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“You sure you’re okay being here?” Bee asked, hitting the button for Emerson’s floor.
“Yeah, totally. We’re just delivering our side of a contract. Nothing’s going to happen this time.”
Bee studied me up and down, not at all buying what I was selling. “It’s okay if you want to see him, you know.”
My eyes flicked to theirs, then quickly away. As much as I appreciated the support, it wasn’t okay for me to want my alpha. Not as long as I was under Roman’s thumb.
The elevator doors opened, and we silently headed down the corridor to Emerson’s office. The floor seemed empty, not unusual for late afternoon, but I suddenly worried I should’ve called first to say we were coming. Before I could pull my phone out to call Emerson, I spotted a young blond woman sitting at the desk outside his office.
Her head snapped up as we approached, and a pleasant smile spread across her face. “Trystan Wells? My name is Pearl. I’m Mr Richter’s assistant. It’s nice to meet you.” She stood, offering her hand to shake, and I took it. Her hand was smooth and delicate, her nails neatly polished, but she had a firm, confident grip. Must be needed when working around alphas. She turned to Bee. “And you must be—”
“Bee.” They leaned forward, shaking her hand enthusiastically. “As in, Bumble.”
“Yes, I was sorry to hear our colleagues couldn’t provide you the help you sought last week. Especially as Emerson had to see to other matters at the time.” Pearl gave me a pointed look, her eyebrows raised with a smirk as she returned to her seat.
Bee either didn’t notice the look, or took pity on me for once and didn’t say anything about it. “Eh, I knew it was a longshot when I came in.”
Pearl gestured to the sofa behind us. “Emerson is in a meeting right now, but please, take a seat. He shouldn’t be much longer.”
I nodded but stayed standing, bouncing slightly on my toes as a strange, nervous energy sparked through me. My eyes darted around the small waiting area, unable to stay focused on one thing for too long. Bee lounged on the sofa, not a care in the world, while Pearl sat opposite, swiftly tapping keys on herlaptop. The sound faded into the background like white noise as my pulse pounded in my ears.
Despite taking my suppressants earlier, Emerson’s leather and patchouli scent filtered through the door. Guess that scent match-recognition thing really wasn’t going away. Could he already smell that I was here waiting for him?
My eyes flicked to Pearl again, only to find her watching me with interest. Scratching at the back of my neck—when had it got so sweaty?—I asked, “You, uh, like working here?”
Trystan Wells, small-talk extraordinaire.
Taking pity on me, her gaze softened. “Emerson is the best boss I’ve had. He’s a good man and easy to trust.”
Pearl’s words weren’t lost on me, but doubts still clawed at my mind. Emerson may be a good lawyer, one of the best from what I’d heard, but I wouldn’t be accepting him as a lawyer. To me, he was an alpha.Myalpha.
Footsteps snapped my attention as a short, pale man in an expensive, but ill-fitting suit stopped at the end of the hallway. He held a small stack of files as he stared down at me, tilting his head slightly, then focused on Pearl.
Keeping my voice low, so not to be overheard, I asked her, “Do you know that guy?”
She glanced over before rolling her eyes back to her laptop. “Oh, that’s Harris. He’s harmless.”
“You sure? He’s staring pretty intensely.”
The office door swung open, and Emerson strolled out, laughing with the two people following him. The sound made something flutter in my chest, completely distracting me from the creepy suit. By the time my brain rebooted enough to look back, he was already gone.
“Trystan, perfect timing.” Emerson smiled at me, making my stomach do that annoying fluttery thing again. “I’d like you tomeet Norah and Francis, the firm’s partners and close friends of mine.”
A beautiful woman with dark skin and a dazzling smile—Norah, I assumed—offered me her hand. “So good to finally meet you. Emerson has been annoyingly tight-lipped when it comes to you.”
I shook her hand, nodding politely before turning my attention to the second stranger.
“Call me Frankie, please,” he said, giving my hand a firm shake as he cast his eyes over me. Frankie wasn’t as broadly built as Emerson, but he clearly worked out regularly. Enough that I was intimidated just standing beside him, especially as his grip on my hand lingered. “Yes, Emerson, I’m surprised you haven’t been bragging about this one. He’s definitely something special.”
In the blink of an eye, Emerson’s expression turned from cheerful to murderous. The warming vanilla in his scent overwhelmed the patchouli, the spice heating the air around us as he snaked an arm behind me. His hand gripped my hip, and he not-so-subtly pulled me away from his boss as he ground out the words, “Well, you can’t blame me for wanting to keep him all to myself.”
Frankie watched with a smirk spread across his pale, freckled cheeks. Throwing me a wink, he said, “Not at all.”
Norah softlythwappedher partner’s chest. “Stop baiting him, dear. Now, I believe you have something for me, Trystan?”
Hopping up from the sofa, Bee bounced into the centre of the most awkward moment of my life, holding up a memory card. “Hi, yes. I’m Bee, and I’d love to get out of here before one of these two starts pissing on my flatmate’s leg.”
She chuckled, carefully plucking the memory card from Bee’s fingers. “I like you, Bee. I assume everything we need is on here?”
