Chapter 7 — The Alpha's Son
1685 Words
ROMAN
The engine dies.
Felix looks at me.
“Do not smile.”
“I am not smiling.”
“You almost are.”
Iris turns the key.
Nothing.
Again.
A clicking sound.
Her forehead drops against the steering wheel for half a second.
I know that gesture.
I used to kiss the back of her neck when she did it.
Desire cuts through me so unexpectedly that Nox growls.
Felix hears.
“Control yourself.”
“Helpful.”
I walk toward the car.
Slowly.
Hands visible.
The guards start to follow.
I turn my head.
“Stay.”
The command rolls harder than I intend.
Three men stop instantly.
Iris flinches inside the car.
I hate myself for that too.
She opens the driver’s door before I reach her.
“I do not need help.”
Her voice is exactly wrong for how familiar it sounds.
“I didn’t say you did.”
“Your entire body did.”
I almost laugh.
Almost.
The old rhythm is there under five years of damage.
That is dangerous.
“I can call a mechanic.”
“I have a phone.”
“I remember.”
Her eyes sharpen.
Wrong answer.
“Iris—”
“That was five years ago.”
Felix coughs behind me.
I look at him.
He studies the sky.
Coward.
I turn back to her.
“You came for Mara.”
“Yes.”
“Four days?”
“How do you know that?”
“Mara told security.”
“Of course she did.”
“I did not ask for your schedule.”
“I did not accuse you.”
“You were about to.”
“I was thinking about it.”
There she is.
She is more than the woman from the ceremony.
More than the memory I have punished myself with for five years.
Iris.
Alive.
Angry.
Close enough that I can see a faint scar near her chin I do not remember.
I want to ask where it came from.
I want to ask everything.
The second scent hits me again.
Blackwood.
Nox pushes one word into my mind.
Ours.
My lungs lock.
No.
Iris sees my face change.
She moves immediately between me and the rear door.
That tells me more than any confession could.
A young guard takes one curious step closer.
His nose flares.
“Alpha, the boy—”
“No.”
The word cracks through the lane.
The guard stops.
Iris’s eyes flash.
“Do not discuss my child.”
My child.
She said my child.
The possessive lands like a wall between us.
I look at the tinted rear window.
“How old is—”
“Do not.”
I stop.
She is breathing too fast.
So am I.
Felix finally approaches.
“Iris.”
Her face changes when she sees him.
Her face does not soften, but some of the danger leaves it.
Safer.
I feel jealousy before shame can catch it.
Ridiculous.
Felix is marrying her sister in two days.
* * *
IRIS
“Theo, wait.”
Too late.
The rear door opens.
My son climbs out of the car with one shoe untied, his dinosaur tucked under his arm, and absolutely no idea that he has just stepped into the center of the secret I built my life around.
He looks at Felix first.
“Uncle Felix!”
Felix’s face breaks into a smile.
“Hey, trouble.”
Theo runs two steps toward him.
Then stops.
Roman is standing between them.
For a moment, nobody moves.
I have imagined this scene in nightmares.
Roman furious.
Roman accusing.
Roman demanding.
Roman taking one look at Theo and knowing.
I never imagined Theo would be holding a green plastic dinosaur with a missing tail.
Children ruin dramatic moments simply by existing inside them.
Theo tilts his head.
Roman’s eyes are silver.
So are Theo’s.
My stomach drops.
Theo points.
“Your eyes do the shiny thing.”
Roman makes a sound I cannot identify.
Felix looks away.
Coward.
“Theo,” I say.
He turns to me.
“What?”
“Come here.”
“But his eyes.”
“I can see them.”
“Mine do that.”
“Yes.”
Roman’s gaze never leaves my son.
Nox is so close to the surface I can smell the change in him.
Theo smells it too.
His little nose wrinkles.
“You smell weird.”
Felix chokes.
Roman finally blinks.
“I have been told worse.”
“By my mom?”
This time Felix actually turns around.
I close my eyes.
“Theo.”
“What? You know him.”
Roman looks at me.
Every old thing between us seems to enter the space at once.
Love.
Betrayal.
The last night through my window.
The applause.
The letter.
Five years of silence.
“Yes,” I say. “I know him.”
Theo looks back at Roman.
“What’s your name?”
Roman’s face changes again.
“Roman.”
“Roman what?”
“Blackwood.”
Theo considers this.
“Mom knows a lot of Blackwoods?”
“No.”
Roman’s voice is rough.
“Not a lot.”
I step closer.
“Theo, bathroom. Now.”
“That’s why I got out.”
“Excellent. We have rediscovered the plot.”
Felix laughs and points toward the checkpoint building.
“I’ll take him.”
“No.”
Roman and I say it at the same time.
We look at each other.
Theo looks delighted.
“You both said it.”
“I’ll take you,” I tell him.
Roman steps back.
Immediately.
That surprises me enough to notice.
He does not touch Theo.
Does not ask again how old he is.
Does not order anyone to stop us.
He just watches as I take my son’s hand.
We are almost at the checkpoint door when the young guard from earlier speaks behind us.
“Alpha, should I update the family access list?”
I stop walking.
Roman’s voice comes cold enough to frost the road.
“No.”
“But the child’s scent—”
“I said no.”
Power rolls through the lane.
Theo squeezes my hand.
“Mom?”
“It’s okay.”
I turn.
Roman is looking at the guard, not at us.
“No one discusses the child,” he says. “No one adds a name to any file. No one changes a guest record. Is that clear?”
Every guard answers at once.
“Yes, Alpha.”
My heart beats painfully.
Roman looks at me then.
He does not ask whether I approve.
He cannot undo the power he has.
But for once, he uses it to close a door instead of trapping me behind one.
I hate that I notice.
Inside the restroom, Theo washes his hands for approximately four seconds.
“Soap. Again.”
“I used soap.”
“For four seconds.”
He sighs like a man paying taxes and starts again.
Felix gets us to the Alpha House. Mara meets Theo on the steps, crying and laughing at once. For a few minutes I can pretend I came only for a wedding.
Theo pats both our backs.
“Everyone is crying.”
Mara pulls away and wipes her face.
“It’s a wedding. We paid for this.”
Inside, the reception hall is chaos.
Flowers. Boxes. Chairs. Relatives. Felix being ordered in three directions at once.
Theo disappears for ninety seconds and returns with two pastries.
“Only one,” I say.
“One in each hand.”
“That is not how numbers work.”
“It is how hands work.”
Mara laughs.
For five whole minutes, I breathe.
Then the main doors open.
Every conversation lowers.
Roman walks in.
He changed coats.
I hate that I notice.
Theo notices something else.
“Why did everybody move?”
“Because he’s the Alpha,” Felix says.
“That seems inconvenient.”
Roman hears him.
Of course he does.
His mouth almost smiles.
Then his gaze finds Theo.
The almost-smile disappears.
Felix goes to meet him near the doors.
Roman speaks quietly.
Too quietly for a human.
Not too quietly for me.
“How old is the boy?”
Felix does not answer.
I set the pastry plate down before I drop it.
Roman’s eyes lift and find mine across the room.
He does not look angry.
That would be easier.
He looks terrified.
He crosses the room, then stops several feet away from me as if the distance is something I placed there physically.
“Iris.”
“Don’t.”
His gaze flicks once toward Theo, who is arguing with Mara about whether two pastries count as one serving.
“How old is he?”
I have spent five years imagining Roman asking that question.
In every version, I am stronger than this.
“Five.”
The word hits him harder than any blow I have ever seen him take.
Nox surges so violently that silver floods Roman’s eyes.
“Five,” he repeats.
“Yes.”
His face empties.
Then something ugly and broken replaces it.
“You were pregnant when you left.”
Anger saves me from shaking.
“I was pregnant when you banished me.”
“I didn’t banish—”
“Not here.”
“Did you know?” he asks.
I stare at him.
The question is so obscene I almost laugh.
“I sent you the medical confirmation the day I found out.”
Roman goes completely still.
“No.”
“Don’t you dare.”
“Iris, I never received anything from you.”
The room seems to tilt.
I hear the courier again in my memory: Private correspondence received — Alpha House.
I see the delivery receipt I kept for five years because pain sometimes needs paperwork.
“It was delivered at four twenty-three,” I say. “To your house. Marked private. With proof that I was carrying your child.”
Roman’s face loses all color.
“What letter?”
- Writer
- chap_listContents
- likeADD