Page 49 of Altius (The Scent of Victory #2)

Thirty-One

Morgan

“ W hat’s got your panties in a twist?” Jacobi asked as he helped himself to another serving of Kelsey’s homemade gnocchi. “You smelled foul all weekend—at least until a certain someone slipped in late last night. Now you’re all gross again.”

Glancing across the table, I raised a brow at Kelsey for confirmation.

My sister gave a reluctant nod. “It’s true.”

“You should have told me. I’ll go spray—”

“Just tell me which idiot I need to kick in the knot,” Jacobi said, shoveling an overloaded forkful of gnocchi into his mouth.

“It’s not one of the guys.” I took a sip of water. “Nor do they have a knot. Dr. Sethi got on my case today, and… Well, it got personal.”

Kelsey set her fork down and studied my face. “She knows about you and Cal?”

“Seems like it. As well as who was at my heat.”

I was almost finished filling them in when the front door unlocked with a sharp beep.

Cal trudged across the threshold with his head bowed. He was wearing his blue suit, clean-shaven with his hair slicked back.

A glance at the clock on the stove confirmed he was early. Really early. Had the board members canceled their dinner plans?

I was on him in a flash, arms wrapped tight around his bulky frame. “What happened?”

“Fucking Chaz,” he ground out, returning my hug with double the force. “He—”

A polite rap at the front door interrupted him. Only one resident on this floor still bothered to knock rather than using the door code.

Cal exhaled and reached back to open the door for a frost-faced Owen.

“I know Chaz is a first-rate asshole,” he said as he strode in, heading straight for the reading chair by the fireplace, “but does he have to prove it quite so often?”

Capturing one of Cal’s large hands in both of mine, I led him to the couch, urging him to sit before asking, “What did your father do?”

Jacobi cleared his throat and began reading from his phone, “Chaz Carling, CEO of Verray Shipping, held a surprise press conference this evening to answer questions about recent embezzlement accusations and suspicions of inequitable designation hiring practices…and to appoint Burke Carling as the new Vice President of the troubled Logistics Division.”

“Who’s that?” Kelsey asked, peering over Jacobi’s shoulder.

Cal let out a sarcastic grunt. “My youngest uncle.”

“A veritable kiss-ass without half of Heather’s qualifications,” Owen added.

“She got passed over again?” I asked.

“Oh no, it’s worse than that.” Slumping down on the couch, Cal ran a hand through his hair, returning some of its usual tousled charm. “She’s now the junior VP—the only junior VP in the company—which means she’s still going to do all the work while another incapable alpha gets all the credit.”

Heather might not be my favorite person, but I was irked on her behalf. “He’s really using his own daughter to make it look like they promote betas to positions of power?”

“It’ll shut the media up,” Cal said with a weary shrug.

Owen straightened his glasses and sneered. “Because nepotism solves everything.”

“That blows.” Jacobi dropped his phone on the table in disgust.

We all nodded in agreement.

Perched on the edge of the arm of the couch, I hesitated to ask when Chaz had made this decision, and whether Dr. Sethi had known before our check-in. I hoped she hadn’t.

Because if she had…

Cal squeezed my hand. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” I said.

Jacobi let out an undignified snort as he speared gnocchi with his fork. “Run-ins with wicked stepmothers aren’t nothing.”

What?” Cal sat up straight, lacing our fingers together before I could try to retreat. “Anya got on your case again?”

After shooting a glare at my loudmouth best friend, I sighed and looked between Cal and Owen.

“Have either of you eaten?” I asked.

They both shook their heads.

“Come sit down,” Kelsey said, already fetching more bowls from the kitchen. “There’s still plenty of gnocchi left.”

“Yes, better fortify your stomachs,” Jacobi said, sneaking a premature third helping while Kelsey wasn’t looking. “Because it’s a doozy of an update.”

“Morgan?” Cal’s brows knit together.

I leaned down to kiss away the tension in his forehead. “Don’t worry. You know me. I give as good as I get.”

A quiet laugh, delivered at close range, sent a shiver down my spine.

“Of course you did.” Owen’s leg brushed my knee as he slipped past, heading toward his customary seat at the head of the table in the dining room. “Because Dr. Van Daal doesn’t like to lose.”

“Oh, you noticed that, too?” Jacobi teased, cheeks bulging like a hamster.

Owen’s gray eyes settled on my profile. “It’s one of her more charming traits.”

“Can we not encourage her stubbornness, please?” Kelsey set a bowl of gnocchi in front of Owen. “You don’t have to live with her.”

“Neither do you,” Jacobi said with a wave of his fork.

Cal and I exchanged a lingering glance.

Was I ready to exchange evenings like this—with the reliable, cozy comfort of Kelsey’s home-cooked meals and her gentle presence, temporarily punctuated by Jacobi’s sass—for the sake of my love life?

“One thing at a time,” Cal whispered as he got to his feet. “Now, tell me how much I have to apologize for on Anya’s behalf.”

***

A glittery orange blur streaked down the runway, launching off the vault with immense power into a tight twist.

Unfortunately, the gymnast’s legs separated in the air, and she took a step on the landing. Even minor mistakes couldn’t escape the seasoned eye of a gymnastics judge.

It was the first home gymnastics meet of the season, and while I was in awe of the height the alpha girls were getting on their vaults, the visiting team couldn’t compete with Northport’s stronger technical proficiency.

My gaze drifted across the arena to the uneven bars, where Wyatt was acting as a spotter, paying close attention to every swing and release, ready to step in at any second to assist one of his athletes.

While the female coaches looked sharp in blazers and blouses in their respective schools’ colors, Wyatt was wearing black joggers with a navy quarter-zip pullover with a prominent Captain Tusker logo on his chest. While the outfit was comparatively casual, it was downright fancy as far as his wardrobe was concerned.

And it did nothing to hide his sculpted physique or deter appreciative glances from members of the visiting team and the assembled crowd.

He’d also been pressured into giving three pre-meet interviews with different sports networks. With his handsome face and gymnastics pedigree, he was the natural choice to sacrifice to the media—something my poor boyfriend would have to get used to.

Thankfully, my omega had decided to be amused by the attention Wyatt was attracting rather than feel territorial.

Our scent match was loyal, almost to a fault, and the only straying he was capable of was the occasional lingering glance in my direction.

Something I hoped Dr. Flemming and the other coaches hadn’t noticed.

My phone buzzed in my pocket. Instead of a reply from Jenna to my earlier question about how classes were going, I found an alert from PheroPass for an elevated reading.

I pulled up the record in question on my tablet, recognizing the name—Nika—as the gymnast currently performing on the uneven bars. Her pheromone emission levels were minimal, but the readings for pheromone exposure were just high enough to result in a warning.

Tabbing through the rest of the squad, I looked for anyone with a corresponding pheromone emission rate.

Nothing. Just like the football team.

Two possibilities came to mind.

Either the sensors had a flaw that quality assurance testing had failed to identify, or even a double dose of scent blockers couldn’t contain Wyatt’s pheromones during gymnastics meets.

I took a screenshot of the reading and emailed it to Owen and Cal, along with a suggestion that we ask Wyatt to start wearing a PheroPass sensor.

Not only would it provide unique insight into someone living with mate waning syndrome, but it would help to confirm or deny if Wyatt’s pheromones were disrupting the other readings.

And if it wasn’t Wyatt…

I slowly surveyed the people surrounding the uneven bars. It was just the gymnastics team, some coaches, the judges, and a couple of cameramen.

Nothing abnormal. No glassy eyes or labored breathing. Completely different from the savagery of the football team.

They were just a group of people focused on the competition, inside a well-ventilated sports complex, where pheromone clouds only lasted a scant few seconds.

Which meant the sensors were malfunctioning. There must be a minute detail Owen and his team had overlooked, resulting in a weakness that the football team’s pheromone bomber had exploited for maximum chaos.

But what?

I decided to take another look at the quality assurance testing reports tonight.

A heated gaze brushed my cheek as the Northport gymnastics squad walked past, moving from the uneven bars to the balance beam. They had a comfortable lead over the visiting school, which would only grow once they reached the floor exercise, their best apparatus by far.

Keeping my head down, lest Dr. Flemming or anyone else notice Wyatt was looking at me, I mindlessly scrolled through biometric dashboards.

On second thought, combing over the PheroPass testing reports might have to wait until tomorrow night.

Such a dominant performance deserved to be celebrated—deeply, thoroughly, with a bit of hair pulling and some dirty talk—until Wyatt begged for mercy.

“Excuse me,” a tentative feminine voice asked. “Are you Morgan Van Daal?”

I looked up, finding that a roving reporter from an omega sports streaming channel was holding a microphone in my face, while a camera loomed behind her.

“Do you have a few minutes for an interview?”

“I’m sorry,” I said with a sufficient amount of professional tact, “but I’m here as a physician, not a commentator.”

That’s right. I was at work, and I needed to focus on the meet.

Not the devastatingly attractive boyfriend of mine, smirking at my misfortune, twenty feet away.

Yeah. The reports could definitely wait.