BENEATH THE ALPHA'S NAME

Chapter 2: Spark and Static

By Jace Vance

The registration pavilion was a chaotic maze of white pop-up tents, scattered brochures, and the deafening chatter of hundreds of students. I dragged my silver-plated trunk behind me, the wheels grooving into the damp turf of the quad. Every cell in my body was on high alert, tuned to my father’s final directive: Look normal. Blend into the background.

As I navigated the crowd, a group of three girls sitting on a stone bench went completely silent. One of them, a blonde in a red knit sweater, twisted a lock of her hair around her finger. She caught my eye, her cheeks flushing a vivid pink, and shifted her posture, clearing a space on the bench beside her. Her friends nudged her, giggling loudly enough to carry over the wind, waiting for me to make a move.

I forced my mouth into a polite, practiced smile. I nodded once, a perfectly calibrated gesture of casual interest, before keeping my stride unbroken. Inside, my chest was a hollow chamber. There was no spark, no sudden rush of blood, nothing but the cold calculation of survival. See? I told the ghost of my father in my head. I’m looking normal. I’m playing the part.

"Oye! ¡Cuidado!"

A hand grabbed the shoulder of my jacket, dragging me backward just before I collided with a stray luggage cart left on the path.

I spun around, my hand instinctively dropping toward my belt before I remembered where I was. Standing in front of me was a guy with a bright, lopsided grin, wearing an oversized vintage jacket. His skin was a warm olive, his dark eyes crinkling with instant friendliness.

"Man, you walk like you got a destination but no eyes, bro," he said, his English thick, rolling over the vowels with a distinct Mexican accent. He extended a hand, completely unbothered by my rigid stance. "I am Mateo. Mateo Garza. I see you dragging that big metal box and looking like a lost puppy. You need help, amigo?"

I blinked, slowly letting go of my defensive posture. "Vance. And I’m just trying to find the residential office."

"Vance! Nice name, man. Very... cowboy," Mateo laughed, clapping my shoulder with an easy familiarity that made my skin prickle. "Don't worry about the office. I know this place like the back of my hand. I show you around, sí? We got to stick together. New guys always get eaten alive by the seniors here."

"I don't need a tour guide, Mateo," I said, trying to re-establish my boundaries.

"Everyone needs Mateo," he countered, already reaching down to grab the secondary handle of my heavy trunk. "Holy madre de Dios, what do you have in here? Rocks? Gold bricks?"

"Just clothes," I lied smoothly. And three silver-alloy hunting knives hidden beneath a false bottom. "And some books."

"Crazy," Mateo muttered, pulling his weight against the trunk. "Come on, the freshman dorms are this way. But look, don't look now, but those girls over there? The ones by the fountain? They are looking at you like you are a piece of tres leches cake. You should go say hola. You got the face for it, man. Me? I got the personality, but you…"

Mateo didn't finish his sentence because I wasn't listening anymore.

A sudden, violent shift in the air pressure around me made the hairs on my arms stand straight up. The ambient noise of the campus, the laughter, the scraping of chairs, the wind in the oaks, seemed to drop to a dull, muffled hum. A heavy, intoxicating scent cut through the crisp autumn breeze, hitting my senses like a physical blow. It smelled like cedar wood after a lightning strike, damp pine needles, and raw, untamed heat.

I took a blind step forward, completely disconnected from my own feet.

Smack.

My chest collided directly into a broad, solid shoulder. It felt like walking into a brick wall draped in heavy leather.

The moment our bodies made contact, a violent, blinding shock of static electricity tore through the fabric of our clothes. It wasn't a normal carpet shock; it felt like a literal current of high-voltage electricity arcing straight through my skin, traveling up my spine and exploding directly into the center of my chest.

"Watch it," a voice growled.

The voice was low, resonant, and vibrated right through the floorboards beneath my boots.

I stumbled back, my breath completely trapped in my throat. I looked up.

The guy standing in front of me was tall, easily clearing me by three inches, with a frame that looked built out of pure, dense muscle. His hair was a dark, messy crop, but it was his eyes that locked me in place. They were an intense, piercing amber-brown, burning with a strange, predatory light that seemed to look right through my skin, straight down into my bones.

The heat hit me instantly.

A wave of intense, suffocating warmth flooded up my neck, scorching my cheeks. My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird. But it wasn't just panic. Down lower, beneath my belt, a sudden, fierce rush of blood made itself known. I went entirely, rigidly erect in a matter of seconds, a raw, primal reaction that I had absolutely no control over. I had never felt anything like it in my entire life, this terrifying, magnetic pull that made every nerve ending in my body scream to step closer to him, to touch him again.

The guy didn't move. His nostrils flared, his chest rising and falling in a deep, heavy breath as he stared down at me. His amber eyes dropped to my throat, then down to my chest where the contact had happened, before snapping back to my face. His jaw clenched so hard the muscles ticked. For a long, agonizing five seconds, neither of us breathed. He looked at me like he wanted to tear me apart, or like he knew every single dirty secret I had ever buried in the dark.

Then, without a single word, he tore his gaze away, pushed past my shoulder, and strode down the path, his heavy boots eating up the distance until he disappeared around the corner of the library.

I stood there, trembling, my hand pressed against my chest where the static had burned through. My face was on fire, my jeans suddenly feeling entirely too tight, my heart racing a mile a minute.

"Hey. Man. Oye," Mateo’s voice cracked through the fog, dragging me back to reality.

I snapped my head around, trying to pull my jacket down to cover myself, my mind spinning in absolute chaos.

Mateo was staring at me, his jaw slack, his eyebrows pushed so high they almost touched his hairline. He looked from the empty path back to my flushed, panicked face. A slow, mischievous grin began to spread across his face, his eyes sparkling with pure amusement.

"What kind of... how you say... gay s**t was that?" Mateo asked, his accent thick and laughing as he lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "Bro. The air went boom. I swear to God, I see sparks fly out of your jacket."

"It was just static," I choked out, my voice sounding incredibly thin. "He... he wasn't looking where he was going."

"Static? No, no, no," Mateo said, waving his hand dismissively, shaking his head. "That was not static, cabrón. That was... fuego. It was hot, man! The way he look at you? Like he wants to eat you for lunch. And you? You look like you just see a ghost and a supermodel at the same time. Your face is red like a tomato!"

"Shut up, Mateo," I muttered, grabbing the handle of my trunk and practically dragging it forward myself, desperate to escape the open quad before anyone else noticed the state I was in. "Just... show me where the dorms are."

"Okay, okay, don't get crazy," Mateo chuckled, hurrying to keep up with my sudden sprint. "But hey, that guy? That is Jaden Veret. He is the big man on campus. Nobody messes with him. He always looks like he wants to kill someone, but with you? Dios mío, that was something else."

Jaden. The name echoed in my head, tasting like copper and smoke. I forced myself to focus on the pavement, ignoring the strange, electric throbbing that still lingered beneath my skin.

We entered the gothic archway of the main dormitory building. The interior was cooler, smelling of old wood, floor wax, and the damp autumn air. Mateo led me up two flights of wide, creaking oak stairs, his non-stop chatter serving as a shield against my own spiraling thoughts.

"Here we are," Mateo said, stopping in front of a heavy wooden door at the end of the third-floor hallway. The brass numbers read 304. "This is your kingdom, my cowboy friend."

"Thanks," I said, reaching into my pocket for the key the registrar had handed me. My hands were still slightly unsteady.

"Don't sweat it," Mateo said, giving me a thumbs-up. "I got to go find my own room down on the first floor before the resident advisor gives me extra chores. I catch up with you later for dinner, sí? We can talk more about your new boyfriend."

"He’s not my boyfriend," I snapped, though the blush returned instantly.

"Whatever you say, Vance," Mateo winked, turning on his heel and jogging back down the hallway, his laughter echoing off the walls.

I took a deep, stabilizing breath. I needed to get inside. I needed to unpack, hide my knives, and find a way to get this ridiculous, unprompted arousal under control before anyone else saw me. I slid the key into the lock, turned it until the mechanism clicked, and pushed the door open.

"Look, I told you I don't care about the…"

The words died in my throat.

The room was spacious, dominated by two twin beds separated by a wide window looking out over the western woods. But I didn't look at the room.

Standing in the center of the floor, completely naked, was Jaden.