Page 4 of A Chance at Love for the Twin Alphas

I nod, handing him the phone and watching how he zooms into the last picture we saw. I’m still feeling confused, though.

“Don’t worry,” Elodie reassures me. “Elise and I didn’t realize it either. Astronomy isn’t our forte. We are more on the practical side…”

“Same for me,” I admit.

Henry, however, stares at the pictures of the night sky in horror. “Alpha Centauri,” he mutters.

I try to roam my brain for an alpha named Centauri until realization dawns on me. I’m glad that, for once, I didn’t blurt out my first association. “You mean the constellation?”

“Rigil Kentaurus is there,” he analyzes. “So is Beta Centauri, but Proxima Centauri is missing,” he blinks. “How can a whole fucking star be missing?”

“Beats us,” Elodie says and sounds a bit impressed by Henry catching the meaning of the pictures so fast. “I didn’t know you knew so much about astronomy.”

“Philosophy and astronomy are a hobby,” he stutters, unusually flustered.

I smile a bit, not saying anything. I want him to have this moment of well-deserved praise.

“So, what’s with the picture?” he asks the girls again. “Is it fake?”

“No,” Elodie explains. “Some members of the Council are monitoring the sky and noticed that Proxima Centauri appears and disappears again, and so do other stars.”

“What?” My mouth drops open. “How is that possible?”

“It shouldn’t be,” Elise admits. “The…” she pauses. “You cannot talk about this to anyone.”

“We promise,” Henry says earnestly.

“You two are the only one we can trust with this,” Elodie points out. “Finn has too much on his plate right now, so do our other friends, but I hoped you two could help.”

“If we can help, we will,” I promise.

“Something is amiss with the deities,” Elise admits. “It could be the doing of dark witches.”

“Excuse me.” I blink at her. “Did you say deities?”

“If the sky is moving in such an unnatural way, it has to be them,” Elodie backs up her sister. “Prince Eric told me and Elise to research further. It seems the irregularity causing all of this is somewhere close to us… or at least in this region.”

Elise looks at us. “Would you help us?”

Henry and I look at each other. We don’t even need a mind link. “Yes,” we say in unison.

Both girls smile in relief. “Thank you.”

“We are waiting for more information from the Council,” Elise explains.

Elodie nods. “Prince Eric wants us to celebrate our birthday and then start with our research.”

“We’ll be ready then,” I promise, actually feeling relieved that I will have something to occupy my mind with.

Elise and Elodie show us some more pictures and tell us which stars are missing and when they returned to their respective star systems. We all try to come up with theories until we decide there is no help speculating like that.

We’ll wait until after their birthday and then make sure we research this properly. Henry and I will have to lead a gruesome training session tomorrow, so it’s better for us, too, that we won’t dive into this immediately.

2

Nerds

*HENRY*

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