Page 14 of Down Knot Out (Pack Alphas of Misty Pines #3)

Such a simple statement, yet it lands with the weight of everything unspoken between us. I remember what you like. As if the years apart were nothing. As if he’s kept a catalog of my preferences filed away, waiting for the moment he could use them again.

“Is that okay?” he asks when I don’t respond. “The order, I mean.”

I nod, not trusting my voice.

As he dials the restaurant, I study his profile—the strong line of his jaw now covered with stubble, the small scar above his right eyebrow that’s new, the way his black hair has grown so long. The familiar alongside the unknown. The Dominic I remember mixed with the man he’s become.

He places the order with easy confidence, repeating my preferences exactly, adding extra sauce without me having to ask. It’s disarming, this evidence of how I’ve lived in his memory all this time. That, while I was trying to forget him, he was committing me to memory in even greater detail.

How can he be so open about it? So comfortable showing me how he carried these pieces of me with him? It ties me in knots, this casual revelation of feelings I’ve spent years trying to forget.

When he hangs up, he winces and rubs his temple.

“The couch,” I command, remembering why he’s here in the first place. “You should be resting, not standing around looking at my things.”

I hurry to the couch and shove pillows aside to clear space for his larger frame. “Sit back, get comfortable. The doctor said you need to rest.”

Dominic sighs in exasperation. “I’m tired of resting. It’s been weeks of nothing but resting.”

“And you have weeks more to go.” I point to the cleared section of the couch. “Sit.”

He complies, lowering himself with a careful movement that betrays his pain despite his protests. Tension tightens the skin around his lips as he squints. He’s hurting more than he wants to admit.

Without thinking, I move to the lamp behind the couch, switching it on to its dimmest setting before turning off the ceiling light. The room transforms, bathed now in a warm glow that softens the angles of his face.

“Better?”

“Much.” He relaxes as the gentler light eases the strain on him.

It’s only after I finish adjusting the pillows behind him and draping a soft throw blanket across the back of the couch within easy reach if he gets cold that I realize what I’ve done.

The dimmed lighting. The comfortable seating arrangement.

The quiet intimacy of my small living room with just the two of us waiting for food to arrive.

I’ve created the perfect setting for?—

My thoughts screech to a halt as heat crawls up my neck and into my cheeks.

“I’ll get you some water,” I blurt out, turning toward the kitchen before he sees my face.

“I don’t have anything else to offer. No soda or juice or—” I cut myself off, aware I’m rambling.

“Just water. Is water okay? Of course, it’s okay.

Everyone drinks water, it’s not like you’re allergic to water, that’s not even possible, well maybe if you were a witch in The Wizard of Oz, but that’s fiction and?—”

I clasp my hand over my mouth, mortified by the nervous babble. This is what he does to me. Reduces me to a jittery, rambling mess just by sitting on my couch looking like he belongs.

“Water is perfect,” he calls from the living room, amusement in his tone.

I take a moment in the kitchen, stuffing the menus back in their drawer and pressing my cool palms to my heated cheeks, trying to compose myself.

It’s just Dominic. Just my ex-boyfriend from years ago who’s now one of the Alphas courting me.

In my apartment. On my couch. Surrounded by my pheromones and adding his own .

No big deal at all.

I fill two glasses with water, ice cubes clinking the sides. My hands shake, causing tiny ripples across the surface. Going with Dominic to his impersonal hotel room would have been better. Having him here, in my private space, is so much more than I anticipated.

It’s too intimate. Too real. The hotel would have been safer, like he first suggested. But I insisted on bringing him here, determined to prove I could handle his presence in my life again.

Now I’m not so sure.

The water glasses sweat in my hands as I return to the living room, tiny droplets sliding down the sides. As Dominic watches me approach, my pulse hammers in my throat and my fingers tremble. The glasses clink, announcing the nervousness I can’t suppress.

I reach the coffee table, a vintage trunk I found at a flea market and repurposed, and I lean forward to set the glasses down.

But his attention turns me into a jittery mess, and my hands shake harder, water sloshing over the rim of one glass, then the other, forming small puddles on the wooden surface.

“Sorry.” I straighten too fast. “I’ll get a towel to clean this up. ”

“It’s just water,” Dominic soothes, but I’m already turning, fleeing back to the kitchen.

My kitchen towels hang from a hook by the sink, one printed with dancing unicorns and another plain blue one frayed at the edges from years of use. I grab the blue one, twisting it between my fingers as I try to calm my racing heart.

What is wrong with me? It’s just spilled water. Just Dominic. Just the two of us alone in my apartment with the lights dimmed and years of history between us.

I take a steadying breath, inhaling the lilies-and-lilacs pheromones that fill my home, now mingled with citrus and musk. Our scents intertwine in the small space like they used to, back when we were everything to each other.

With the towel clutched in my hand, I return to the living room. Dominic hasn’t moved, but he follows my approach. I drop to my knees beside the coffee table, dabbing at the small puddles with the edge of the towel.

“Sorry,” I mumble again, focusing on the task. “I’m just so?—”

Before I can finish, warm fingers close around my wrist, stilling my movement. The touch sends a jolt through me, like static electricity but deeper, a current that runs all the way to my core.

“Chloe.” My name on his lips comes out soft yet insistent. “Look at me.”

I raise my face to him, aware of how close we are, with me kneeling on the floor and him leaning forward on the couch, our faces only inches apart. His hand still encircles my wrist, his thumb resting over the place where he can feel my pulse beating frantically.

“You don’t need to be nervous,” he says. “I’m not going to do anything.”

Something twists in my chest. Disappointment? Relief? I’m not sure, only that his words created a hollow space beneath my ribs.

“You’re not?” The question slips out before I can stop it, small and vulnerable.

The gray in his eyes turns stormy as his pupils dilate, and his focus drops to my lips with a hunger that steals my breath. “Do you want me to?”

The question hangs between us, charged with possibility.

My tongue darts out to wet my lips, and his nostrils flare at the movement. The room is too warm, the air too thick with our mingled scents while his touch burns my skin.

“I thought—” I swallow, finding my voice. “I thought we were courting. That’s what it meant when you signed the contract. I didn’t agree just for show. I thought you meant it, too.”

“I meant it.” His voice drops lower into a purr. “Very much.”

“Then I don’t want it to be pretend for you,” I whisper, finding the courage to push past this final barrier. “Because it’s not pretend for me.”

His free hand comes up to cup my cheek, his palm warm, and my breath catches at the tenderness of his touch. “Nothing about the way I love you is pretend.”

He searches my face before he leans forward, closing the distance between us with aching slowness, giving me every opportunity to pull away.

Last time, I did. Last time I’d run scared.

My pulse races wildly, and my body trembles.

He’s going to kiss me if I let him. If I don’t turn away again.

I don’t.