The Alpha Imposter Wife

Chapter 5: He Does Not Ask

NORA POV

"Don't say anything" I muttered sideways at Dana without moving my lips much.

"I wasn't going to" she whispered back.

Rhett was already moving. Coming down the steps toward us, one hand in his jacket pocket, no hurry in his stride at all, like two women standing frozen at the bottom of his steps at sunrise was something that happened every morning.

My brain was going very fast. Cousin. Old friend. Distant relative passing through. My mouth was going through options and rejecting them all before they were even fully formed because none of them were good enough, none of them could explain away the fact that the woman standing next to me had my exact face, and if Rhett looked at us long enough he was going to..

He reached us.

He looked at Dana first. Just for a second. Dana, to her credit, did not flinch. She held eye contact with him like she had every right to be standing there, which I guess technically she did, and Rhett's expression did nothing I could name.

Then he looked at me.

Long. Quiet. The kind of quiet that has weight to it.

My chest was so tight I was basically not breathing.

"Good morning" he said.

Both of us answered at the same time. "Good morning." Mine came out steadier than I expected. Dana's was half a beat behind.

Rhett's eyes moved between us once more. Then he said, completely normal, like he was commenting on the weather, "I hope the guest rooms are comfortable this time of year. The east wing gets cold if the heating isn't checked." He looked at me specifically on that last part. "I'll have Conrad sort it."

And then he walked past us.

Both of us turned to watch him go. He crossed the grounds toward the training area at the same easy pace and didn't look back once and in about thirty seconds he was just a figure in the distance and then he turned the corner and he was gone.

Dana let out a breath so big her whole body moved. "Okay" she said. "Okay, that was fine. That was actually fine, right? He didn't.."

"Stop" I said.

"He just said good morning and walked away, so.."

"Dana." I turned to look at her and whatever she saw on my face made her stop talking. "That was not fine. That was not him being unbothered. That was him deciding not to do anything yet. Those are very different things."

She stared at me. "You think he knows?"

"I think Rhett Blackwood doesn't say good morning and walk away when something surprises him" I said. "I think he files it and waits. And I think we just gave him something very big to file."

Dana opened her mouth.

"Inside" I said. "Now. Before anyone else comes out."

I got her upstairs and into the east guest room before the pack started moving properly. The room was fine, bigger than it needed to be, with a window that looked out over the side garden and enough space that she wouldn't feel like she was in a box. She dropped her bag on the floor and sat on the edge of the bed and looked around and I stood in the doorway and watched her take it in.

"The story is you're visiting family" I said. "Complicated personal situation, you needed somewhere quiet for a bit. Don't offer details. If anyone asks questions you can't answer, say you're tired and end the conversation."

"Okay."

"Stay in this wing as much as possible. I'll bring food up if I have to."

"Nora, I'm not a prisoner."

"No, you're my secret" I said. "Which is worse. So please just do what I'm asking."

She looked at her hands in her lap. "Okay" she said quietly. "I will."

I left before I said something I couldn't take back.

The morning's meetings were a disaster. Not visibly. Nobody in the room would have known anything was wrong because I kept my voice even and my answers sharp and my face doing the right things. But inside my head it was loud. Too loud. I kept replaying Rhett's face at the bottom of those steps, kept turning over what he said, kept trying to figure out if I had missed something in those four seconds of him looking between us.

I hope the guest rooms are comfortable.

He knew there was a guest. He already knew.

Which meant someone had told him or he had seen her arrive or he had been watching the east gate the same way he watched the east tree line and I just hadn't known to factor that in.

I was still turning it over at lunch when Bex appeared across the table from me with her tray and that look.

"So" she said, sitting down.

"So" I said back.

"The woman in the east wing." She picked up her fork. Casual. Very deliberately casual. "She looks exactly like you."

I took a sip of water. "She's family."

"I noticed."

"Distant" I added. "It's complicated."

Bex chewed a bite of food and looked at me and didn't say anything for a moment and that was somehow more uncomfortable than if she had pushed. Then she said, "Is everything okay?"

And the way she said it. Not asking about the visitor. Not asking about pack business. Asking about me, the actual question underneath the surface question, and I felt it land.

"Yes" I said. "Everything is fine."

She looked at me. Directly. Without blinking. For about four full seconds.

Then she nodded and went back to her food. "Okay" she said simply.

That was it. She let it go. No pushing, no following up, just okay and then she started talking about the afternoon patrol rotation and let me breathe again. I could have hugged her for it. I also felt slightly sick because she deserved a better answer than fine and I couldn't give her one.

The rest of the afternoon dragged. I checked on Dana once between meetings. She was asleep, which was probably the best thing for her, and I closed the door quietly and went back to being Luna and tried not to think about what Rhett was doing right now. What he was thinking. Whether he had already talked to Conrad.

Conrad came to my office at six.

He knocked twice, which he always did, and came in and sat in the chair across from my desk and folded his hands in his lap. He wasn't hostile. He was never hostile. He was just very, very careful in a way that made the air feel slightly different when he came into a room.

"The Alpha would like to speak with you tonight" he said. "After dinner."

The words hit me in the chest like something physical.

"Okay" I said. My voice came out fine. "What about?"

Conrad looked at me. One long second. His face gave away even less than Rhett's usually did, which was saying something.

"I think" he said, very quietly, "you probably already know."

He stood up. Gave me a small, professional nod. And walked out.

I sat in my office after he left and stared at the wall.

Five years. Five years of managing this, of keeping every plate spinning, of being exactly who this pack needed me to be every single day. Five years of early mornings and careful words and making sure nothing cracked.

Tonight might be the night it all came apart.

And the worst part was I couldn't tell if I was more scared of that or more tired of waiting for it.