Page 25 of My Begrudging Scent Matches

“I can take the bus,” she says, a bit breathless at their sudden proximity.

“Don’t be difficult,” he says. It’s a plea more than a command. Still, she inches closer, and so does he—they’re less than a foot apart now. She smells him, and Caleb, too, lingering on Grant’s clothes.

“I’m not difficult.”

“You’re a brat.”

“And you’re bossy,” she quips, but her neck is tilted back so she can look at him in those scorching blue eyes, bright like the base of a flame.

“Christ,” Grant breathes and before she knows it, his lips are against hers. She falls right into it, her bag slipping off of her shoulder before he scoops her against him. He doesn’t kiss so much as he devours, his tongue sliding into her mouth for her to suck on and push against.

A tiny groan escapes him as she bites his lower lip, and his arms wrap even tighter around her.

There’s this fire building in her chest, smoke tingles beneath her skin and through her veins. She’s afraid she might combust just from this, just kissing him in a stale hallway beneath buzzing fluorescent lights. The only other sounds are the heater flowing through the vents and their frantic breaths.

Alice gathers a sparse grip on reality and pulls her face away from Grant’s. He searches her face, none of the rakish confidence she saw last week. Only need, and desperation. He’s gripping onto her for dear life. Their heavy breaths mingle together and the heat of his skin under her palm all feels right, but there’s that niggling and persistent concern again.

“I have to go home,” she says instead of spilling the secret fears bubbling inside of her. “I’m not feeling well.”

“Let me take you,” he says.

She gulps before giving a nod. She will let him because he and Caleb have a nice car with heated seats and XM radio that will get her home faster than the bus, which is already slow even on a day with perfect weather. She will let him because she can only deny her body so much and walking away from him now would be too big an ask.

They untangle themselves from one another and walk to the elevator without touching. Once the doors slide shut, there’s a brief, tense moment before Grant kisses her again. It’s intense and messy, he kisses her so hard that her knees falter and she has to lean on the rail for support. He pulls back from her after only a minute of this, fixing his jacket just as the doors open to the parking garage.

Grant winds the scarf around Alice’s neck twice, and it smells as much like Caleb as she hoped it would. The car is much the same, an envelope of their scents encasing her as soon as Grant closes the door behind her.

“Will Caleb be upset?” Alice asks once they’ve pulled out of the parking garage. “About, um, the kissing?”

“Why would he be upset?”

Alice chews on the inside of her lower lip. “Because you’re together.”

“We are.” Grant nods. “I think if I was kissing anyone else he might be, and with good reason, but you’re not just anyone. You’re our missing piece.”

Grant’s candor about this makes Alice’s cheeks burn. They’re entering into dangerous territory, talking like this.

“You two seem happy enough.”

“We are,” Grant agrees. “I love him, and he loves me. We have a home together, a life we’ve built, it’s all very neat, but we were always open to finding an Omega.”

“Then why haven’t you?” They are the most eligible Alphas Alice has ever met. They’re hot, nice, and hard-working—Grant has a damn law degree and Caleb an MBA. Undeniably, they’re sexy, educated men, and Alice is to believe they haven’t had their pick of Omegas before now? That she was the one to finally turn their heads?

“It wasn’t right,” Grant says, like it’s the simplest thing in the world. Like the difference now is that she is right. “Caleb’s been. . . yearning these last couple of years. I think he’s been quietly hoping we’d find someone that fits with us for a long time.”

“Does that make you feel bad?” Alice’s mind rolls over the possibility that sweet, lovely Grant could be the one who hasn’t really wanted this match, not Caleb.

“No,” Grant smiles and a dimple shows on his cheek. Alice stuffs her hands under her legs to refrain from reaching out to touch it. “Caleb likes to take care of people. He’s got a lot of love under that rigid exterior.”

“Where is Caleb now?” She asks instead of digging further into this missing piece business.

“I dropped him at home. He has food to prep for tomorrow.”

“Oh. Right.” Tomorrow. Thanksgiving. It’s usually one of her favorite holidays, but this year she will be spending it alone.

In trying to deflect her mom’s probing questions, she hadn’t booked her flight early enough. Now they’re all too expensive, so she lied and told her parents she would be spending the day with one of her coworkers and vowed to spend at least a week back at home for Christmas. It’s for the best, ultimately, because Alice doesn’t know that she can deal with her family right now.

She’d assured her mother enough that she was safe, her heat was painless and, no, she didn't bond with either of the Alphas, but Mom, lots of people wait nowadays, it’s not a big deal. Olivia is the only one who knows Caleb and Grant are her scent matches, a secret Alice only prays her sister won’t spill over turkey and mashed potatoes tomorrow.

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