Page 46 of Traded

Herface will probably be up here soon.

“Come on,” I say abruptly. “Let’s get this over with.”

I’m under strict orders, and whatever conversation Liam wants to have will be hard enough after today. I feel robotic as I take my pack’s scent patch through every room in our home, through the open plan kitchen and living room to the utility and family-sized bathroom we never use but my alphas use to store their hockey stuff.

The smell makes me close the door quickly, realizing I forgot to arrange pick-up. It was on my list for today. “The Furnace does most of their kit washing, but I send out the rest for dry cleaning.”

“I don’t blame you.” Lauren backs away quickly. There’s almost—almost—a brief moment of shared understanding. Hockey playersstink.

“Right.” I avoid the faint flicker of hope in her eyes and pivot. “Come on.”

My tension rises as I show her the halls that branch off from our main space. “That one leads to the gym. There’s an office we use for home working, home cinema room, extra storage.”

“This place is huge.”

“Yeah. We have the team over a lot.” I frown. Team dinners might not be so easy when we’re trying to keep under the radar. I’ll need to speak to Liam about it.

But Lauren is nodding. Her feet shift toward the second hall, and I push in front of her before she can move, blocking her way.

Both of us stop. My breathing grows heavier, my skin clammy. “I—”

Not there.

Lauren looks over my shoulder. There’s a stiffness in her expression, a tightness in the faint lines on her forehead. She shuffles forward, and my response is immediate. My hands fly up, the rejection torn from my throat. “No.”

She wants to go down the hall.

To our space. To the rooms wherenobody elsegoes. Only pack. To where we sleep, and nest, and fuck. The only scents behind me are theirs and mine, and this omega doesnotbelong here.

Every cell in my body screams for her to leave. To stay away from their space, from my nest, from the heart of our home that I built for us.

But she’s not leaving. And there’s nothing I can do to make her.

My desperation leaks through the words I parrot back to her. “You just met them.”

Lauren’s eyes stare back at me. There’s desperation there too, even if she hides it well, her voice flat. But her whole body is still primed to dart into the hall I’m blocking. “They’re my scent matches. I can scent—them. And you.”

The admission spills between us like tar, sticky and smothering. “I don’t like it.”

She sounds… stunned. Surprised, as if it’s a question and not another strike against the life I thought I was building. My tension creeps impossibly higher, and I vaguely register the realization that this is not going to go to Liam’s plan.

At all.

When she takes a step, my hands raise in warning. My inhale sounds closer to a hiss as our eyes lock. “I saidno.”

A pinnacle rises beneath my feet, and I'm about to tip over it. Into a place where I can't be rational anymore. Where I can't step aside and let their scent match walk into the life we built.

There isn't a part of me capable of moving right now.

Lauren’s face flickers with shock. “Shit.”

The acknowledgment sits between us. Neither of us can move.

Which means we’re stuck here, facing off until one of us is forced to give in. Or until my alphas exit the elevator and find us in a full-blown dominance stand-off.

I am so beyond fucked.

Chapter fifteen