Page 74 of The Midnight Frequency

“Well, well, well,” Declan’s voice met my ear. I barely resisted the urge to sigh. Or did I resist at all? Who knew. “Maggie, you actually have a figure underneath all those awful outfits.”

“I thought you Alpha Mindset guys preferred women in dresses and skirts.”

“Sure. Just not the kind you wear.”

Yeah, I was going to need a whole lot more punch if all anyone did tonight was insult me.

“Gee. Thanks,” I drawled.

“I’m just saying, you could put a wolf into a rut.”

Okay.

Gross.

“No,” I said.

“Oh, you know how we feel about ‘no,’” he said, reaching out to tug the stretchy material covering my hip.

“Declan, this is not a ‘no, but maybe.’ It’s a flat-out no. And if you don’t get your hands off me, you’re going to get a sexual harassment complaint filed against you.”

To that, I got an eye roll.

“Wouldn’t debase myself by being with a human anyway,” he mumbled as he moved away.

He would.

His pride was just hurt.

But there was no man I desired less than the kind who thought my only purpose in life was to obey my spouse and produce as many children as my body would allow.

I drifted around the outskirts of the room, surrounded by basically everyone I knew, yet feeling so alone I could hardly breathe.

I’d never been good with parties.

Sure, Tess and Margo could sometimes be good social buffers. But when they were off having fun, I was usually left on the sidelines, feeling even lonelier than if I’d stayed home alone.

Eventually, I slipped down the hallway, my throbbing feet begging me to find somewhere to sit down.

When I reached my office door, though, I found the knob wouldn’t turn in my hand. I was about to start pounding on it, telling whoever was inside that they better not be having sex on my desk when I saw the little sticky note above the handle.

No working tonight—witches’ orders!!!

Okay.

Well, there was still the break room.

Except the witches had thought of that too. When I tried to pass through the threshold, I found myself bouncing against something invisible but rubbery.

Nice try. Go back to the party.

Clearly, I had a reputation around this station. And not the most flattering one.

Still, my feet were demanding a break, and there was no seating out by the party.

I crept further down the hall until my only two choices were the storage room and Silas’s studio.

And where did I end up going? Yep, Silas’s studio. I tried to tell myself it was because there were actual chairs in his office instead of having to sit on the floor in the storage room, but some part of me knew it was simply because I’d grown fond of his drafty old studio with its rattling air vent and vintage charm.