From Wolfless Omega To The Rival Alpha's Queen novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Cracked Door
Keira overhears Broderick plan to reject her after the merger and give her project to his ex Blair, lets him kiss her forehead, and leaves the building with her mind made up. At the curb, the rival Alpha holds open a car door.
At nine ten on Wednesday morning I stood outside Broderick Davenant's office with two lattes in a cardboard tray.
The door was open a hand's width, which it never is.
His is the corner office on the fortieth floor of Davenant Tower, and I have never once seen it left open.
I had brought his coffee at nine ten every morning for seven years.
Vanilla syrup in his, nothing in mine.
I am the project lead for the Davenant Group's Chicago expansion.
I am also a wolfless Omega, the only one in a pack of four hundred who has never shifted.
Broderick is our Alpha, our CEO, and the destined mate I was supposed to bond with next month.
I gave up a full scholarship in California when I was twenty so I could stay beside him.
I reached for the handle, and then I heard my name.
"Keira has been at your side for seven years," said a second voice.
It was Broderick's Beta, his second-in-command, and I knew the voice as well as my own.
It was low and tight, and he was not saying it the way a man pays a compliment.
"She wrote the market plan that saved the expansion. She has earned the title of Luna."
"Earned it," Broderick said.
He laughed once, through his nose.
"She's wolfless, Derrick. She'll take whatever the pack gives her and say thank you."
The tray tipped.
Hot coffee ran over the rim and across the back of my hand.
I did not move it.
"The bonding ceremony is for the elders," Broderick said. "They want a Luna on paper before they vote on the merger. After the vote, I reject her."
I stood there and let the coffee run.
"And Blair?" Derrick asked.
"Blair Kingsley is my equal. Blair has the bloodline and the wolf. She lands Saturday."
Blair Kingsley was his ex.
I knew her name from the framed photo he kept in a desk drawer.
I had never mentioned that I knew.
"What about Phoenix?" Derrick said.
Phoenix is mine.
I built it from one spreadsheet and a lot of nights, and it will put four thousand apartments on the Chicago river.
"Blair gets it," Broderick said. "A welcome home present. She can put her name on it."
"And Keira?"
"She'll cry. She won't fight. Where would she go?"
Behind my ribs something went very quiet.
The bond on the back of my neck, the one that only ever pulled one way, burned until my eyes watered.
"I'll collect Blair from the airport Saturday," Broderick said. "We'll have dinner."
Saturday is my mother's birthday.
Three weeks ago Broderick had promised, with his hand on my face, that he would sit beside her at the table.
A chair scraped inside the office.
I had two seconds to run.
I did not run.
The door swung open and Derrick was standing in front of me with his tie crooked.
He looked at my face.
He looked at the coffee dripping off the tray.
Then he looked at my hand, and he did not look away fast enough.
"Keira," he said, loud enough for the room. "You're early."
I was exactly on time.
"Good morning," I said.
"Is that Keira?" Broderick called. "Send her in."
Derrick stepped aside.
I walked in and set the tray on Broderick's desk.
He came around it and kissed my forehead.
He smelled like cedar and the cologne I had picked for him.
"There she is," he said. "You're shaking."
"Cold," I said. "The air is on too high."
"I'll fix it." He took the vanilla cup and drank. "Saturday I'm all yours, by the way. Your mother's dinner. I wouldn't miss it."
It was a very good lie.
It had taken him less than a second.
"She'll love that," I said.
I picked up my own cup and wiped my wet hand on a napkin.
Under it the skin was pink and clean, with no blister and no sting.
I folded the napkin over it before anyone else could look.
"I'll get the Phoenix binder for the afternoon," I said. "You'll want it ready."
"Perfect."
Broderick was already looking at his phone.
I had been, to him, a piece of furniture that fetched coffee.
So I stopped being his.
I did not say it aloud.
I took my bag from the chair outside my office, and I left my badge in the drawer and my pass on top of it.
Derrick was at the elevator when I got there.
He pressed the button for me and did not speak.
I rode down forty floors with the tray still in my other hand, and I threw it into the lobby bin.
Outside, Michigan Avenue was gray and loud.
A black car sat at the curb with its back door already open.
A tall man in a dark coat stood beside it, one hand on the frame.
I knew him from the business pages.
Orson Crane, Alpha of the pack that Broderick said he would crush before spring.
He did not smile.
"Miss Duggan," he said. "Derrick called me. Get in."
Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend