Page 30 of Ruined Beta

He gives me a tight smile. “You would suspect so, wouldn’t you?”

I shrug. “Maybe if you’d told me …”

“I’m not mad at you,” he cuts me off. “And the interview is going ahead. Spencer is just going to be here to conduct it with me.”

I blink at him. “Seriously?”

He nods. “If you’re making coffee, I could use another.”

“Sure,” I tell him, leaving him to go over his papers.

He seemed cool and calm as usual, but there was a faint undercurrent of frustration.

E.A. isn’t like most people. Since I’ve known him, his emotional range has been limited.

He admits he’s probably a sociopath, and I don’t think he’s wrong.

There are very few people he cares about. Everyone else might as well not exist.

I take my keys out of the desk and lock up out front before I go back up the apartment to make E.A. his filtered water, specially pressed beans black coffee.

We only take walk in clients when I’m there to greet them.

E.A. would only scare them off.

Chapter Seventeen

Toshi

I don’t like feeling like a stalker, and I definitely feel like one right now. It’s bad enough when I’m stuck in a car in a seedy motel parking lot, waiting for my chance at a money-shot. That moment a cheating spouse exits a room, almost always leaning back for a kiss. A couple of clicks and I capture the picture that gets me paid. It can take up a whole night, and it never feels good to show the wife the evidence, even if it’s what she came to us to get.

This is a million times worse. I’m literally tailing a woman who was attacked by a serial killer a couple of months ago. Watching her every move for my boss because of who she is and what she could do for us.

It’s messed up.

The fact that I spoke to her yesterday morning, and I’m already deeply attracted to her …

Well, I might as well be following her around because I’m obsessed with her, because I am.

It’s not just because she’s gorgeous, which she absolutely is.

I don’t think most women who’ve been through what she has would have invited a stranger to sit with her, let alone allowed him to spark a conversation. It feels like she has a strong will, and an open heart.

I know Echo would agree with me. He’d feel what I felt, stronger than I felt it.

Still, it would be an odd thing to admit to my pack brother.

Our relationship has never evolved beyond friendship, but he’s an Omega who has two male Alphas who are considered his mates. Things are very different for Betas. If I wanted to date someone, it would never be taken that seriously. I don’t know how comfortable I feel about that.

My brothers are my pack, my family. Bringing another person into our world would feel strange.

Maybe that’s why I’m so transfixed by this woman.

I haven’t been with anyone in so long.

I’m starting to crave the kind of attention that Echo gets from his Alphas, and it’s turned my brains into mush for the first beautiful, intriguing woman who crossed my path.

She leaves the café and I duck my head under my newspaper as she exits the building, feeling my heart start to race as she passes by, so close to where I’m leaning against a wall that I know I should be able to smell her perfume, if she was wearing any.

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