Her eyes are on my nails—specifically, my chipped nail polish.
“I thought you’d have fixed this. The event is tomorrow.”
“Sorry,” I stammer, cheeks heating. “I brought remover—I’ll fix it tonight.”
“Nonsense. I’ll just add you to my manicure.” She drops my hand.
“It’s okay if my nails are painted?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?” she says with a light shrug.
We both know why. But she says it like a challenge to anyone who might protest.
“Thanks,” I murmur as I pull my hand back, hiding it under the table. It’s kind ofmoremortifying that she doesn’t care if my nails are painted, just if they’re paintedbadly. I kick myself for not fixing them earlier.
The waiter sweeps by and drops my soup in front of me, and the aroma of butter and savory lobster fills my mind. Something a lot of betas don’t realize about alphas and omegas is that our senses are all hypersensitive. Smells that would be slightly unpleasant to others are hell to us, and smells like this…
This is heaven.
But the waiter is gone, and there’s nothing in front of Morgan, and I wince. If I’d known she was going to get me the cod, I would have skipped the soup.
I’m pretty sure ordering for someone is supposed to be a red flag, but honestly I’m grateful. She’s my, like, boss’s boss’s boss after all, and this is a work dinner. Technically. Even though it’s only the two of us.
Regardless, there were only ten options on the menu, and I still couldn’t pick one. There wasn’t a single entrée under eighty euros, and I forget the exact conversion, but I’m pretty sure that’s my takeout budget for an entire week.
The soup alone is twenty euros! I was trying not to over-spend, and I ended up doing it anyway. Shit.
I push that aside and try to stop calculating how many sweaters I could buy with however much the bottles of wine are.When in Rome, I tell myself. Then I sort of laugh, since I’m pretty sure wewillbe stopping in Rome.
And this isn’t just any bowl of soup. A drizzle of olive oil creates a delicate spiral ringed with floating pumpkin seeds like a little starburst. The plate under the bowl is similarly embellished with swirls of a golden sauce and a sprinkle of herbs, which add their own delicate aroma.
It tastes even better than it looks. I didn’t even know lobster could taste like this, elevated by a complex blend of herbs adding depth to the flavor.
Two seconds ago, I was horrified anyone would charge twenty euros for a bowl of soup.
Now, I think it’s worth every penny. Pence. Whatever.
This isn’t just food—it’s art.
I glance up, and Morgan’s eyes are tracing me. There’s a fragment of a smug grin on her lips.
“Worth it?” she says, and I realize she’s going to sit there and stare at me eating this soup as punishment for not acknowledging that her saying I was going to get the cod was not a suggestion.
Mom says making guesses like that is called hypervigilance. That both she and I had to get good at predicting alpha behavior to survive Chuck. It takes no effort at all for the familiar gears in my brain to twirl, to find the best path forward.
I give a sheepish smile. “I decided I was hungry after all. And the soup looked too good to pass up.”
I watch Morgan’s face and notice every little twinge of muscle. She knows I’m lying, but she likes my style. The slight crinkle around her eyes says so.
Those brilliant violet eyes. I don’t think Morgan has evertried to pass as a beta, or even considered it. Alphas have far fewer reasons to try to pass, anyway. Even betas give alphas plenty of space.
The assumptions that betas make about alphas work in alphas’ favor. Betas assume they’re powerful, uncompromising, competent.
On the flip side, both betas and alphas—and even other omegas sometimes—assume that omegas are submissive, accommodating, meek. They take it as license to walk all over us.
I’m grateful that Mom is none of those things. She’s self-possessed, principled, determined. She’s kind and understanding, yes, but that hardly justifies taking advantage of someone.
The top part of Morgan’s hair is pulled back in a French twist, the rest cascading down her shoulders. The style shows off her pointed ears, and the tilt of her half-smile seems perfectly calibrated to show off her long canines.
