Page 5 of Mark & Don't Tell

Are you still good to attend the launch of the line tonight at After Dark?

We started the company, Good Vibes, when we were in our late twenties, and we’d tried every product out there to get Felicia excited about me sharing the nest. After going through a couple dozen toys, we quickly realized they were all shit and there was an opportunity.

And maybe us creating all sorts of products to try with Felicia was a last-ditch effort to finally make the pack work like it should. When an omega goes into heat and she has a pack, all she cares about is having them with her, but with Felicia, half the time, she pushed me out. Demanded I leave the nest.

The phone buzzes with a new message.

Vic? You good?

I said I was good when we set the date.

We haven’t talked in a month.

Yeah, that’s my fault. Just like Felicia leaving was my fault. But hey, I’m used to being blamed for shit, so it’s not like I care.

I’ll be there.

Since the pack broke up—or rather, since I left the pack—I’ve distanced myself from the company, but the public marketing side of things has always been my job. As much as I hate being around people, I know how to sell shit.

Okay. Dinner next Friday?

I have a session.

Saturday?

Why?

The bubble that shows he’s typing appears and disappears a few times before Kai finally sends a message back.

Let us know how the products are received tonight.

I grunt and toss my phone onto the couch. What did I expect? Some heartfelt reason for them wanting to get together? We’ve never been like that, and we’ve never discussed what happened. Almost like my leaving wasn’t a big deal.

And that, more than whatever Felicia said or did, really fucking bugs me.

Kai and Lincoln were like my brothers. Ever since we bonded during a spur-of-the-moment skydiving adventure in college, hell, even before then, we were tight. Best friends since private school. Our families vacationed together in the Hamptons. We got into so much shit together, our becoming a pack was inevitable.

Falling apart . . . well, no one saw that coming.

The diffuser sputters out, and I sigh, grabbing the vial of perfume and the jug of water from the supply closet and refilling it. I close the lid and turn the machine back on, leaning over the mist and inhaling.

Felicia smelled like sugar and chocolate, sickly sweet.

I never loved it, but she wasn’t the pack’s scent match, and it wasn’t repulsive. But this scent, the floral, almost earthen, richness of the lavender? It does something to me. My skin practically buzzes in approval, and I take another breath, exhaling and making the mist billow for a moment.

Glancing down at the vial clutched in my hand, I read the label. On the site, each perfume or diffusing oil has a name. I’ve explored a few other products from the shop, but I always come back to Fragrance D.

The Confident Omega, the label reads. Lavender—an earthen floral with soft notes of powder and smoke—will leave you soothed and ready to fall in love.

I roll my eyes at the last part, but maybe it’s not so off the mark. I’m not ready, nor do I want a relationship of any kind, but I’m more than a little obsessed with the perfume.

Maybe it’s what our scent match would smell like.

Clutching the vial, I shut down all those thoughts before I go to a dark place and put it and the jug of water back into the supply closet.

I’m definitely not in the mood to go to After Dark, but it’s business, and I’m not about to give the guys a reason to give me shit. I’ll talk up the products with the clients at the club, get people excited and experimenting, then leave.

With a club full of eager participants, I should be excited. I should want to have some fun.

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