Page 11 of The CEO Alpha’s Substitute Mate

My hand comes off her throat.

She’s past me before I’ve fully turned. Luca stands at the corner of the hall in pajamas with a sock on one foot, rubbing his eye with the heel of his hand. She’s on her knees in front of him inside two seconds.

“Baby, how are you feeling? Are you thirsty?”

“My head’s better.” He’s looking over her shoulder at me the whole time. “Who’s that?”

She answers faster than I expect. “He’s a friend of mine. He came by to check on you because you weren’t well.”

The boy holds my eyes, which most adults can’t manage. “Is he your boyfriend?”

“No.” A strangled laugh escapes her. “Luca, he’s not my boyfriend. God forbid.”

I feel I should be a little insulted.

“Tobias’s mom says you really need to get one.”

She pinches his cheek lightly. “This is neither the time nor the place, buddy.”

He ducks out from under her hand and turns his whole attention on me. “Who are you?”

“My name is Callum Vance.”

He takes in my outfit. “You look rich.”

“I am.”

He goes quiet after that. Then he moves one small step sideways until he’s standing in front of her knees with his shoulders squared at me. She hasn’t noticed it because she has both hands on his arms and she’s checking his temperature with her cheek. I’ve been in rooms where grown men make that move and get it wrong. He’s six years old, he came through the first convulsion of his life just minutes ago, and he has put his body between a stranger and his mother without anybody teaching him how.

There’s alpha in that blood, and it’s already awake, which is the exact problem the protocol was built to hold back.

I look at the two of them, already reevaluating. He’s too possessive of her. Separating them might not be in the boy’s best interests. At least not yet.

I take a card out of my inside pocket and set it on the table by the door, then cross the room to the two of them. Ariela immediately tries to push him behind her, but she’s too late. Three hairs come away between my thumb and forefinger with the roots attached. Luca yelps, clapping a hand over the spot.

“What are you doing?” She slaps my wrist hard enough to sting, gets an arm around the boy, and pulls him behind her hip. “What is wrong with you?”

I hold the hairs up between two fingers. “What you wanted.”

“You could have asked!”

I straighten and slide the hairs into an envelope out of my pocket, sealing it against my thigh. “I’ll be back tomorrow with the result. You should know that I already have it.” I look at her over the boy’s head. “This is so those friends of yours ‘in high places’ have nothing to complain about.”

She goes red from her collar to her hairline, which tells me everything worth knowing about the friends. I let myself out.

The chain goes back on behind me before I’ve reached the top of the stairs, so I stop where I am. Then I listen to the boy, who’s close to the other side of that door.

“Who is he really?” he says.

“He’s nobody important, baby. Come let me take your temperature.”

I stand there for a few more minutes, trying to reconcile the events of tonight. I have to get my emotions in check before I go down to the car.

Petrov has the door open before I reach the pavement. I get in and don’t tell him to move. Damien answers on the first ring.

“Well?”

“It’s him.”