The Billionaire Alpha's Hidden Luna

Chapter 10: Expensive Flowers

CHAPTER TEN: Expensive Flowers

Emily Hart spent the next three days trying very, highly hard not to think about Ryan Blackwood.

Unfortunately, Ryan Blackwood made that entirely impossible.

Every single place she looked in the city, something persistently reminded her of him. The artisanal designer coffee she couldn't afford to buy. The expensive tailored suits she saw on businessmen downtown. The ridiculous, rich laugh she kept hearing on a loop inside her own head. The baffling fact that he had randomly paid off her mother's active hospital bill through a blind trust.

The man was rapidly becoming a massive problem. A very attractive problem. Which was somehow ten times worse.

Emily let out a heavy, defeated sigh and buried her face flat into her open literature textbook.

Across the small dorm table, Sophie Martinez watched her with deeply narrowed eyes. "You're doing it again."

Emily looked up from the pages, adjusting her frames. "Doing what?"

"Staring blankly into empty space and smiling like a complete idiot."

"I was absolutely, unconditionally not smiling, Soph."

"You completely were, Em."

Emily immediately looked profoundly offended. Sophie pointed a manicured finger right at her face. "There. Right there."

"What?"

"The literal smile."

"There is no smile on my face, Sophie."

"There is. It's a total crush smile."

Emily aggressively threw a pencil across the table. Sophie caught it out of mid-air with fluid, effortless grace. Years of intense roommate friendship had thoroughly prepared her for violent moments like this.

The university library space around them was completely quiet. Peaceful. For approximately three whole seconds.

Then, Emily's phone began to vibrate loudly against the wood. Both women uniformly looked down at the illuminated digital screen.

Unknown Number.

Emily frowned, her eyebrows knitting together. "Don't answer it. It's probably a telemarketer."

"Answer it right now," Sophie whispered loudly, leaning over the table. "What if it's a scam?"

"What if it's Ryan Blackwood?"

Emily answered the call immediately. Sophie gasped dramatically, placing a hand over her mouth. Traitor. Absolute traitor.

"Hello?" Emily spoke into the receiver.

A cheerful, professional voice responded on the other end. "Good afternoon, Miss Hart. We currently have a private courier delivery waiting for you outside your building."

Emily blinked, thoroughly confused. "A delivery? For me?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Are you entirely sure you have the right address?"

The delivery man let out a soft laugh. "Quite sure, Miss Hart. If you could come down to the courtyard."

Twenty minutes later, Emily Hart deeply regretted every single life decision she had ever made.

Because she was currently standing outside the dormitory entrance, completely surrounded by flowers. Not one modest bouquet. Not two standard vases. An entire botanical arrangement. The thing was absolutely enormous. Huge. Possibly sentient and plotting to take over the quad.

Students traveling to their afternoon lectures slowed down significantly as they walked past, staring open-mouthed. Whispering. Taking high-definition digital pictures on their phones. Emily wanted the earth to split open a crack and let her disappear immediately.

A tiny, elegant cream card rested right among the yellow petals. Her hands shook slightly as her fingers opened the seal. The typed message inside was incredibly short.

Your mother mentioned yellow roses are your favorite.

Nothing else. No name attached. No digital signature. No corporate explanation.

Emily stared blankly at the words. Then, she let out a loud, miserable groan. Because she knew exactly which brown-eyed predator had sent them.

Across town, inside the top-floor boardroom of Blackwood Industries, Ryan was in a meeting. A very important, high-stakes meeting.

Millions of dollars in venture capital were currently being debated by data analysts. Global investors waited anxiously for answers. Corporate executives waited for binding decisions.

And sitting directly beside him, Lucas waited for a shred of patience. Unfortunately, Ryan’s patience was rapidly running out.

"You're doing it again," Lucas’s low frequency voice drifted into Ryan’s ear link.

Ryan looked up from his digital tablet. The entire corporate boardroom instantly went dead silent at the Alpha’s movement.

Lucas sat across from him, completely, utterly unimpressed by the Alpha presence. "You're smiling again, chief."

Ryan frowned, his jaw tightening into a stern line. "I am not."

"You are."

"No, Lucas."

"You literally just sent a botanical garden to a university dorm, Alpha."

Ryan just stared at him, his dark eyes leveling a lethal warning.

Several senior executives around the glass table suddenly became profoundly, intensely fascinated by the margins on their paper documents. Cowards. Every single one of them.

"Lucas," Ryan muttered, a dangerous rumble vibrating in his throat.

"You sent yellow roses," Lucas repeated, unbothered.

Ryan remained suspiciously silent. Lucas leaned back into his leather chair, a low groan escaping his lips. "Oh, this is exceptionally bad."

Ryan’s eyes narrowed into slits. "What exactly is bad?"

"You actually like her," Lucas pointed a finger, his gray eyes steady. "The untouchable Alpha is caught."

The boardroom somehow became even quieter. The corporate staff looked ready to faint from the dropping air pressure. Ryan considered denying the accusation, but then he remembered Lucas wasn't stupid. Unfortunately.

"I simply enjoy her company," Ryan murmured coldly, turning his gaze back to his tablet.

Lucas let out a genuine chuckle. "That is classic Alpha language for 'I am in massive corporate trouble.'"

Ryan aggressively returned his attention to the financial data. Mostly because he absolutely hated how accurate his Beta sounded.

Meanwhile, Emily marched straight into the hospital wing, carrying a trimmed selection of the massive rose arrangement.

Half of the desk nurses smiled warmly at her as she passed, while the other half stared in absolute awe at the sheer quality of the yellow petals. One nurse even took a quick picture on her tablet. Emily pretended to be completely blind to the attention.

Her mother, Elena Hart, was sitting completely upright in the bed when she entered Room 402. She looked significantly stronger than she had in days, a hint of color returning to her cheeks. The beautiful sight immediately eased a massive layer of Emily's daily anxiety.

"Wow," Elena blinked, her eyes tracking her daughter. "What is all that?"

Emily placed the yellow roses down on the bedside table with a soft thud. "You've officially got some heavy competition, Mom."

For a brief second, her mother looked entirely confused. Then, her gaze noticed the specific yellow roses, and a smile slowly spread across her frail face. Slow. Knowing. Highly dangerous.

"Oh," Elena whispered.

Emily immediately recognized that exact maternal look and hated it. "Don't."

"Don't do what, sweetheart?"

"Whatever romantic storyline you are currently writing in your head."

Her mother looked completely innocent. Suspiciously, terribly innocent. Emily pointed an accusing finger at her. "That face."

"What face?"

"That exact face, Mom. Stop it."

The maternal smile only widened. Emily groaned, dropping her head against the edge of the mattress. "Mom, please."

"He seems incredibly sweet, Emily," Elena murmured gently.

Emily nearly choked on her own saliva. "He paid your entire active treatment balance under a blind trust, Mom. He's an invasive billionaire."

"He helped us when we were drowning, Emily."

"He sent an entire field of flowers to my dorm."

"They are absolutely beautiful, darling."

"Mom!"

Elena laughed softly, the rich, warm sound filling the sterile hospital room. Comforting. Intensely familiar. Emily hadn't realized how much her soul had missed hearing that laugh over the last two years of sickness.

Then, suddenly, the beautiful moment fractured.

Her mother winced sharply, her eyes closing as a tiny, instantaneous flicker of intense pain crossed her features. It was gone almost a microsecond later, masked by another forced smile, but Emily’s heightened vision caught it perfectly.

The smile instantly vanished from Emily's face, her chest tightening. "Mom? What's wrong?"

"I'm perfectly fine, Emily," the answer came far too quickly. Too automatically.

Emily's stomach tightened into a hard knot of dread. Because lately... her mother seemed deeply tired all the time. Not normal, human exhaustion. Something much deeper. Something systemically wrong inside her cells. The human doctors couldn't explain the degradation. the medications weren't holding it back. Nothing seemed to help anymore. And that silent unknown terrified Emily far more than she ever admitted out loud.

That exact evening, Ryan Blackwood picked her up outside the campus gates for dinner.

Not an agency-arranged meeting. Not a corporate business function. Just a regular, ordinary dinner. Which somehow felt ten times more dangerous to Emily’s heart.

Emily climbed into the passenger seat of the sleek, dark luxury vehicle, her navy gown catching on the door sill before she adjusted it. She immediately noticed something unusual about the front cab.

"There's no private driver?" she asked, turning to him.

Ryan glanced at her, his hands gripping the leather steering wheel. "No."

"You actually drive yourself around the city?"

"Sometimes, yes."

Emily looked thoroughly impressed by the information. Ryan felt an absurd, ridiculous surge of pride wash over his beast at her expression. "Wow," she murmured.

The corner of his lips twitched. "What?"

"I honestly just assumed billionaires magically appeared at places via a corporate portal."

For a silent moment, Ryan said nothing, navigating the city traffic. Then, he deadpanned, "I usually teleport. The car is just for show."

Emily nodded with absolute seriousness. "Honestly, that makes significantly more sense."

Ryan burst out laughing, the deep, chest-rumbling sound echoing beautifully through the quiet interior of the car. And suddenly... neither of them noticed how entirely natural it felt to be sitting next to each other. A comfortable, warm silence settled over the leather seats—the rare kind of silence that only ever existed when two people genuinely, deeply enjoyed each other's presence.

Then, Emily turned her head to look out the dark window, her expression turning thoughtful. "Can I ask you something, Ryan?"

Ryan nodded his head, his tone soft. "Anything."

She hesitated, her fingers twisting the fabric of her dress, then blurted it out. "Why are you so lonely?"

The question hit his chest like a physical punch, knocking the breath right out of his lungs. Ryan's hands froze on the steering wheel, his frame turning to stone.

Emily immediately, intensely regretted the words the second they left her mouth. "Oh my God," she covered her face with her hands, her cheeks burning. "That sounded horribly rude. I'm sorry."

Ryan remained perfectly, completely silent as he drove.

Emily wanted to open the door and jump out of the moving vehicle into the street. Possibly twice. "I didn't mean to pry, I just—"

"No," his velvet voice was incredibly quiet, cutting through her panic.

She peeked through her fingers, looking over at his profile. Ryan's dark eyes remained fixed entirely on the road ahead, his jaw clenched.

"No one has ever asked me that question before, Emily," he whispered.

The honest answer surprised her. A lot. Because surely, with all his success, people asked him personal things? Didn't they?

Then again... maybe they didn't. Maybe the world only ever saw the untouchable billionaire. The powerful Alpha corporate king. The success metrics. Nobody ever bothered to look at the vulnerable man underneath the walls.

Ryan exhaled a long, heavy breath through his nose. "You can buy a lot of things in this life, Emily."

Emily blinked, her hands dropping to her lap.

"You can buy luxury houses," his grip tightened firmly on the leather wheel. "Global companies. Fleet cars." Another heavy pause stretched. "But you can never buy a real person."

For the very first time since walking into his office building, Emily saw something rawly vulnerable shifting beneath his armor. Small. Deeply hidden. Painful.

And suddenly... her soul understood. Ryan Blackwood wasn't lonely because he lacked a crowd. He was lonely because absolutely nobody in his massive kingdom truly knew the man behind the crown.

The profound realization sat quietly between them in the car. Neither of them spoke a word. Neither of them needed to anymore.

Meanwhile, miles away across the dark grid of the city...

A private investigator stepped into a luxury penthouse suite and calmly placed a thick manila file onto Vanessa Sterling's vanity desk.

Vanessa opened the cover with her sharp, manicured nails. She read the very first page of the background data.

Then, a slow, cold smile spread across her beautiful face. A dangerous, toxic smile. Because her investigator had finally found a crack in the wall. Something hidden about the background of Emily Hart. Something incredibly interesting. Something highly useful.

Vanessa stared down at the surveillance photograph attached to the file registry. Then, she whispered into the dark room: "Well..."

Her toxic smile widened, her eyes gleaming with absolute malice. "This changes absolutely everything."