Page 154 of Beautifully Scarred Omega

Her heels are kicked off on the floor, her legs curled beneath her in the oversized seat. In her hands—pressed against her face, her nose buried in the fabric—is my scarf. The gray cashmere one I leave draped over the back of the chair because the office gets cold in the mornings.

She doesn’t hear me open the door.

I stand there and watch her.

She’s breathing it in. Eyes closed and lips slightly parted.

Then she sees me, and the scarf drops from her hands. It lands on the desk between us, a rumpled heap of gray cashmere that might as well be a confession.

“Ethan.” She straightens in the chair. Her hands move to the desk like she’s about to explain something with a spreadsheet. “I was just⁠—”

“Sophie.” I step into the office, and I can’t keep the amusement out of my voice. I close the door halfway. “What are you doing?”

“Nothing.” The word comes out too fast, and the look on her face says she knows exactly how unconvincing she sounds. Color climbs her neck—I can see it in the lamplight, a flush that starts below her collarbone and moves upward, reaching her jaw and her cheeks.

“I was checking something. In the office. For the investigation.” She pauses, then her shoulders drop. “Okay. I was smelling your scarf.”

“I saw.” I lean against the doorframe and cross my arms.

She closes her eyes for a second, like she’s bracing herself. “I just needed a minute. Away from the crowd, from all the noise. And your office was quiet, and the scarf was on the chair, and it smelled like you, and I just—” She stops and looks up at me, half defiant, half mortified. “I picked it up. And I couldn’t put it down.”

My throat tightens and doesn’t let go.

“Because I like the way you smell,” she admits, quieter now, her fingers picking at the hem of her dress. “Your scent. I can’t always catch it through the suppressants, but it gets into the fabric, and it’s—” She shakes her head. “I like it. I like it a lot.”

“Yeah?” I ask her, softly. I close the door behind me—all the way this time.

She nods.

“Well, if you’re taking requests, the sweater on the couch has a higher concentration. I wore it yesterday.”

She laughs, her fingers curling around the arm of the chair. “You’re not supposed to encourage this, Ethan.”

“On the contrary. I happen to know what it’s like to want someone’s scent so badly it overrides your better judgment.” I cross the office and lean against the edge of the desk beside her, close enough that the lamplight catches us both in its warm circle. I can see the faint sheen of sweat at her temples and smell her shampoo, along with something underneath it that isn’t shampoo at all. “Plus, I’m a scientist. I’m supposed to optimize outcomes. If the objective is my scent, I can suggest more efficient delivery methods than my scarf.”

The laughter fades. She looks up at me, and the air between us changes. The flush is still there, but her eyes have gone dark—the pupils widening as I watch, her gaze dropping to my mouth and back up again in a movement she doesn’t try to hide.

“Ethan.” Her voice is soft, barely there.

“Sophie.”

“I wasn’t just smelling your scarf.”

“No?”

“I was thinking about you.” She holds my gaze. “The archive room. Your hands on me. And—” She pauses and wets her lips. “What you told me you’ve been wondering about.”

I’ve been wondering what you’d taste like. What you’d look like. What you’d feel like.

Heat floods my chest, my stomach, lower. My skin prickles like the air pressure in the room has dropped, and every nerve I have orients toward her like a compass needle finding north.

“Sophie...” The word comes out low and rough, barely more than breath. “You shouldn’t say things like that.”

Her eyes widen and the warmth drains from her face.

“Sorry.” She stands up from the chair. “I didn’t mean⁠—”

The embarrassment in her voice cuts through the fog in my head like a blade.