“Jesus Christ, Mum!” I hissed at her, then pulled away, trying to repair the damage and preserve my modesty as Pa chatted to Cress and Theo, who’d made an appearance. “I’m supposed to be on the edge of frenzy, not charging ten bucks an hour.” My eyes jerked up, staring into my impassive parents’ ones, using the need for discretion to my advantage. “I’m not likely to be able to relax enough to feel anything for anyone if the two of you don’t back off.”
Yeah
, that was a mistake.
“Helen,” Mum said, turning to the ‘stylist,’ “grab the bottle on my dresser. The small amber one.” Dad looked down at her in suspicion. “Bulgarian rose attar melded with the sweat of several hundred omegas kept in a state of frenzy. The process is quite cruel, and it’s hideously expensive.”
She held out an elegant hand when Helen returned, pulling the stopper and then rubbing it against my wrists, then blotting the scent against my neck.
“Is it effective?” Dad asked.
“Only time will tell.” Mum shrugged. “But Kit is right—unless she’s allowed to relax into things, we better make sure we find a good scent analog. Otherwise, the Chadwick boy will just smell the sour odour of stressed omega.”
There were times like this when I was forced to stare hard at my mother, to try and decode what exactly was going on under the brittle exterior and the impeccable manners, ready to crack at any moment. She would do things like this, in a suitably bored, callous manner while staring at the two of us baldly, half a cruel smile on her face, masking the fact that she had just got Dad off my back.
Times like this made me think somewhere under the dysfunction was a mother who loved me.
Then a knock came at the front door.
“Well, have a lovely night, darling,” Mum said, doing a complete three-sixty and dropping straight back into Stepford mode. “I’m sure you’ll have a wonderful time.”
And Dad? He didn’t say anything, just stared at me before moving to the front door and opening it.
“James! Come in, come in,” he said, waving my alpha inside, but James paid him little mind. Did they see it, as he stalked through drawing rooms and offices, galleries and studios? He wore a raw linen shirt buttoned up loosely, a thin scarf tossed carelessly around his neck, but that wasn’t it. His eyes ate me up in a way that was both subtle and declared exactly what I was getting myself into tonight.
“Hello, Kit.” I felt shivers go up my spine at the sound of his dark chocolate voice. “You look positively edible.” A finger reached out, touching the small locket I wore at my neck, a single curl of Tris’ hair within it, before he looked down at me through those horn-rimmed glasses and smiled. Dad smiled too, evidently happy with what he saw. “Are you ready to go?”
“Of course,” I replied, little more than a breath, and James grinned in response.
“Have fun, you two. We won’t be waiting up. My father intends to whip my butt on the golf course early tomorrow morning.”
“And I will too,” Pa shouted across the foyer.
“You can see what I’m dealing with.”
James nodded. “We were thinking of going out to a club or two afterwards. Seeing Kit in this ensemble, it seems criminal not to give her an opportunity to show off how beautiful it makes her look.”
“Well, if she’s in your capable hands, I know she’ll be safe.” Dad leant in, the picture of the indulgent father. “Have a lovely night, kitten.”
“So what the hell did they subject you to?” James asked me once we were out the door and walking towards his car. “The rose attar went some way to masking it, but you smell stressed.”
“What apart from their directions to entrap you by getting pregnant? My mother decided to rearrange my décolletage into what is apparently a more alpha attractive arrangement.”
His eyes dropped down, one eyebrow arching as he considered my mother’s handiwork.
“And I wasn’t sure if Dad was going to allow me out of the house without a ten-slide PowerPoint presenting all the ways I was gonna get my man.”
“He doesn’t understand, like so many don’t.” He put his hand above my head, resting it on the car roof. “You don’t have to do a damn thing to turn my head, Kit Greyson. My eyes are on you as much as they can be without stepping over the rules of propriety…” His hand went to my jaw, tracing the line of it. “And then just a little bit more. Come on, let’s go before I forsake my friend’s opening and take us straight into the jaws of Abaddon.”
I just stood there, stunned, as he opened the door, only all the training I’d been put through making me move to take a seat inside the car. James leaned over, grabbing my belt and clipping me in with a move that was so alpha, it usually nauseated me, but he smiled, slow and cocky, when I didn’t balk at all, no doubt my scent improving astronomically. He jogged around the other side of the car, then slid in, turning the ignition and then driving us the fuck away from my home.
“Len said he rang you afterwards,” he said, glancing away from the road for a second. “How did that go, Kit?”
“He listened to me cry.” My hands fidgeted in my lap. “I haven’t done that in god knows how long, thought it had been well and truly beaten out of me. But Len, it seems to be what he does. He sweeps in, provides a big, broad, very strong shoulder to cry on, and then despite all your best intentions…”
“We’ll get you out of this situation, both of you. You don’t have to consider my suit if that’s not what you want, but…”
His voice trailed away as I looked up at him, stared at the side of his face until he abruptly pulled over on the side of some suburban street and turned to stare back, the motor still throbbing.