"Well," Tristan said, deliberately breaking the silence with a sharp clatter against the ring post. "If you're legally unattached for the foreseeable future, you need to burn off this wound-up energy before you actually kill someone by accident."
"I need to train harder."
"You need to get laid," Tristan said bluntly. "By someone who doesn't care about your last name, your trust fund, or your territorial alliances. When did you last go anywhere without a security detail?"
"I don't have patience for campus social politics right now." The legacy omegas at the student mixers made my skin crawl — every touch a calculation of my political worth. They didn't want Hayes. They wanted the Heir. "It's a snake pit."
"I didn't say take someone on a romantic date. Use the app." Tristan slapped me on the shoulder. "That's what Knottr was built for. Anonymous, untraceable, politically neutral. The only place on campus where legacy doesn't matter."
"It's a security risk," Chris observed from the bleachers, not missing the tactical flaw. "The encryption is robust, but meeting an anonymous shifter off-campus through a blind geolocation system is a vulnerability."
"You two are exhausting," Tristan groaned. "One of you is trying to carry the entire shifter political structure like a martyr, and the other analyzes a hookup app like a military extraction. Live a little. Before your father chains you to an arranged mate you can't stand to look at."
Tristan's words struck a nerve.
Unbidden, I thought of her.
Wren.
I had watched her from the edges of Northern ballrooms since we were teenagers. Drawn to the quiet resilience in her eyes, the soft vanilla scent that cut through the heavy perfumes. But she had belonged to Trent Hawthorne — locked into an ironclad arrangement before she was old enough to understand what it meant. I'd had to watch his cold, apathetic treatment of her for years, paralyzed by pack law that forbade interfering with another Heir's recognized mate.
And then three weeks ago, Trent had discarded her publicly.
The anger in my chest was sharp and hot every time I thought of what he'd done to her core. The brutal gossip about her broken bond had dominated the legacy circles for weeks. It made me sick.
She was here. Right now. Somewhere on this campus, hiding from the shame he'd deliberately saddled her with.
I had seen her earlier tonight, pressed against the wall at the mixer in an oversized sweater, trying to fold herself into nothing near the emergency exit. The sight had nearly broken my control.
She had bolted the second I spoke to her. Looked at me and seen another Northern monster waiting to judge her.
My chest ached — a deep tug of protective instinct I had no legal or biological right to feel. She wasn't my mate. She wasn't my responsibility. To my father, she was less than nothing.
I couldn't help her. I was useless.
"Fine," I said roughly.
I walked to the bench and pulled my phone from my gym bag. Tristan grinned like he'd won a lottery.
"Set the filters to 'No Questions Asked' and 'Neutral Territory Only.'"
I opened Knottr. The interface was black and sleek — none of the colorful social posturing of regular apps. A utilitarian systembuilt around defining a biological need and finding a secure, anonymous match. Sterile. what I needed to numb the ache.
I logged into my encrypted account and tapped 'Available for Match' to activate my location beacon.
The screen flashed red.
Not a standard match. A Crisis Beacon.
Emergency System Override Match. Unbonded Omega in immediate heat crisis. Proximity: 3 miles. Requirement: Suppression Stabilization. Critical Warning: No claim permitted.
A low growl vibrated in my throat — involuntary, biological, responding to the distress signal of an omega in pain. My aura flared, cracking the air pressure in the gym.
"What is it?" Chris asked sharply, already standing.
"Crisis beacon," I said. "An omega dropped into an early heat. Close proximity."
"In a mixed dorm?" Tristan's smile was gone. "Without a pack to contain the scent, the fever burns out their nervous system in hours. Or a rogue pack smells them first."
