ZAYN
We fucked up.
I stare at the empty chair where Darren usually sits during our team meetings, the silence in the room thick enough to choke on. Eight hours since he stormed out of The Terrace. Eight hours of unanswered calls and texts. Eight hours of growing certainty that we've managed to royally screw up the one thing he asked of us.
Be normal. For one fucking dinner.
Jax paces the length of our living room, phone pressed to his ear. It's his fifth attempt to reach Darren in the last hour alone. Each call goes straight to voicemail, and each time, Jax's expression grows more grim. The bourbon scent that usually surrounds him has sharpened with anxiety.
"Still nothing," he says, tossing his phone onto the couch with more force than necessary. "Where the hell could he be?"
"Maybe he went to a hotel," Aidan suggests, perched on the edge of the armchair like he might bolt at any second. The kidhasn't stopped fidgeting since we got back. "Or he could be at the practice facility. Sometimes he goes there to clear his head."
"At three in the morning?" I snort, running a hand through my hair. It's probably a disaster by now, but for once, I don't care.
Dmitri sits silently in the corner, his massive frame somehow making the oversized chair look small. He hasn't said much since we got back, but the storm brewing behind those ice-blue eyes is unmistakable. The big guy doesn't anger easily, but when he does, it's like watching a glacier crack.
"We should go look for him," Aidan says, standing abruptly. "Split up, check his usual spots. He could be hurt, or?—"
"He's not hurt," I cut in, sharper than intended. "He's pissed. And the last thing he wants right now is us tracking him down like he's some lost puppy."
Aidan's face falls, but I don't have the energy to soften the blow. The rookie's crush on Darren was obvious before, but after tonight, after scenting Lexie and realizing what she is to us, it's painfully transparent. The way he keeps glancing at Darren's empty chair, the nervous energy radiating off him. It would be pathetic if I wasn't wrestling with my own mess of emotions.
"Zayn's right," Jax says, though it clearly pains him to admit it. "Darren needs space. We give him that, at least for tonight."
"But what if?—"
"He's a grown man, McKinney," I interrupt again. "Not some fragile little flower who needs rescuing. Or have you forgotten that he spent twenty-seven years as a beta who could take care of himself?"
The words come out harsher than I intended, but I can't take them back. I'm chastising myself more than him at this point.
I've been a dick. It's kind of what I do. But in my attempts to get Darren to accept the reality we're all living in, I know now that I went too far. Pushed too hard.
Maybe pushed him away for good, along with our scent match, and the one-two sucker punch of that realization is hard to swallow.
Aidan flinches like I've slapped him. "That's not what I meant."
"Isn't it?" I challenge, leaning forward. "Because from where I'm sitting, we've all been treating him differently since he presented. Like he's made of glass. Like he needs our protection whether he wants it or not."
"You're the one who's done nothing but harass him since he presented!" Aidan protests.
"Yeah, and you're just as bad as me," I counter. "At least I've never let him win. At least I'm honest about it."
"That's enough," Jax cuts in, his captain voice slicing through the brewing storm of alpha instinct and conflict. "Fighting among ourselves isn't helping anything."
I lean back, crossing my arms over my chest. He's right, of course. Jax is always right. The perfect captain, the perfect alpha, the perfect everything. It's fucking exhausting sometimes.
"We need to talk about what happened tonight," Dmitri says, breaking his silence. "About this woman. Lexie."
And there it is, the petite elephant in the room we've been dancing around for the past eight hours. Lexie Goodwin. The beta with the pumpkin spice scent that hit us all like a freight train the moment we walked into that private dining room.
Our scent match.
The statistical impossibility that somehow became our reality tonight. A woman who smells like home and comfort and everything right, who happens to be the same woman Darren found on his own. The same woman who now probably wants nothing to do with any of us after our spectacular display of social ineptitude.
"What about her?" Aidan asks, a defensive edge to his voice.
"We need to decide what to tell Darren," Dmitri says simply. "About what she is to us."
