Page 56 of The Alpha Wolf's Pregnant Bride

“Tell me more,” I say, leaning back, too, a smirk growing on my face.

***

Two weeks away from Mysthaven has given me some time for introspection. Checking my reflection in the mirror, I twirl in the black dress that I’d previously bought for the meeting with a client who turned out to be Cyrus.

I’d always been self-aware, my ample curves bringing about an abundance of torture and scornful words from the Alpha of the Moon Shine Pack. Back then, he was only next in line as the Alpha’s son. Still, his words cut deeply and had me fleeing from the pack and leaving the country.

With the nine years away, I was able to reclaim my power and feel confident in my own skin. When I returned for Mama’sfuneral, I didn’t have an ounce of insecurities weighing me down. I was confident that I could dispel any oncoming attacks from the Alpha’s poisonous tongue.

I wasn’t counting on that tongue administering the most heated seduction. He probably realized that I was deaf to his bitter words and decided to use another tactic to disarm me.

Why is he always out to get me? I think woefully, realizing that this feeling of insecurity has nothing to do with my body.

He didn’t break my self-esteem this time around.

He broke my heart.

Taking a deep breath, I steel my spine and square my shoulders in preparation for tonight’s meeting. Equipped with an earpiece hidden beneath the curls framing my face, I tap the device to check in with Kenji.

“Testing…”

“I can hear you loud and clear,” comes his confirmation through the earpiece. “Are you ready to leave?”

“Yes,” I concur with a firm nod at my reflection. It isn’t for Kenji’s sake, but mine. It’s easier soldiering through battered self-esteem than it is fighting through the dull ache in my chest.

I only have myself to blame since I’d willingly surrendered to the Alpha that night on the mountaintop. It was so much easier to take his cruel words from one ear and out the other.

The exchange of bodily fluids has seemingly created some kind of energetic tie that touched my heart—the one thing I worked hard to protect.

Only mildly convinced that I could make it through the night, didn’t help that this dress was a reminder of the heady look of lust I’d witnessed in Cyrus’s eyes that night.

How foolish of me! I think scornfully, recalling everything else I witnessed that very same night. He was flirting with a human in the restaurant, but it slipped my mind when he exercised his charms on me outside my cottage. I should have seen it coming—that he was only going to use me for my body.

The ride to the restaurant is quiet, my palms sweaty on my lap while I stare out the window, the street lights flashing by like white streaks in my vision. A faint, distant echo of white noise fills my ears, but I relegate it to the simple fact that I’m doing this for the first time in nine years.

Cyrus’s meeting doesn’t count since it turned out to be a bust.

Gosh! Why am I thinking about him so much tonight?

And why does this dress suddenly feel like it’s stifling me?

I brush away the unwelcomed thoughts and enter the restaurant, providing a fabricated name to the hostess at the front. A waiter shows me to the reserved table, its emptiness indicating that I’m earlier than my fake “husband.”

Ordering a bottle of the finest wine the restaurant has to offer, I get comfortable in the plush seat as I wait for the client’s arrival.

“I’m in position,” I whisper between my palms so that it isn’t obvious that I’m speaking to the mic tucked between my breasts.

“Great. The client’s on his way,” Kenji replies. “He knows that he’s Mr. Harris for tonight.”

I giggle under my breath. “Please choose better names next time. These are so bland.”

On the other end, Kenji chuckles sarcastically. “Next time, you pick a name that doesn’t draw attention to you.”

“I—”

“Mrs. Harris…”

The humor I was feeling a second ago gets wiped out of existence the moment I hear the familiar voice call out the name Kenji invented for me tonight.

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