Hunter
"For fuck's sake," I mutter, tugging at the collar of my tux for what feels like the hundredth time as we all get ready in Blake’s suite.
"You've worn a tux before,” Zale chuckles from where he’s fixing his hair in the hallway mirror. He’s gone for a classic navy and white combo. Shiloh helps him adjust his bowtie, looking cute in a green fitted suit with black lace accents.
We’d flown together as a group to Crest Haven on Evans’ private jet, well, everyone except Sadie. That was a hard no from me and Evans agreed it would give her the wrong message.
The gala was taking place at one of Pembroke Holdings premier hotels, and he’d managed to check us into a series of interconnected suites. Shiloh and Zale had one, Bell and Blake shared another and Ivii, Evans and I were in the third.
"I know, but this one is choking me. It’s trying to kill me."
Bell eyes up my outfit, trailing a finger over my lapel with a brow raised. "It's bespoke. From Milan."
They’re wearing a lace, semi sheer suit jacket with something that looks like a black silk waistcoat beneath.
It dips low in the front, and when they move something on their skin shimmers.
Clearly I’m supposed to be impressed that my suit is bespoke, but instead I huff in annoyance as Blake hands Bell a glass with whiskey and ice.
He’s wearing a crushed velvet suit jacket a similar shade to Zale’s.
"I don't give a flying fuck if it was hand stiched by fairies."
Beside me, Ivii doesn't even bother looking up from smoothing invisible wrinkles out of the pale blush gown she's wearing as she snorts. She was my date tonight since our parents decided to opt out of this event and with Evans bailing on me, I could use some emotional support.
"Why do they always make us wear these monkey suits?"
"Because," she sighs, "it's a charity gala and we're rubbing shoulders with the rich and powerful."
I smirk at her. "We are the rich and powerful."
"You don't act like it." She finally stops worrying about her dress and looks up at me with her eyes narrowed. After a moment, she says, “I like your hair. It feels much more..Byronic hero-tortured artist.”
“Thanks…” I run a hand through my hair on instinct.
The faded blue I'd been clinging to for months is gone, replaced earlier this afternoon with black so dark it almost looked like spilled ink. I’d also taken a few inches off the length, leaving it just kissing the tip of my shirt collar.
Evans hasn’t seen it yet, it was a surprise.
“Mom says she approves too.”
“Did you already send her a picture?”
“Yeah, it’s in the group chat.” Lifting her phone she shows me the conversation taking place right now. My mother thinks I look ‘brooding’ apparently, while my dad just send a thumbs up.
“Blood ties?” I chuckle when I spot what the family chat is saved as in her phone.
“What’s with the new hair anyways,” Ivii asks with a curious glance as she accepts a glass of champagne from Blake.
"I’ve decided I need something a little more…
presentable." If I looked a little less conspicuous then people might not notice that I was lingering near Evans all night. Because that was the crux of my plan, get in, find my man, stick to him like glue so that the Templeton shrew couldn’t sink her teeth into his meaty ass when I wasn’t looking.
“Awhhhh, he’s outgrowing the stoner starving artist phase!” Zale teases, hooking an arm around my neck and tugging me into an armlock.
“Excuse me, my net worth is more than yours.” I yelp, grabbing his side until he releases me. For a moment I catch Bell’s reflection in the window, their smile falters.
"We're all very proud." Ivii pats my shoulder. “Now come on, we’ve got families to represent and money to spend.”
The lift dings softly, the doors sliding open as we arrive on the floor where the reception is being held.
"Remember," Blake says, straightening his jacket as we make our way towards the ballroom. "Smile."
"I smile," I squint at my housemate,
“Eh,” Zale chuckles as he checks his teeth one last time in the elevator mirrors. I catch his gaze as he lifts one shoulder in a lazy shrug. "It’s more like you bare your teeth."
My eyes narrow. "It's basically the same thing."
"No." Shiloh slips his hand around Zale's arm with a small head shake. The alpha reaches out and strokes his omega’s belly. Shiloh swats him away. "One says 'nice to meet you'. The other says 'I'll fight you in the parking lot.'"
"I can multitask."
“Not tonight,” Ivii warns, like the fun police. “Tonight we play nice.”
I'd been to charity galas before. Auction dinners. Museum openings. Art exhibitions. Wherever rich, bored people congregated, I probably had an open invitation. Hell, my parents practically collected charity committees like Pokémon cards but this, this was something else entirely.
Crystal chandeliers hang from impossibly high ceilings.
Hundreds of candles flicker between towering floral arrangements.
Waiters weave effortlessly through the crowd carrying silver trays balanced on one hand.
A jazz band plays from a raised stage while couples glide across the dance floor.
And that was just the main room. There were four other rooms off the main hall, all themed differently.
As we step forward, looking for our seats, and in Blake’s case, the bar, heads turn our way. We may not know everyone here, but they know us. We’re the next generation.
They stare, some covertly assessing, others outright cataloguing us from head to toe.
They drink in Bell’s outfit. Admire Zale and Blake as the rising football stars of Oakley U, and Ivii somehow looks like she belongs on the cover of a fashion magazine, her alpha aura radiating.
I ignore all of that, all of the peacocking and preening, the pointless foreplay between business men and trophy wives as they try to measure whose knot is bigger.
My eyes are already searching, scanning the room for a tall guy, muscular, with dark eyes and a dimple but he’s nowhere to be found.
“Dude, isn’t that Macsen at the bar talking to Blake?” Zale hisses, nudging me with his elbow as Shiloh, Ivii and Bell all turn to look.
“Subtle, guys. Real fucking subtle.”
“Who?” Tilting my head, I look at the handsome man laughing at something with Blake. He places a hand on Blake’s arm, and a man standing next to him inches closer, mouth drawn into a tight line.
“Macsen, from Patchwork.” Ivii squeals as she glances around looking for something before scanning a QR code on a nearby table for a programme. “Are they playing here tonight?”
Raising a brow, I catch Blake’s gaze across the room and nod towards the lurker behind Macsen.“If he’s not careful, his boyfriend is going to take a swing.”
“Is that his boyfriend?” Bell snatches two champagne flutes off a passing waiter. “I think it’s his bodyguard.”
“They’re fucking,” I say confidently before faltering. “Or maybe he just wants to fuck him? There’s something there either way, just look at them.”
A familiar shrill banshee-like voice snags my attention and my eyes swing towards a group of people near one of the opulent floor to ceiling windows.
“We’re so delighted to be here this evening,” Sadie purrs, linking arms with Benedict Crawford II.
She’s wearing an ivory gown that looks suspiciously bridal, as if subliminal messaging would work on my Benny.
I would know, I'd been walking around almost naked for years and it never got me anywhere.
They’re talking to three men, alphas I would assume by all the posturing, smiling politely while his father laughs and claps him on the shoulder. The smile doesn't reach his eyes.
His deep purple tux fits him like it was stitched onto his body. Did we share the same magical suit sewing fairies?
As if he can feel my gaze on him, his head turns. It’s like time is suspended for a moment, and in that split second the mask falls and I can see how he would rather be anywhere else.
Lifting my champagne glass in salute I grin when I see the corner of his mouth twitch.
His expression softens, just a fraction and his shoulders drop.
It’s like seeing me lets him breathe again, and all I can think is, there you are.
Hidden beneath the Crawford mask, waiting for someone to remind him he doesn't have to wear it forever, is my Benny.
Harrison Crawford says something and Sadie laughs, the sound like rubbing glass shards down my spine. Evans blinks, and the walls slip back into place effortlessly.
It takes two hours of pointless socialising and pretending to listen before I even get close to Evans. Even now I’m simply standing in a nearby group, about ready to claw out my own eyeballs.
Every time I see him smile or laugh with Sadie who’s glued to his side like a parasitic barnacle, I feel things I ‘d rather not.
There’s this low simmering anger working its way through my veins, my dominant alpha side feeding it, stoking it like embers in a fire. Every time she touches what’s not hers, I have to swallow back a growl and resist the urge to launch myself across the room.
Every time her parents or Harrison seem to praise the couple, there’s a slick oily slithering in the pit of my stomach.
I’ve never been insecure about anything, but if there’s even just a fraction of a possibility that I may lose him, it will be because of this.
Because of her. Because of his father. And the life I cannot give him.
Trying to think of ways to get closer, I’m on the verge of recruiting Shiloh since he knows about us anyway, when I feel a tug on suit jack. Evans is standing behind me now, his back facing mine, but there’s no mistaking the pull as he does it again.
“Excuse me, I’ll just be a moment.” He leaves Sadie and their parents behind without so much as a glance, weaving through clusters of guests with the effortless confidence Harrison has been drilling into him since birth, if only he knew the real Benny beneath.