Page 28 of The Forbidden Alpha

“I was just leaving,” Gabe said abruptly. He didn’t even look at Mavy, focusing instead on me as he stood. “Text me and I’ll come over.”

“We just got here, Gabby. At least sit down while we finish our coffee. Mavy won’t bite. Much,” Nikki teased.

“I’m sure Trent can handle that. I have things to do,” Gabe muttered, his voice dropping into a tone he never used with me. He gave my shoulder one last squeeze—a silent I’ve got you—and cut a path through the crowd toward the exits. He moved fast, leaving a wake of uneasy silence behind him.

Mavy sat down slowly in the seat he’d vacated, her gaze lingering on the doors where Gabe had disappeared. She didn’t say anything at first, but the weight of her presence was heavy. She moved for her coffee, her movements precise and elegant.

“He’s lovely today,” Mavy observed, her voice sarcastic. She turned those silver eyes on me, and for a second, her gaze went straight through to the void where my wolf should have been. “And you smell like you’re on edge.”

My stomach turned. I couldn’t tell her about the dream, or the man in the photo, or the sting in my neck.

“It’s the festival,” I said, my voice steadier than I felt. “Everyone is either excited or uneasy. I’m the latter.”

“Some more than others,” Nikki added, pointing her fork toward a group of visiting Alphas who were openly staring at our table. “The vultures are already circling.”

I looked down at my yogurt, the fruit now looking like bruised ink.

“Eat, Ady,” Mavy said. I looked up to find her eyes on mine. “We’re going to need our strength.”

Chapter 16

The afternoon passed like hours do when you’re dreading something—slowly, and then all at once.

Mavy had dubbed my room the dress-up area by noon. By two, everyone’s belongings had overtaken the space. Her dress hung in my closet, the door open, her shoes lined up in a neat row, at attention. Nikki’s bag was large enough to suggest she was moving in, and took up most of my bed—a feat itself. After that, the room stopped being mine entirely.

I didn’t mind. It took my mind off things to be swept up in the craze. I preferred it to sitting alone and counting down the minutes.

The suite smelled of hairspray, new clothes, and the frantic, pheromone-heavy energy of excitement. Nikki leaned back, her eyes narrowed as she applied the final coat of mascara to my lashes. She hadn’t let me look in the mirror for an hour, and the suspense had become its own slow-burning fever. I kept repeating my new mantra in my head: This is just a night. This is just a mask. One night.

“There,” Nikki whispered, a sharp contrast to the dread pooling in my stomach. She squeezed my shoulders and nodded. My legs felt heavy as I stood, but I turned toward the full-length mirror anyway.

I didn’t recognize the woman looking back. The smoky eyes were a dark smudge of defiance; the eyeliner swept into a lethal wing that pointed toward my temple. My hair fell in heavy, luscious waves of perfection. My lips were a plush, taunting pink, and my cheekbones were high and carved by the shadows Nikki had painted onto my skin.

Then there was the dress. It was a marvel of red silk that fell effortlessly and hugged my curves. The neckline dipped into a sweeping V that left my chest exposed to the cool air of the room. The back was nonexistent and dipped dangerously low.

“Oh my Goddess, Adea,” Mavy breathed, stepping up behind me. She was royalty in a floor-length gown, her eyes catching the light in a way that reminded me, not for the first time, that she was her father’s daughter. Something calculated flickered across her face as she looked at me in the dress—a moment of assessment so quick I almost missed it.

“We chose the right one.”

“We did,” Nikki added, adjusting her own dress—a sheer, thigh-length dare that left almost nothing to the imagination. She wasn’t wearing a bra and she was a siren designed to wreck whole fleets.

“Do you think they’ll know?” I whispered, my hand fluttering to my bare throat where a mate-mark should have been. “The visitors? Will they smell the void?”

Nikki paused, her green eyes softening for a second. “They’ll be too busy trying to breathe, babe. Besides, finding a mate isn’t a fairy tale. It’s a hostile takeover. If yours is in that room, he won’t care if you’re wolfless. He’ll just care that you’re his.”

A sharp knock at the door cut our chat short. Mavy’s spine straightened, the Alpha’s daughter mask sliding into place. She opened the door, and the air was sucked from the room.

Shane.

He stood there, dark elegance made solid, his hair slicked back, save for one loose curl. But it was his eyes—usually a dead black, currently flashing with the dangerous gold of his wolf—that pinned me to the spot. His gaze traveled. It was a slow crawl down my body, lingering on the curve of my chest before snapping to mine.

“Brother. You’re early,” Mavy huffed.

All traces of gold vanished, but he ignored her, sauntering over until he was in my personal space. My body went on high alert as he loomed over me. He wrapped a heavy arm around my waist, pulling me flush against the hard planes of his chest. The scent of his cologne tried and failed to mask the scent of rot.

“Words can’t describe how beautiful you are tonight,” he whispered into my ear, his breath warm against my skin. He pressed a lingering kiss to my earlobe, his hand sliding lower to give my hip a firm, possessive squeeze.

I stiffened, my pulse hammering in my neck as my eyes locked on Mavy’s, wide with surprise.