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She caught up with him fast, her irritated glare sliding off when she noticed how he was looking at her. “What?”

“Why’d you do that?”

She looked down at her phone where the notifications were already pouring in. How many followers did this woman have, anyway?

“I’m bored?” She shrugged. “There isn’t a lot to do in this town. Excuse me for finding a pet project,Ollie.”

He squirmed at the nickname, twisting the cart handle. Nobody called him that outside of his family. People tried, but he always politely rebuffed them. At least, he did up until a year ago. These days, he usually just glared.

“What, they didn’t give you anything to do while you’re stuck here?”

“I don’t actually—” She stopped, bitingher lip. She twisted to look around the empty aisle. “I just consult. For the marketing team. And that’s only because I gave them all fruit baskets and shouted them to baseball games so they’d give me a chance. If my dad knew how often they emailed me to fix a problem…”

He frowned as he pulled the cart to a stop in front of several stacks of wooden slats. “He doesn’t want them to?”

She laughed again, running a hand through her hair. She looked genuinely nervous; no distraction-through-cuteness this time.

“He wants me to stay out of the way. He thinks the only thing I’m good for is posing for pamphlet photos.” She held up her manicured hands. “These lil’ paws aren’t made for work, you know? They’re made for leisure. And I’mverygood at it.”

She said it with a grin. But there was a bitterness under it like she wasn’t fully on board with her cruisy lifestyle.

He sounds like an asshole.Oliver bit his tongue, reaching up to grab a wooden plank from behind her head. He’d assumed she wouldn’t know what work was if it ran up and bit her. However, she’d actually gone behind her dad’s back to find work—admittedly, at his own company—but still.

“Weird,” Oliver said instead. “I assumed he was smart. Since he runs a company and all.”

She blinked. For a second, he thought he’d overstepped—just because she was ragging on her dad didn’tmean he got to. But then she grinned at him, nothing coy about it.

“Are you being nice to me?”

“No,” he replied, heaving the plank into the cart. “I’m insulting your dad. Problem?”

She shook her head. Her stare was so hypnotic that Oliver found it difficult to tear his gaze away and reach up for the planks again. The bond fluttered in his chest, growing hot tendrils.

He pulled another plank out, distracted. He didn’t notice the other wooden planks sliding forward until it was too late.

“Shit,” he barked. There were too many to catch at once. He grabbed Luna, bending over her just in time. The planks slammed into his back, making him wince.Thatwas going to bruise. For about ten minutes, but still.

Luna yelped, jumping closer as they rolled off him and onto the floor.

“Oh my god,” she yelled.

“It’s fine,” he said, strained. He pulled back. “You alright?”

She nodded. “Areyoualright?”

“Sure.” He grimaced, rolling his shoulders. “Takes more than that to hurt me.”

A fairy fluttered into the end of the aisle, dressed in a staff uniform.

“I got it,” Oliver called. “Don’t worry about it.”

He looked down. Luna was clinging to hisshirt. She looked down as if she hadn’t noticed. Her arms dropped back to her sides, taking a large step back.

“Very, uh…” She coughed. “Very alpha of you. Why doesn’t your grandmother want you to be alpha, anyway? That seemed like a whole… thing. You weregoingto be alpha, right?”

“I still am,” Oliver said shortly.

Luna gave him a dubious look. “Sooo… what happened?”