Alphas' Indecent Proposal

Chapter 11

Kate's POV

"Kate."

"Mm."

"Did you hear a single word I just said?"

"Third booth. Window side. Two companions." I dragged my gaze back from wherever it had drifted and muttered, low and slightly resentful, "I heard you."

I lifted my glass again and took a long, reckless swallow, using the burn of the wine to drown out the deafening hammer of my own heartbeat. It was so loud I was half-convinced Damian could hear it from across the table.

The shame arrived late, the way it always did with me. A slow, creeping heat that climbed my throat and settled across my cheeks like a brand.

Damian had only leaned in because we were playing a couple tonight. That was the mission. Get close. Look natural. Relay Catherine's position without drawing attention.

And I, like an absolute fool, had thought he was about to touch my face. Or kiss me.

He pulled back now, watching me with an expression I couldn't decode. Something caught between amusement and a heavier emotion, buried deep behind his eyes, there and gone before I could name it.

"Good," he said. "Now smile."

"What?"

"You look like someone's holding a gun to your head. You won't even need to walk past Catherine's table. She'll smell your nerves from the corridor."

"Maybe someone is."

I mumbled it without smiling, but I obediently raised my palms and pressed them against my cheeks, careful not to smudge my makeup, working my jaw and lips until the muscles in my face loosened.

I was nervous. Coming here tonight hadn't been part of any scenario I'd imagined for myself. But I wanted this mission to work. I wanted progress. I wanted this entire nightmare to end in one clean stroke.

While I was busy massaging my own face like a lunatic at a five-star restaurant, Damian's gaze dropped to me. It started at my eyes, then slid lower. Past my chin. Hovering somewhere between my nose and my mouth.

My lips.

He was looking at my lips.

Did my lipstick smear?

I fumbled through the clutch for my compact mirror, snapped it open, and checked. Everything intact. I exhaled and looked up, ready to ask what was wrong.

But Damian had already turned away. His jaw was tight. His eyes were fixed on something across the room that clearly required his full, undivided attention.

Before I could press him, Catherine rose from her seat.

I swallowed the question and took three slow breaths, tracking her movement. She was heading toward the restrooms.

This was the moment.

Damian's gaze followed Catherine, then returned to me. Something shifted in his expression. Softer. Steadier. It might have been encouragement. It was the closest thing to warmth I'd ever seen on his face, and I carried it with me like a lit match as I stood and walked in Catherine's direction.

This was exactly what we'd planned. My face was unknown to Catherine. A stranger. Harmless. I would approach casually, make contact, feel her out.

Catherine only dropped her guard around people who didn't matter.

The corridor leading to the restrooms was narrow and dim. Dark stone floors. Walls paneled in what looked like walnut. At the far end, a single gold sconce cast a half-moon of amber light across the ceiling, like a halo that had slipped.

Everything about the design was engineered to make guests feel at ease.

Classic high-end restaurant psychology.

It wasn't working on me.

In the minutes since Damian pointed out Catherine's table, I'd been watching her. She was flawless in social settings. Radiant smiles for her companions, perfectly timed laughter, the kind of charm that looked effortless because it was rehearsed. But the instant she turned to hand her coat to a server, her expression flipped. Cold. Flat. Utterly dead behind the eyes. Like a switch lived somewhere inside her body, toggling between performance and void.

I didn't need the Voss brothers to tell me any more stories about Catherine. I'd seen enough.

And the closer I got to where she'd disappeared, the more a strange, unwelcome feeling settled over me. Not suspicion. Recognition.

Because Ronald did the same thing.

I'd watched him do it a thousand times. Weekend dinners out, his face warm and devoted across from me, then snapping to ice the second he spoke to a waiter. Office events where his voice shifted mid-sentence, honey for clients, steel for interns. The transition was so fast that if you blinked, you'd miss it entirely.

I used to call it charm.

He's so good with people, I'd tell friends. Ronald just knows how to read a room.

I'd also called it emotional intelligence. Social instinct. A gift.

But watching Catherine exhibit the exact same quality, something in my stomach turned. It didn't feel like charm anymore. It felt like something with teeth.

Coincidence, I told myself. That's all.

I pressed down the unease and reached for the restroom door.

But before I could push it open, Catherine's voice slipped through the gap.

"...You're certain continued use won't be detected?" The tone was nothing like the ones I'd catalogued at her table. Not warm. Not poised. Sharp. Interrogative. A blade wrapped in silk. "She still hasn't noticed?"

I stopped breathing.

My hand froze on the door. Every nerve in my body locked into place.

This was not the right moment to walk in, wash my hands, and strike up a casual conversation.

Before I could ease the door shut, Catherine's voice kept going, spilling through the c***k like water from an open faucet. Relentless. Unguarded.

Then she laughed.

The sound was beautiful and cruel, the kind of laugh that existed to celebrate someone else's suffering. It crawled across my skin like frost.

"...God, it's pathetic. She can't even feel her own wolf anymore."

My blood froze.

I didn't know who was on the other end of that call. I didn't know what drug she meant. My rational brain couldn't connect the fragments into anything coherent.

But my body understood.

A wave of pure, undiluted terror crashed into me so hard my vision blurred.

Because my wolf had gone quiet a long time ago.

And today, she hadn't answered me once.

I don't remember walking back.

Some autopilot version of myself retraced the route on muscle memory and deposited me into the booth. My hands reached for the wine glass. I tipped what was left into my mouth in one desperate swallow, but my fingers were shaking so violently I set the glass down immediately and gripped the edge of the tablecloth to hide it.

Damian's eyes locked onto me the instant I sat down.

"What happened?" His voice was sharp. Low. The fake-boyfriend mask from thirty seconds ago was gone, stripped away in a blink. In its place was the Damian I recognized. The real one. Lethal focus. Absolute authority. The kind of presence that made entire boardrooms fall silent.

Tell him, my brain whispered. Tell him what you heard.

I opened my mouth.

Then closed it.

Find a reason, I told myself. What Catherine said on that phone call has nothing to do with the affair. It could be about anyone. It doesn't mean what you think it means. You're spiraling. You're projecting. Don't make a scene. The priority right now is to pull yourself together and go back out there.

"Nothing." I forced a smile. It came out stiff and trembling and not even remotely convincing. "She was on the phone. I didn't catch anything useful."

Damian didn't blink.

He didn't move.

He just looked at me.

One second. Two seconds. Three.

Then he leaned forward, his broad shoulders blocking out the rest of the restaurant behind him until the only thing left in my field of vision was him. His warmth surrounded me. He reached for the wine bottle, filled my empty glass, and placed it directly in front of me where I could reach it without stretching.

Then he sat back.

His eyes never left mine. They were the kind of eyes that could peel back every lie, every wall, every defense mechanism I'd spent years building.

"Kate." His voice was quiet. Certain. The way a man speaks when he already knows the answer and is simply giving you one last chance to tell him yourself. "You're lying to me."