Alphas' Indecent Proposal

Chapter 4

Kate's POV

Damian's face was inches from mine.

Close enough that I could count the individual flecks of silver in those frozen-lake eyes. Close enough that his breath skimmed my skin — warm against the cold mask he wore like armor. This was not a safe distance between two people who were strangers. This was not a distance that should exist between a married woman and her boss.

But I couldn't move.

Because Valentine's Day had just detonated inside my skull.

Alfredo sauce.

My nose could still smell it — the ghost of that evening, hovering just behind my eyes like a photograph left too long in the sun. Me, standing barefoot in our tiny kitchen, one eye on the wall clock, one hand stirring the sauce I'd spent two hours perfecting from scratch.

Alfredo was Ronald's favorite.

I'd bought real Parmigiano-Reggiano for the occasion — the twelve-dollar block from the Italian deli on Fifth Avenue, not the powdered stuff in the green can. I'd changed out of my work clothes and slipped into the dress Ronald once said made me look like "that girl in the painting — the one holding the flowers."

He'd meant Botticelli's Primavera. He always mangled his art references. And I always loved him a little more for trying.

I'd set the table just before his usual commute time. Lit a candle — vanilla and sandalwood, his favorite. Folded the napkins into little swans because I'd watched a YouTube tutorial during my lunch break and wanted to surprise him.

That Valentine's Day was our first holiday after the miscarriage.

I'd wanted it to be perfect.

Then the text came.

"Babe, the quarterly numbers are a disaster. Stuck at the office until at least midnight. Eat without me. I love you."

I stared at the screen for a long time.

Then I blew out the candle. Wrapped his plate in cling film and slid it into the fridge with a little Post-it note — For my hardworking husband. Microwave 3 min. Don't forget the garlic bread! — with a smiley face drawn in the corner.

Then I sat alone in our empty apartment, one hand pressed to my stomach out of habit, swallowed the ache behind my eyes, and ate my dinner in silence.

And the entire time — the entire time — he was at a café.

With a beautiful blonde woman in his arms.

"Kate."

Damian's voice hauled me back to the surface. I was still in the office. Still on the leather sofa. Still staring at those photographs, my knuckles white where they gripped the edge of the stack.

The images swam. Ronald's arm around Catherine. The way he held her — firm enough to say I've got you, gentle enough not to hurt. His lips pressed to her forehead.

Valentine's Day.

He said he was working late.

The lie was a splinter lodged under the skin — so small you could almost pretend it wasn't there. So sharp you couldn't stop feeling it.

But here's the thing. The one thing that kept me from shattering. The one piece of driftwood I could cling to while the current tried to drag me under:

My wolf felt nothing.

I pressed my palm flat against my sternum and searched for the pain. Every she-wolf had heard the stories. A mate's betrayal was never subtle — it was wildfire in your chest, a blade drawn slowly across the bond, agony so total that wolves had gone mad from it. Hospitals had entire wards dedicated to wolves whose bonds had fractured.

I felt... nothing.

My wolf wasn't oblivious. I knew that much. When I'd lost the baby — that tiny, half-formed life that never got a name — she had howled for weeks. I'd lain awake night after night with her grief layered over mine, a double wound that wouldn't close.

But now, where there should have been a wolf's scream, there was only a dull, flat silence.

Where there should have been agony, there was only quiet.

And that quiet was the only thing keeping me sane.

"He lied." My voice scraped out of my throat like it had been dragged over gravel. "About where he was. That much is obvious."

"Yes." Damian's tone was steady. Unsurprised.

"But lying about his whereabouts doesn't mean —" I swallowed hard, and the words came faster as the logic sharpened, clicking into place like armor I was building in real time. "She was crying. Maybe she called him. Maybe she needed a friend. Ronald is the kind of person who would drive across the city at two in the morning if someone needed him. That's who he is."

That's who he is.

Isn't it?

And maybe — maybe — Ronald was still angry with me. He'd wanted that baby so much. And I hadn't been able to protect it. I'd failed him in the one way that mattered most.

From across the room, Damian exhaled — a short, controlled breath that somehow managed to convey an entire thesis on naïveté.

"A friend." He repeated the word like it had a taste, and the taste was rancid. Each syllable encased in frost. "On Valentine's Day. While his wife was at home making handmade pasta and folding napkins into swans."

I whipped my head toward him. "How do you —"

I stopped.

Of course. He made it his business to know everything about his employees. His own words from the first time I'd walked into this office echoed back at me like a taunt.

Damian held my gaze without blinking. No pity. No apology. "The person you should be angry at isn't me, intern."

"Don't call me that."

"Then stop acting like one."

The air between us crackled.

My wolf — the same wolf who hadn't flinched at a stack of photographs showing my husband wrapped around another woman — bared her teeth at this arrogant, insufferable man.

"Look at me." I rose to my feet. "Am I screaming? Am I falling apart? I'm not. My wolf is completely, entirely calm."

Damian studied me. Those ice-carved eyes swept over my face with the precision of a surgeon searching for the fracture line in a bone. And for one fleeting instant, something that might have been doubt crossed his sharp features.

"Bonds can be manipulated —" he began, his voice low and dangerous, but Damon cut him off.

"She has a point."

Damian's head snapped toward his brother. "Damon —"

"I said she has a point, Damian."

Damon stepped forward, positioning himself between me and his brother in a single fluid motion. His voice was calm, almost soothing — a perfect counterweight to the storm on the other side. He didn't look at Damian. Those dark-gold eyes locked onto mine with absolute focus.

"Your wolf didn't react. I respect that. But the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence."

He let that land.

"Your wolf felt nothing — and I hear you. But those photographs exist. They show your husband concealing his location on Valentine's Day while you were home alone. And right now, those two facts are in direct contradiction."

He spread his hands — palms open, posture transparent, argument airtight. Reasonable. Fair. And so precisely devastating that it left no air in the room.

"Don't you want to know which one is the truth?"

I opened my mouth. Closed it.

From the far wall, Darius's flat monotone cut in without warning.

"Her wolf's sensory data can be used as a baseline. Cross-reference it against the photographic evidence. Isolate the false signal. Standard intelligence analysis."

Three heads turned toward him.

Darius blinked. "What? It's basic protocol."

Damon pinched the bridge of his nose. "Darius, please —"

Darius obediently shut his mouth.

Damon resumed. He reached into his jacket — how deep were those pockets? — and produced a sleek silver pen and a neatly prepared document.

"One month." His tone was the tone of a man presenting an offer so clean you'd feel foolish refusing it. "We install concealed surveillance in your apartment. Top-of-the-line equipment — completely undetectable. Darius handles it personally. For thirty days, you move out, and we observe together. If Ronald is truly the faithful partner you believe him to be, he'll pass with flying colors."

Darius opened his mouth. Damon caught it instantly — one finger raised in his direction. Darius's jaw clicked shut.

Damon offered me an apologetic half-smile, then continued.

"Thirty days. Observation only. No confrontation. No interference with your marriage. Just... watching."

I shook my head. "And what do I get out of this? My entire private life exposed, and the slow psychological torture of choosing to spy on my own husband?"

"If Ronald is faithful —" Damon leaned forward, closing the distance between us just enough to make the words feel like a confidence shared between allies. "— then all you've lost is thirty days. And what you gain is something no suspicious wife in history has ever had: absolute, irrefutable proof that the man you married is exactly who he says he is. You will never have to wonder again."

The words settled over me like a net.

Never have to wonder again.

God. God. He was good.

"And," Damon added, reaching into his jacket once more — at this point, I half-expected him to pull out a rabbit — and producing a second document, "regarding compensation. For your time, your emotional investment, and the significant disruption to your personal life, my brother is prepared to offer you —"

He wrote a number on the document and slid it across the coffee table.

I looked down.

The number had a lot of zeros.

My brain ran the math automatically — student loans, car payments, the exact balance of the joint savings account Ronald and I shared.

"One million dollars?" I kept my voice level. Almost succeeded.

"Consider it what you're owed." Damon's tone didn't waver. "Regardless of the outcome — whether we're right or wrong — this money is yours. Think of it as... a hazard pay bonus for tolerating my brother's personality for thirty consecutive days."

Damian's jaw tightened by a fraction. He said nothing.

"And if I refuse?" I asked.

"Then you walk out that door." Damon's gaze was steady. "Free and clear. I give you my word — no fourth brother waiting to intercept you this time. No retaliation. No consequences. Next time you see Damian in the hallway, he'll even pretend to be polite."

"No, I won't," Damian said.

"He will," Damon corrected without looking at him.

Then he eased back, giving me room. Giving me time. Letting me see everything laid out on the table — the photographs, the contract, the number with all those zeros — and letting me think.

My eyes drifted across it all.

I could leave. Right now. I believed Damon's promise — they'd played every card they had. But if I walked away, I would spend the rest of my life wondering about the questions this office had planted in my head.

Could I live with that? Close my eyes every night and swallow the doubt?

No.

"One month," I said slowly. "Then it's over. No matter what."

"One month," Damon confirmed.

"I want it in writing. Every clause. Every boundary. Camera placements, data access protocols, deletion procedures after the term expires. And I want a clause stating that if any footage is used for any purpose outside this agreement, I will sue all three of you back to the Stone Age."

Damon's eyebrows rose — a flash of genuine surprise. "You've read contracts before."

"I married a sales manager. I read every contract he ever brought home." I held his gaze. "And I have one more condition."

"Name it."

"If nothing turns up — if Ronald is clean — Damian apologizes. To my face. In person. And he means it."

I turned to look at Damian.

He was watching me with an expression I couldn't fully decode. It wasn't the cold contempt from before. It was something else — slower, more deliberate. Like a man re-running an equation he thought he'd already solved.

"If I'm wrong," Damian said, his voice low and dark, "what I'll do will go far beyond an apology."

The words hung in the air between us.

His gaze held mine — heavy, unblinking, loaded with something I refused to name.

My wolf didn't growl this time. She was still. Silent. But somewhere deep inside, she stirred — like turning over in sleep.

Like a sigh.

My breath stuttered.

I looked away first.

Damon had already placed the revised contract on the table — amended per my demands, annotated in ink, every clause addressed. The man worked at a speed that was either impressive or terrifying.

I checked every line. Then I picked up the pen.

No more hesitation.

I signed my name.

The scratch of steel on paper sounded exactly like a lock clicking shut.

"Done." I set the pen down and looked up at all three of them — three Alphas, three different kinds of dangerous — and felt a belated, reckless current of electricity buzz beneath my skin. "One month."

And then I will never see any of you again.

I said it silently. To myself.

Damian's mouth curved — barely, almost imperceptibly — as if he'd heard every word.

"Better start packing an overnight bag, intern." His voice was silk over a blade. "You won't be going home for a while."

Before I could fire back, Darius spoke.

"I'll bring the surveillance equipment tomorrow. Ten a.m. — that's typically after your husband leaves for work." He unfolded his arms, straightened to his full height, and crossed the room in three long strides. Before I could react, he took my foot in his hands, rotated my ankle with startling speed — click — and set it back down. "Your ankle's been reset. Try walking on it. You should eat something before tomorrow. Your hands are trembling and your complexion is pale. Based on physiological indicators, you haven't eaten since approximately noon."

I stared at him.

Damian closed his eyes.

Damon took a very slow sip of water.

"I —"

I opened my mouth, shut it, grabbed my bag, and headed for the door.

Insane.

I've gone completely insane.

I just signed a contract with three lunatics.

My hand was on the door handle when Damon's voice reached me one last time.

"Kate."

I stopped. Didn't turn around.

"For whatever it's worth," he said quietly, "I hope we're wrong."

I didn't answer.

I just tightened my grip on the strap of my bag.

Because I hoped so too.

And in my experience, hope was nothing but fear wearing a prettier dress.