The Alpha’s Hidden Mate

Chapter 7 Mae

I didn’t sleep very well last night, I desperately wanted to talk to Liam again, even though I wasn’t even going a full 24 hours without seeing him. But I needed to make myself look together. I had about 30 minutes until I needed to leave to meet up with Liam and my hair was not cooperating.

After a few more minutes of fussing I decided to let it be and he was going to get the full curly experience, leaving it down to fall to my mid back.

I put on the outfit Lilly and pulled together last night and started to do my makeup. In the past, when I had dated other men, I would have done a lot more makeup. But for some reason Liam made me want to stay way more natural and just highlight my features.

I grabbed my notebook that I had jotted some ideas and questions I had thought of and loaded myself into the car. I wanted to get there a little bit early to get settled and feel comfortable, but as I pulled in I could clearly see Liam already on his laptop in the coffee shop.

I frowned. This man had a multi million dollar business to run, how on earth was he alway able to make the time to beat me to our meeting places?

He hadn’t seen me yet so I did a quick mirror check and took a deep steadying breath. I was absolutely thrilled to get to see Liam again but I still had my doubts that this highly successful and wealthy man saw me as a potential partner, or even someone who could offer something to his company. The thought crept in that maybe he was planning on hiding me from a wife or girlfriend. But my gut wasn’t giving me any bad feeling about him at all. In fact my gut told me to run full steam ahead with him, but that made me feel crazy.

I gathered my things and walked in. Liam looked up from his computer and flashed one of his dangerous smiles and motioned for me to come over.

“Mae, early as usual,” he said with a smile.

“I should say the same thing about you. How do you keep beating me?” I asked as I pulled off my coat.

He chuckled. God I could get used to that sound.

“There are a lot of things that I can do remotely. And to be honest it’s nice to get out of the office. If I’m not careful I can find myself cooped up in there for weeks,” he said. He spun his laptop around to show me some schematics of a few buildings. One map showed that they had plenty of space between them to offer plenty of privacy but clearly were clustered together in a community way. They were modest 2 floor houses, varying number of bedrooms and layouts. In general, they would be lovely places for a young family or even a retired couple to live.

“I’m getting ready to break ground on this, but have a few of these types of community homes up already. I’m trying to figure out if each community should have a garden or each house or -“ his voice trailed off, signaling that was about as far as he had thought this through.

“Well first of all these places are all designed perfectly to have green roofs. You’ll be able to get plants up there that offer insulation and sound proofing. Also the kitchens all have windows that could have built in herb gardens that residence could use for cooking all the time. These layouts definitely could have a large garden incorporated, but unless you have a resident with a green thumb a dedication, it can be hard to convince people to upkeep a garden,” I said. I had been looking at his laptop and finally looked up at him. He had a look I couldn’t quit place, was he impressed?

“I never considered green roofs, and herb gardens would be a great addition for residents. I’m not worried about a lead for a community garden, we can just assign one,” he said as pulled his laptop back and started typing something.

“Assign one? Like as part of their resident agreement?” I asked. I suppose it wasn’t unheard of but that seemed a little intense.

Liam paused for a moment. “Yes. As part of their resident agreement. What if we had community gardens that focused on one crop to then share with the other communities? Is there an issue with production?”

“Sure, it wouldn’t be a problem. But do you really think everyone would be coordinated enough?” I asked. I felt like Liam had a lot of faith in people to be cooperative and selfless enough to create a share program like that. It seemed a bit far fetched.

“I think we could make it happen,” Liam said with a slight smirk. “What types of produce would you suggest to get us started?”

“Potatoes are lower maintenance, zucchini, spinach, snap peas, strawberries. It would kind of depend on how the space is, if it has enough room to grow, the amount of sunlight -“

“Let’s go look then,” Liam said, looking eagerly at me.

“Go where?” I asked, not sure I understood.

“Let’s go check out these living communities. It’s 45 minutes away, you can take your own car, and really get a sense of the area and land,” he said and reached for my hand. My skin tingled pleasantly where he touched me. “I swear I will be a perfect gentleman, and you can meet my project manager Garrett. You can tell someone where you’re going, I’ll give you the address to send them and you can program it in your phone.”

I swear he was giving me puppy dog eyes. Logically I knew it was a terrible idea to leave and follow this man to an unknown location. This was going to get me my own special.

But my gut told me this was a good move. It was telling me to go. And I always followed my gut.

“Ok,” I said after a beat. It almost felt like I had answered a marriage proposal. Liam beamed. God I could get used to that, too.

He gave me the address and I immediately texted it to Lilly. I programmed it into my phone and gave Liam a quick wave as I got in my car. As I pulled out, I called Lilly.

“Hey Mae, what’s going on? What was that text?”

“Don’t freak out. I’m driving there right now to meet Liam and see the new housing he is building,” I said and then held my breath.

Lilly was silent for a moment.

“Look, you know I’m rooting for you to jump him, but are you sure this is a good idea?” I could tell she was, in fact, trying not to freak out.

“I know it sounds crazy, but honestly I feel really safe with him. And this project is so cool. My instincts are telling me to do this. And you know how those instincts are,” I told her, remembering our chance encounter.

“Ok, Mae, just be careful. If you think something is going sideways just get out of there,” said Lilly.

“I will, and you’ll be my first call,” I reassured her.

We said our goodbyes and I settled into driving. I had fallen behind a black BMW and I was pretty sure it was Liam. Even though I was antsy the drive went by surprisingly fast. It didn’t take long to get out of the city and we were quickly surrounded by tall trees. We took a turn onto a nondescript driveway and drove several miles into the woods. I thought that maybe I should start feeling nervous about this but I still felt fine about it. After a few more minutes of driving, Liam’s car pulled up to another BMW parked in a beautiful clearing. There was a man standing beside it. I parked next to Liam’s car and stepped out.

The clearing was large enough to let the sun give lots of light, and through the trees I could see another clearing with a cluster of modest but beautiful houses.

I assumed the man waiting for us was Liam’s project manager, Garrett. He was also very tall, maybe 6’3”, with sandy blonde hair and light blue eyes. He was leaner than Liam but still clearly muscular. He was undeniably handsome but he had more of a boyish charm, I instantly felt like we could be great friend.

“Well,” I called out them, “I suppose if you were leading me out to the woods to murder me at least it’s a beautiful spot to go.”

Garrett let out a booming laugh and slapped Liam on the shoulder as I walked towards them.

“She funny!” Garrett gave him a little nudge and then held out his hand for me to shake.

“I’m Garrett, Liam told me some of the thoughts you had for our new housing, and I think they’re awesome ideas. I’m excited to hear your thoughts for this space.” We shook hands, and while I didn’t feel the same light tingle I did when I touched Liam, my heart felt happy.

“I’m Mae, it’s great to meet you. This is quiet the space you have out here.” I turned and we all started walked more towards the center of the clearing.

“You have great sunlight so you’re not too limited on plants that you can grow here.” I turned my face up to the sun and soaked it up for a minute.

“Actually Mae, I want to check out this space at the edge of this clearing because there is a small creek and I’m wondering if we could use it for hydroponics,” said Liam pointing ahead. We started moving that direction and I heard the light tinkle of water.

“Oh yeah. That has potential. You’ll need to get that water tested though,” I said turning to them. Garrett’s eyes moved from my face to my chest.

“Oh wow, I just noticed your necklace. My girlfriend loves those types of stones. She’s really into crystals. Do you mind if I borrow it for a second? I left my phone in the car and I’d love to be able to send a picture to her,” Garrett said.

He was almost giving me puppy dog eyes too. My brain was not sure, I pretty much never took it off and it seemed like a bit of a weird request. But my gut was telling me to do it.

Is my gut broken?

“Sure, just please be careful with it, it has a huge amount of sentimental meaning,” I said as I put my hands behind my neck and unclasped it. I handed it to Garrett. He had a huge grin.

“Thank you! I’ll be quick!” And he turned and walked quickly back to the cars.

I turned to Liam and stepped a little closer to the creek. I was about to say something when suddenly it felt like the sun was getting brighter, hurting my eyes. I put my hands up to my face and then a headache started to push through. It all happened so suddenly that I started to lose my balance. Then I felt Liam’s strong arms steady me.

“Mae? Are you alright? What’s wrong?” I could hear Liam talking to me but he suddenly sounded so far away, like was a rushing wind going by my ears.

“I- I don’t know what’s wrong with me. My head, God it’s really hurting,” I said. I saw Garrett running back but my vision was starting to tunnel and I couldn’t support myself at all anymore. I could feel myself crying out in pain, but my head was suddenly filled with a loud howling. My vision was going black and I knew I was going to pass out. Just as I was about to lose consciousness, I heard someone speak in a low growl:

“MINE.”