scent my happiness or the lingering thrill that coated my skin after one of Ayden’s kisses. But they didn’t say a word.
