Page 21 of How to Lose a Pack in 10 Dates
Aimee
I ’m still giggling when I close the door.
Actually, no— giggling doesn’t do this justice. This is full-on, shoulders-shaking, wheezing-into-a-pillow laughter. I have to physically collapse onto the bed to avoid making noise, face buried in the fluffiest pink throw blanket in existence. Which, by the way, I bought solely to irritate Wes.
Worth. Every. Penny.
The face he made. The misery in every begrudging note.
God, if I could bottle the energy of Wesley Knight gritting his way through that pitchy verse, I would slap it on a luxury candle, call it Alpha Regret, and use the royalties to fund a beach house, a small skincare empire, and an emotional support alpaca.
I kick my feet and roll onto my back, beaming at the soft, estrogen-drenched chaos that is now my room.
Technically their old guest room—now officially Omega Nesting Paradise.
It’s been a week since I moved in, and honestly, I’m thriving .
The transformation is complete: blush-toned bedding, mood lighting that says I’m soft but dangerous , and a passive-aggressive cactus named Kevin who judges everyone equally.
And, of course, a humidifier set to “ Lavender + Domination .” I made Wes unbox it for me and set it up while I sat cross-legged in bed wearing the tiniest silk pajamas I could find—barely-there shorts, a lace-trimmed cami, and zero shame.
He looked horrified .
I open my group chat with Lex and Zara. The notifications hit me immediately.
LEX: Aimee, bitch: where are you??? We need an update. Immediately. Screenshots. Scent profile. Body count. ZARA: And outfit deets. Is Cam’s hoodie back in rotation? We need visuals.
I snort so hard I briefly worry I’ve dislocated something, then type out a two-word response:
Wes sang.
There’s a brief pause.
Then all hell breaks loose.
LEX: YOU ARE KIDDING ME?! WHO DID YOU KILL?? WHAT SONG?! DID YOU FANG HIM MID-VERSE? ZARA: Wait. Like... sang sang? With vocal cords and suffering?
I’m laughing so hard I can barely type.
Yep. Full verse, with eye contact and everything. Pure misery on his part.
Oh, the memory . The way Cam and Jace stared at Wes as if he’d committed an actual crime by refusing to partake in the singing, then their expressions when he started existing off-beat.
His grimace. The soul-leaving-his-body energy.
It was everything I dreamed of and more.
LEX: OH MY GOD. You did it. You brOKE him. ZARA: God I hope it was off-key. Like... aggressively. LEX: You’re a menace, Aims. I’m so proud.
I stretch, then remember—
Oh. Right.
The Wi-Fi .
I snatch my phone back up with manic glee and type:
I also renamed the Wi-Fi to OmegaNet: Streaming Hormones 24/7. He hasn’t emotionally recovered.
It was like watching a cartoon, the way his face had visibly reddened upon realizing. All that was missing was the steam coming out of his ears.
LEX: I’M GONNA GET THAT TATTOOED ZARA: That’s art. Frame it. Cross-stitch it. Put it on a tote. LEX: You’re a national treasure. Is he crying? Is he pacing???
Heavy footsteps move up the stairs—measured, deliberate, with that familiar pissed-off rhythm—and I pause to listen. I glance down at my closed bedroom door, watching the unmistakably broad, alpha-shaped shadow stretch across the hallway floor.
It has to be Wes. No one else stomps and sulks at the same time.
He hesitates outside my room, and for a moment, everything goes still. He stands there long enough for me to feel it—his scent, faint through the crack, citrus-sharp and restrained—before he keeps walking.
Coward .
I send them my update:
He hovered outside my door for six seconds, but did nothing more. Probably journaling about it now. Or doing voodoo.
ZARA: Tell Kevin the cactus to stay alert. LEX: I’ll alert the Groupchat Council. Next prank: scented laundry detergent?
I smirk.
Already switched it to “Spring Meadows.” He told Cam he smells like a baby wipe. Cam cried laughing.
LEX: AIMEE YOU ICON.
I laugh under my breath as I toss my phone aside. Operation: Drive Alpha-hole Ex-Boyfriend Insane is officially underway, and so far? 10/10. No notes.
But the gleeful sound dies the second I open my laptop.
There it is. The document I’ve been ignoring for the past two days.
HOW TO LOSE A PACK IN 10 DATES.
When I first typed that title, it felt powerful. Bold . A little unhinged, sure, but righteous all the same. A manifesto that I could truly get behind, and a middle finger to every smug alpha who ever thought an omega’s bond was his birthright.
And then, after finding out I’d been matched by the app to Wes and his pack, it was supposed to be a takedown.
A slow, controlled unraveling of the most arrogant alpha I’ve ever known—and proof that scent-matches, soulmate packs, and all that fairy-tale bullshit was just a hormonal scam with good PR and a cult following.
Now, it stares back at me like a threat I don’t know how to follow through on. Not because Wes doesn’t deserve it— he does. He’s still every inch the self-important, control-obsessed asshole he revealed himself to be to me four years ago.
It's crazy to think that there was once a time when I saw something totally different in him; a time when he was sweet, when he was soft and gentle and protective, when his possessiveness didn’t feel toxic and his love felt kind.
Now, he’s cold and sharp-edged, mean and angry and emotionally constipated enough to qualify as a cautionary tale.
He still hasn’t apologized for the way he treated me. For how he ghosted me as though I was disposable, as if I never meant anything to him at all.
He makes my blood boil. He also makes my thighs clench. Which is—frankly—rude.
But Cam ? Jace ?
They weren’t supposed to be part of this, and they weren’t meant to matter . They were supposed to just be background noise; supporting characters and casualties of narrative. Names I planned to forget once I proved my point.
But now they aren’t . They’re kind and they’re sweet and they’re real, and they’re all the things I’ve ever wanted in an alpha, or a pack, or… or a mate.
They’re everything I once believed he was. Or at least, what he could be.
Cam folds my laundry and brings me tea and flusters himself into a full-body blush every time I so much as look at him with intent. He told me yesterday that I make the house feel more like home, and then he smiled like he hadn’t just punched me in the feelings.
Meanwhile, Jace has me laughing until my sides hurt and makes me feel lighter.
He's easy to be around, fun and silly while being an excellent listener and good company. He sat back and let me rearrange the cupboards three separate times and still managed to find the cinnamon I buried behind the emergency granola bars. He just raised a brow and passed it to me with a smirk, like he knew I was spiraling but didn’t want to embarrass me about it.
They don’t deserve to be caught in this. And sure, maybe it started as a little experiment, a thesis wrapped in chaos, but now I’m living with them, laughing with them, wanting them; and what’s worse—
They want me back.
They’ve seen the version of me that I haven’t even let myself fully be in years. The chaotic, sharp-edged, soft-hearted hurricane of a girl who just wanted someone to stay; and suddenly, it doesn’t feel like a thesis anymore.
It feels like a lie I don’t know how to climb back out of.
And despite the fact that I’m suppressed and scent-blocked to high heaven… I feel it. The way we’re scent-matched, the four of us. I feel it in every nerve-ending, every shared look, in every stupidly soft domestic moment I didn’t plan for.
My body reacts like it knows something I don’t want to admit, and they don’t know that I’m faking it. That it started as a lie.
Eventually, they’re going to find out. And when they do…
My stomach tightens. It’s not as if I haven’t thought about that part—I have.
But it always felt… clinical. Distant . A necessary side effect of teaching Wes a lesson he’s had coming for four long years.
I can’t even count the amount of times I’ve told myself any damage was justified, that it was collateral.
But now they’ve defended my glitter war, fucked me in the back seat of an SUV, gone along with ridiculous things like my purchasing of fluffy dice and obnoxiously named scented candles and sequin cushions that I don’t even like.
They’ve backed me up on the stupid strawberry milk stunt, sung pack songs with me in the kitchen, and even helped me cover up the knife-drawer rebranding as though it was normal.
So yeah: now, it feels different. Now, it feels like I’m not just exposing a broken system, but like I might be breaking something good.
I blink down at the cursor blinking on the page, chewing my lip. If things were different—if this wasn’t an article, if this wasn’t a plan, if Wes hadn’t ruined everything before it even started—then maybe...
No. That’s not how this works. Things aren’t different. This isn’t some romantic comedy redemption arc. This isn’t fate or bonding or some scent-matched fairy tale.
It’s revenge. It’s strategy.
It’s war .
Wesley Knight is still the same cocky, controlling, emotionally unavailable alpha-hole who humiliated me in front of half our old friends and acted like it didn’t matter.
He’s still the man who single-handedly made me feel small and unwanted and replaceable, who deemed me unworthy of an explanation, never mind a goodbye.
He hasn’t changed. He never will.
So I won’t, either.
I click into the document and start typing again, voice steady, fingers moving fast.
Let this be a warning: scent-matching is just a high-tech version of snake oil. If an app claims it knows who you belong with, ask yourself: what happens when they don’t treat you like you’re theirs?