Page 5 of Sweetheart: Part One

Sweethearts weren’t obligated tofuckthe alphas they were assigned—they were just supposed to balance us. But most wouldn’t know the nuance of alpha instincts if it slapped them in the face. The fact was, I could fuck whoever I wanted, but I never would—even when they begged.

Not that they always did. Sometimes they begged, sometimes they ran. But it was always an outlet in itself, holding that power over someone else. Especially when I couldn't show myself to the rest of the world: bad for the brand, Love said. We’d lose everything.

The fucking brand.

Sometimes I felt sick of it all.

So this was all I had. The last little fragment of thrill, and Love could take that from me too, if I pushed him. I wasn’t willing to give this all up, yet.

But it had beenweeks, and I wanted my Sweetheart.

Even when they were rejected time after time—this was a place I could finally unmask: in the confines of NDAs. All for my pack’s desperation to do something about my ever-increasing instability.

Of course, I arrived at the office first. I could feel the rare smile bracing my lips as my fingers closed around the doorknob.

Then I heard a sound permeating through the door before me.

I froze.

It was something softer and sweeter than my steel exterior was used to. A song in a gentle, lyrical voice that sent shivers pricking every inch of my body. I caught the words through the door, each plucking a chord in a chamber of my soul, dusty and dark and untouched for far too long.

"…Fill your soul with joys and love...”

I blinked, reeling my disturbing reaction back in with all my might.

“…And I’ll stay with you until the first break of day…"

I shook myself mentally, rejecting the notion that it affected me. But still, something within me quaked.

I rejected that, too, and with fury.

With more aggression than was necessary, I turned the doorknob and entered.

VEX

I jumped out of my skin as the door violently burst open.

Ebony Starless stepped in with a presence so cold and furious that it almost stopped my heart. The lullaby died on my lips, and my cheeks burst into flames. He stared me down with something icy in his storm grey eyes.

Shock seized me.

I'd seen him with the others at the event, but not up close.

Ebony Starless was a known rogue, and rich enough for it not to matter.

But he wasn’t a bad guy—at least, he wasn’t from everything I’d ever seen. He was quiet, calm, and kind; holding doors open for fans, buying lunch for a homeless man near where his film crew set up. Then there was that time he paid for the cancer treatment of a fan after she rear-ended his limo on her way to the hospital.

But every fragment of information I’d ever gleaned from a magazine, interview, or news article, died a sudden and violent death as I digested the real thing.

Cold, sharp, and—right now—predatory.

Ebony Starless was fucking terrifying. Terrifying, and also goddamned beautiful because, even if he wasn't aware of it, he was my scent match. And his scent, the cool earthy aroma of twilight grass, flooded the room, a frightening edge of fury to it.

He had straight silver hair that was loose; tucked behind his ears and tumbling to his waist. His skin was a dusky tan, and his eyes were startlingly grey.

The silver fae, he was known as. Drake was quiet, and Rook was the playboy, but magazines referred to Love and Ebony as the fae brothers. Both were tall, with long hair—as if mirrors of one another. They were elegant and had an almost ethereal appearance.

The magazines were kind of right, actually; he was ethereal. But it didn’t offset the danger I felt from him.

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