“What was that?” Haze asked with a characteristic purr that had been hot in teenage Haze and was fucking well near sinful in the adult version. He sidled on up to Candy, and even she looked slightly flustered as a result.
“Don’t answer him,” I told Candy. “Do not fucking answer him.”
“Your girl Riley here can’t seem to catch a dick,” Candy said with a glee so apparent, I was going to melt a whole block of laxative chocolate into her next coffee.
“And why would that be?” Haze asked, but his attention was on me, the forms set aside with a click on the desk.
“She’s always been a catch and release kind of girl,” Candy said, twirling her finger in her hair. “Like, she’ll reel them in. With those legs, how could she not?” A series of deep masculine grunts at that seemed to perfume the room with testosterone. Even Janet was fanning herself lazily with a letter. “But when it comes time to land those suckers, something always gets in the way.”
“Does it indeed?” Haze asked, his focus shifting to me.
I took a step back, because fuck, he was intense. Had I forgotten that, or had he just gotten worse? It didn’t matter, it was past time to nip this in the bud.
“Well, considering my love life is absolutely no one’s business but mine,” I told the room primly, “I’m going to go into my special, highly secure laboratory and start working on what I’m supposed to. Candy, you could always try that as well. Guys, I’m sorry to hear you’re having such a hard time finding the right omega, but I guess all I can say is that she or he has to be out there.”
I smiled then, letting some of the affection I always felt for the pack filter in, but not too much. That locked box inside me might be rattling, but I wasn’t opening it up again.
“I’m sorry you got your hopes up, but we don’t handle that kind of issue here. If erectile dysfunction is the problem—”
“Not right now, it’s fucking not,” Haze muttered.
“Fuck, I thought that was just me,” Blake shot back.
“Well.” I blinked, trying to brain bleach away the mental images I was getting right now. “If everything’s medically sound, can I suggest a psychologist?”
“Why do you think we’re here?” Colt asked, then he laughed. No, another word needed to be devised for such a humourless sound. “She was the one who suggested this. I told her it would be a waste of time.”
I didn’t know what the hell to say or do, but I was saved from having to say anything as our boss swung in through the door. He stopped, taking in the uncharacteristically full reception area with just a cocked eyebrow.
“Robert, we’ve had an alpha pack present to give us some samples for our database,” Candy said smoothly. “This is the Vanguard pack.”
“Ah yes, Fen Vanguard?” Robert said, finding Fen with unerring accuracy and offering him his hand. “It’s good to finally meet in person.”
“Well, I’ll leave you to process the paperwork, Candy,” I said with a meaningful glare. “Conflict of interest and all that.”
“You grew up in Bordertown, didn’t you, Riley?” Windsor asked.
“Her dad was an enforcer for our pack. A bloody good man,” Fen said, real emotion colouring his words. “We grew up together, were thick as thieves, which is probably why she doesn’t feel comfortable taking samples from us.”
“My staff is perfectly capable of behaving professionally in every circumstance, but if Candace has some free time…?”
“Of course,” she said brightly. “Let’s grab those forms and come through here.”
She smirkedat me behind Windsor’s back as she swiped everyone in, Haze mimicking her shit-eating grin as I watched the pack file into my lab. I was forced to hustle after them, going through the door before it slid closed, and when inside, it felt like the lovely sterile peacefulness of it had been somehow sullied. I shook my head, dismissing that feeling, and instead marched past the chaos, retreating into my office. It wasn’t until I had unlocked the door and shut it behind me that I felt I could take a full breath.
Shemoved inside me. She’d always been a slight presence, just something…extra I felt every now and then, rising at inopportune moments, usually when strong emotions were in play. An instinct that told me, ‘no, not that guy’ when later reports came back that he’d been accused of date rape. Like a ghost, she haunted me, appearing and disappearing at will, but in the quiet of my office, I heard her low whine inside my skull.
My hands clapped over my ears, as if that would stop the sound, but of course it wouldn’t. Her pants made a mockery of my attempt. I forced my hands down, made myself straighten my spine and then walk over to my desk, firing up my computer.
I knew what I was—a latent. The discoveries I’d made during my studies and then my own research painted a horrific picture for me. Latents contained recessive alpha or omega genes, giving us the capacity to shift, if not the ability.
The accounts I’d read feverishly at night during uni had horrified me. Sufferers told of feeling haunted by a wolf that they could never let free. Some even tried and… It was safe to say that the video footage I’d seen during lectures, the phases of an unsuccessful shift discussed in clinical detail, had been enough to stop me from ever getting in touch with my inner wolf. It did however pique my scientific interest. I never wanted another person to go through that, let alone me. It was that, that bone-deep feeling of purpose that I clung to as I opened up my emails and started sorting through my inbox.
Papers sent by our librarian, along with data sets and, even as I clicked on it, a computer model of a prospective therapy. I twisted the 3D model of the adrenal system using my mouse, consulting the accompanying paper as well, to explain what they were proposing. Messing around with the adrenal, or fight-or-flight system, was risky to say the least, but what they were posing…
I played around with the sliders in the model, showing the responses to higher levels of adrenalin. What they were suggesting was a massive spike of synthetic noradrenalin to replicate the cascade that went through an alpha or omega’s body prior to a shift. It was suggested that a latent’s inability to shift had something to do with a beta’s much lower levels of the hormone. Trouble was, alphas and omegas had much more robust systems to counter that incredible rush. Their hearts wouldn’t go into arrest or develop tachycardia, their blood pressure remained relatively stable, and… I tapped a pen against my lips and started to knock out some notes.
And just like that, any thought of the Vanguard pack was shoved completely from my mind as I began to dig in. The modelling seemed promising, but we needed to find a way to keep a subject stable and healthy throughout the process. We would never get human trials past an ethics committee until that was proven. I began trawling through different databases, looking for medications, existing or in trial, that might help us counteract the dangers of adrenalin overdose…