E & Gabriel

    E

    Alexander and I had crossed a line that could never be uncrossed.

    I almost expected to wake and find him gone, too ashamed of our tryst to even spend the night with me, but he was there. I could feel his warmth tucked against my spine. His arm draped over my side and his hand gently resting on the swell of my belly while the morning sun warmed our faces.

    Careful not to wake him, I turned in his arms so I could look at him. Just one look to make sure it was

    real, that I hadn’t imagined all of itst night.

    My breath caught faintly as I turned to find that he was already awake, green eyes wide and looking directly at me.

    “E, aboutst night…”

    My stomach dropped. This was the part where he regretted everything and went back to treating me like a political necessity, wasn’t it? The part where he painfully reminded me that whatever brief moments of passion we’d had were unimportant and devoid of true feeling.

    “What about it?” I managed around the sudden lump in my throat.

    Alexander opened his mouth, but no sound came out. That happened a few times before he shook his head and muttered, “Nothing.”

    Nothing.

    I couldn’t decide if that was worse than if he’d simply told me it was a mistake. Now, more than ever, everything felt confusing and up in the air andpletely uncertain and yet… It was also so, so delicious.

    For the time being, the ambiguity was almost afort. It meant that we could go either way–one step forward or one step back. And for a few precious moments, I let myself imagine that it could be the former.

    Alexander was just beginning to shift a little closer, and I thought he might kiss me and confirm my hopes, when the bedroom door burst open.

    “Alpha, the transition team wants to meet at-” Gabriel’s voice died mid–sentence as he took in the sight of us tangled together in bed.

    Rage exploded in my chest so violently that I saw red. I was so tired of this shit, so fucking done with Gabriel’s constant interruptions and hispleteck of respect for boundaries.

    Without thinking, I grabbed one of the pillows from behind my head and hurled it at him with all the

    strength I could muster.

    “Get out!” I shouted, clutching the nkets to my bare chest. “Get the fuck out of our bedroom, Gabriel!”

    The pillow hit him square in the face, and Gabriel stumbled backward, sputtering in shock.

    “I… The door wasn’t locked…”

    “That doesn’t give you the right to just barge in here! What the hell is wrong with you?”

    Behind me, I could hear Alexander making a choking sound. But I didn’t look at him.

    “This is important pack business-”

    “Get! OUT!”

    My Luna authority bled into my voice, and the Beta’s jaw feathered. He hesitated for a moment, but then nodded and spun on his heel and left without another word.

    Once the door was firmly shut behind him, I heard the soft chuckle escape from Alexander’s lips. Then came another. And another.

    When I turned to look at him, I saw that his face was split with a wide smile. He wasying back against the pillow, eyes squeezed shut, fingers tangled in his red hair.

    Hisughter was like music to my ears, and soon, I found myselfughing, too.

    Gabriel

    Gabriel stalked through the hallways of the mansion with his hands clenched into fists at his sides. The humiliation of being pelted with a pillow by that imposter of a Luna still burned in his chest, but that was nothingpared to the dread that was twisting violently in his gut.

    Alexander and E were falling in love.

    He’d seen it in the way Alexander had begun to look at hertely, the protective way he touched her, the way she always seemed to be at the forefront of his mind.