My Rival Mate (Westbridge Mates #3)

Chapter 2 Devan

Devan

Canary-fucking-yellow.

It's obnoxious. It's blinding.

It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.

Sam Sharma is wearing a hoodie the exact shade of a highlighter three rows up, tapping a pen against his teeth.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Professor Foster is droning on about utilitarian ethics, but all I can hear is that rhythm.

I'm staring at the back of his neck, where his black hair curls slightly over the collar.

My hand twitches on the desk. The urge to reach out, to span the fifteen feet between us and bury my nose right there, in that soft curve of skin, is so intense it makes my teeth hurt.

Heat crawls up my collar. My fingertips ache with the phantom memory of those dark curls, of skin I've never touched.

This is pathetic. I'm pathetic. I got maybe three hours of sleep last night because I made the mistake of checking his Instagram at 2 a.m. and then spent forty-five minutes zooming in on a photo from some party, trying to figure out whose arm was around his shoulder.

It was his sister's. His sister, who lives in Boston and was visiting for the weekend. I figured that out at 3 a.m. after scrolling back through eight months of posts like a complete psycho.

"Mr. Morse?"

I blink, tearing my eyes away from the back of Sam's head.

Professor Foster is staring at me over his glasses. The entire seminar—fifteen of Westbridge's brightest and most pretentious minds—is looking at me.

Fourteen of them are looking at me with the usual mix of wariness and annoyance.

Sam is looking at me with a grin that could power the entire eastern seaboard.

Cool. Love this for me.

"I asked," Foster says, "if you agree with the assertion that rational self-interest is the only reliable variable in this equation."

I don't shift in my seat. I don't fidget. I learned a long time ago that stillness unnerves people. "Variables are only reliable if the system is closed," I say. "But human systems aren't closed. Emotion is a constant variable. Ignoring it makes the equation flawed, not rational."

Sam's grin widens. He loves this. Loves when I talk, because it means he gets to tear me apart.

"But emotion isn't quantifiable, Devan," he says, twisting fully in his chair. "If you can't measure it, you can't model it. That's Econ 101."

"Just because you can't count it doesn't mean it doesn't count, Sharma."

"Ooh, poetry," Sam teases. "Didn't know you had it in you."

The class titters nervously. They don't know how to handle us. To them, we're the Hatfields and McCoys of the Philosophy Department. The brooding, silent alpha statue and the golden retriever omega who won't shut up. They think we hate each other.

They have no idea.

My alpha rumbles deep in my chest. He's looking at us. He's engaging with us.

I hold his gaze. I don't smile.

"I have a lot of things in me you don't know about."

Like my teeth. In your neck.

Sam's smile falters for a fraction of a second. A tiny flicker of something. Confusion? Or, if I'm praying to a god I don't believe in, awareness?

Then he blinks, and it's gone, replaced by that competitive shine. He turns back to the front.

I exhale slowly.

Two years.

Since I walked into that lecture hall, a nineteen-year-old who thought he had the world figured out in spreadsheets and logic gates. And then Sam walked in.

He was late. He was flustered. He was wearing a bright red scarf that looked like it was trying to strangle him. And the moment the door swung shut behind him, the air in the room changed.

For everyone else, it was just a guy hunting for an empty desk.

For me, it was a shock to the system so violent, I nearly fell out of my chair.

Mate.

The word echoed in my skull, loud and absolute. Every instinct I'd been raised to suppress, courtesy of two brilliant, emotionally constipated parents, screamed at me to get up, cross the room, and bite him.

But Sam didn't look at me. He rushed to a seat, apologized to the professor, and started chatting with the person next to him.

He didn't know.

That's the cruel joke of the universe. Fated mates are supposed to be this cosmic collision.

Two halves of a whole snapping together.

But sometimes... sometimes the connection only opens on one side.

Or maybe he was just too overwhelmed, or I was too closed off, or the wind was blowing the wrong way.

He didn't smell me. He didn't feel the pull.

And I, paralyzed by a lifetime of social awkwardness and a crippling fear that I was hallucinating, stayed in my seat.

I've stayed in my seat for two years.

Sophomore year, I "accidentally" signed up for a 7 a.m. yoga class because I heard him mention it to a friend.

I don't do yoga. I'm six-three and about as flexible as a two-by-four.

I went exactly once, pulled something in my hip, and limped for a week.

He wasn't even there—he'd switched to the evening session.

Last semester, I spent forty dollars I didn't have on a ticket to some indie band I'd never heard of because he posted about going.

I stood in the back of a sweaty basement venue for three hours, couldn't see him anywhere in the crowd, and then spotted him on Instagram the next day at a completely different show across town.

Wrong venue. Wrong band. I still have the ticket stub in my desk drawer like a fucking serial killer.

I watched him date a beta sophomore. Watched him break up. Watched him flirt with half the student union. I've watched him from the shadows, starving, while my alpha paces the cage of my ribs, snarling at the bars.

There was one night—god, this is embarrassing—I was walking back from the library at like 1 a.m. and I saw him sitting alone on a bench outside the student center.

He looked sad. Just... sitting there, staring at his phone.

And I almost walked over. I had this whole thing planned in my head: "Hey, you okay?

" Like a normal person. Like someone who knows how to talk to people.

I chickened out. Obviously. Walked past like I didn't see him, went back to my dorm, and ate an entire sleeve of Oreos.

I couldn't just walk up and say hello. So I became the asshole. The obstacle. I became the only person in his classes who didn't fawn over his charisma, who challenged him, who made him work for it.

It worked. He knows my name. He seeks me out to argue.

Sure, he thinks I'm an arrogant prick, but he thinks about me.

It's not a great system. I'm aware. I have the romantic instincts of a feral raccoon and honestly? I've made my peace with it.

"Now," Foster says, bringing up a slide that makes half the room groan and the other half lean forward. "Before we get to the syllabus for the term projects, we need to address the elephant in the room. Or rather, the tiger."

The screen displays a logo: The Johnston Internship.

The air in the room shifts. This isn't just an internship. This is The Internship. A pipeline to the top tier of economic policy. One slot. A fifty-thousand-dollar stipend. A golden ticket.

"As you know," Foster says, leaning back against his massive oak desk, "Westbridge is one of only three universities invited to submit candidates this year. The selection process is brutal and exhaustive. And acts as the primary filter for the rest of your career."

It's not the work I'm worried about. I have a 4.0 and plenty of research hours. On paper, I'm perfect.

I look at Sam.

He's sitting up straighter, hoodie bunching at his shoulders. He's stopped tapping his pen. He wants this. I can see it in the set of his jaw. Sam Sharma, for all his smiles and parties, is a shark.

If he gets it, he'll move to D.C. in June. He'll be gone.

If I get it, I'll be the one leaving.

It's a zero-sum game. My win is his loss. His dream is my nightmare.

Fuck.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck—

"The committee looks for individual brilliance," Foster continues, scanning the room. "But they also value the ability to synthesize conflicting viewpoints. Which is why your thesis proposals will not be solo endeavors."

A groan goes through the room. Group projects. The bane of every high-achiever's existence.

"You will be paired for the next three weeks," Foster says, raising his voice over the noise. "And you will not be choosing your partners. I have taken the liberty of pairing you based on... complementary skill sets."

My pulse spikes. I know what's coming. Foster is a sadist who thinks friction creates heat.

He starts reading names. "Miller and Zhang. O'Connor and Levine. Patel and Davies..."

I tune them out. I just stare at the back of Sam's neck. He's tense. He's waiting for it too.

"And finally," Foster says, a smirk on his lips. "Mr. Morse and Mr. Sharma."

The silence is louder than the whispers.

My alpha settles. A heavy, dark satisfaction. Mine. Close.

My brain, however, is pulling the fire alarm.

Three weeks of late nights in the library. Coffee runs. Arguments. Just the two of us, dissecting philosophy and economics while I try to keep my hands from dragging him onto a table.

Three weeks. I can barely handle forty-five minutes in a lecture hall. How am I supposed to survive three weeks of one-on-one time without doing something catastrophically stupid?

I'm going to say something weird. I'm going to stare too long. I'm going to accidentally call him "baby" or something and then have to transfer schools and change my name and move to Montana.

Sam spins in his chair.

He mouths a single word at me.

Finally.

Does he mean finally we settle who's smarter? Or finally, he gets to crush me?

"The project is fifty percent of your grade," Foster adds, oblivious to the fact that he just threw raw meat to a starving animal. "And the quality of your collaboration will weigh heavily on my recommendations. I suggest you get started."

Books snap shut and chairs scrape as everyone scrambles for the exit.

I don't move until I have the roar under my ribs locked down. I smooth my face into the mask of Devan Morse: the asshole.

I stand and use my height to carve a path to the door.

Sam is waiting there.

Up close, the scent is obscene. Lemon zest and warm cotton and burnt sugar. It hits the back of my throat. My brain short-circuits.

He's shorter than me, but he takes up twice the space.

"So," Sam says, stepping into my path. He has to tilt his head back to look me in the eye. "Partners."

"Looks like it," I say.

"I hope you're ready to actually work, Morse," he says. "I'm not going to let you steamroll this with your depressing nihilism. We're going for an A."

"I don't get anything less than an A," I say, looking down at him. I can see the pulse in his neck. Right there. Where the mating gland sits untouched, unclaimed. "And I'm not a nihilist. I'm a realist."

"Same difference," he scoffs, but he's grinning. He thinks this is a game. "I have a shift at the library tonight. Meet me there at seven? We can map out a timeline. I want to crush this."

"Seven," I agree. "Don't be late."

"I'm never late."

"You were late to the first class of freshman year," I say.

Oh my god. Why did I say that? Why did I say that out loud with my mouth?

Sam blinks. "You remember that?"

My stomach drops.

"I have a photographic memory," I say, flatly. "I remember everything. It's a curse."

Smooth save. Totally normal thing to say. He definitely believes that and doesn't think I'm a creep now.

Sam tilts his head. The air between us goes heavy. Static buzzes along my skin.

His phone buzzes.

He checks the screen and his face lights up with a real smile, not the sharp one he gives me. Jealousy burns in my gut.

Who is it? Who's texting him? Is it that guy from the Econ department, the one with the teeth? I hate that guy. I've never spoken to him but I hate him.

"Right," he says, distracted. "Seven. Library. Study room. Bring your brain. You're gonna need it."

He turns and slips out into the hallway. I watch the yellow hoodie until it's swallowed by the crowd.

I'm standing there, nails digging into my palms.

Seven o'clock.

I have until then to figure out how to be in a small, enclosed room with the love of my life without ruining everything.

So basically I have four hours to become a completely different person. Cool. No problem.