Page 68 of Knot Their Safe Haven

"This has to be a prank." She says it like a question, hope and suspicion warring in her tone. "Right?"

"I've never been the pranking type." My voice comes out rougher than intended, Alpha pheromones already flooding the space between us. "That's the twins' domain."

I close the distance between us, each step deliberate despite every instinct screaming to rush. This close, her scent is devastating. It bypasses logical thought, speaks directly to the primitive parts that existed before language, before civilization, before anything except need.

She tilts her head back to maintain eye contact—even in heels, I tower over her.

The height difference puts her at the perfect angle to?—

Control yourself.

I slide my jacket from shoulders that suddenly feel too broad, draping the Brioni over her smaller frame. The gesture is protective, possessive, and practical. Mountain evenings are cold, and that dress, while perfect, offers little warmth.

But it also serves another purpose.

I lean in, ostensibly to adjust the jacket, and inhale deeply at the junction of her throat and shoulder.

The scent there is concentrated, pure, undiluted by perfume or product.

Divine.

The word is inadequate.

She smells like everything I've craved since I understood what craving meant. Like safety and danger combined. Likehome I've never had and adventures not yet taken. Like the answer to questions I didn't know I was asking.

"Alessandro." My name on her lips is barely voiced, but the submission in it?—

I bite my bottom lip hard enough to taste copper, the pain barely keeping me from claiming that mouth, from discovering if she tastes as extraordinary as she smells.

Instead, I offer my hand.

"As much as I'd love to be a typical Alpha and kiss you until neither of us can breathe, Alexis threatened to kick my ass if I don't behave. She's probably watching through the security system to ensure compliance."

Velvet laughs—not the careful chuckle of recent days but something genuine and delighted.

"Alessandro Lucien Devereaux is afraid of a female Alpha?"

"Absolutely,” I don’t even deny how confident I am with that truth. “She's a male-dominating psychopath in Prada." I lean closer conspiratorially. "Don't tell her I said that. She'll find out anyway when she reviews the surveillance, but plausible deniability and all."

Her laughter intensifies, and the sound does things to my chest that violate several laws of physics.

When she finally catches her breath, her eyes hold something soft, something I haven't earned yet but desperately want to.

She held my gaze with a glint that signaled mischief, then gestured with the smallest finesse.

“Lean down for a second.”

I obeyed, drawn as if by gravitational force, bending so we stood truly eye to eye. The world narrowed to a tunnel—our faces, her perfume, the impossible shade of her lips. She closed the last inch, standing on tiptoe so the black Louboutins nearly wobbled beneath her, and placed her hand on my cheek.

Fingertips cool, but the heat behind them was instant.

Her lips contacted mine with an audacity so subtle it transcended seduction—nothing like the desperate, possessive kisses Alphas traded when the scent-matching hit. It was a scientist’s test, a painter’s first brushstroke. The contact was feather-light, so brief my mind threatened to discount it as a daydream.

But my body documented every microsecond.

Taste: wild cherries and the mineral tang of blood orange, then a crescendo of cinnamon—her favorite, the telltale of her scent profile.

Scent: amber caramelizing in the firelight, vanilla and black orchid colliding.