9. Shay
Shay
“Do you take your coffee like a normal person, or am I about to find out you put twelve syrups in it?”
The question comes from the kitchen, and it’s completely unfair. Everything about this morning is unfair.
The bed is warm. Declan’s side is empty, but his scent is still tangled in the sheets—cedar and clean cotton and that deeper note of woodsmoke my body has apparently decided is a primary food group.
My face is smashed into one of his pillows.
At some point, I must have crossed the empty space between us and just… taken it.
Great. Very independent.
“I don’t use syrup,” I call back, my voice rough. “I’m not Jude.”
My phone buzzes on the nightstand, lighting up with the group chat.
Jude: i know you’re awake
Jude: i can sense it
Benji: you cannot sense anything. you once walked into a glass door
Jude: irrelevant
Milo: Did you sleep okay?
Shay: I’m blocking all of you.
Soren: ??
A quiet, stupid laugh escapes before I can stop it.
The sound dies as I look around. Declan’s room is still his room.
Dark wood dresser. A chair in the corner with his jeans folded over the back, because of course this man folds his jeans.
Like he has a pension and a favourite hardware store.
And there’s a shirt on the floor I recognise from yesterday, dark blue and soft-looking, putting out enough of his scent that something deep in my chest gives a low, possessive hum.
Mine. Take it.
“No,” I whisper to myself. The urge is a physical thing, a tightening in my gut that I have to shove back down.
“Shay?” Declan calls.
“Coffee. Black. One sugar.”
There’s a pause from the kitchen. Long enough for it to be a choice.
“You want me to put the sugar in?” he asks.
“I can do it myself.” The words are out before I even think, sharp and automatic.
Another pause. Then, his voice is quieter. “I know.”
That shouldn’t land the way it does. But it does.
I shove the blankets down and swing my legs over the side of the bed, staring at that shirt on the floor like it’s a crime scene. The claiming mark on my neck gives a faint, warm throb. It doesn’t hurt anymore. It’s just there. Permanent.
I get up. Lying around in an alpha’s bed, smelling like an alpha, while he makes me coffee is how people end up as a cautionary tale.
The apartment is bright with late-Sunday-morning sun, lighting up the dust motes over the couch. The bar below is silent. All I can hear is the low hum of the coffee grinder and Declan moving around in his kitchen.
He’s barefoot in grey sweatpants and a faded black T-shirt that his shoulders test the seams of.
His hair is a mess, the grey at his temples more pronounced in the daylight.
One hand is braced on the counter as he scoops coffee into a filter.
He looks like he’s done this a thousand Sunday mornings in a row.
And it feels like I’m supposed to be here watching him.
The thought is so unwelcome it’s almost a physical taste in my mouth. He belongs here. In this kitchen with its chipped mug tree and a bowl of lemons that I’m pretty sure are decorative. And the quiet, settled way he moves implies I belong here, too.
He glances over his shoulder, catches me staring, and the corner of his mouth softens.
“You hungry?”
“I haven’t decided.”
“That means yes.” He turns back to the coffee maker without waiting for an answer. “Eggs?”
“I can make my own breakfast.”
“I know.”
There it is again. That quiet refusal to play the game. I lean against the doorframe, crossing my arms. “You saying that every time I object doesn’t make it less annoying.”
He huffs a quiet laugh, and the sound does something to the air in my lungs. “You want to cook, the kitchen’s yours.” He gestures with the spatula. “It’s not a trap. It’s eggs.”
Declan turns around fully, his eyes tired but warm, green catching the sunlight. He takes in the whole picture: the defensive posture, the sharp tone, the fact that I’m standing in his kitchen wearing his shirt. Again.
He doesn’t comment on any of it. He just waits.
The quiet offer deflates the fight in me, which is infuriating.
“Scrambled,” I say, the word coming out softer than I intended.
“Toast?”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
“Are you conducting a formal survey?”
He meets my eyes. “I like knowing what you want.”
It’s such a simple thing to say. A nothing question.
But my brain flashes on an image of my mom, making herself smaller in a dozen different kitchens for a dozen different alphas.
Her saying she didn’t care what they ordered, she could eat anything.
Her pretending leftovers were a real meal because someone promised he’d be home and just… wasn’t.
I clear my throat. “Toast is fine.”
Declan’s scent shifts—just a flicker of woodsmoke, a subtle change in the air—and I know he caught it. He knows something just landed hard. But he doesn’t ask. He just turns back to the stove.
“Toast is fine,” he repeats, his voice even.
So, Declan makes breakfast. I stand there, pretending I’m only in the kitchen for coffee, but when he reaches for the cabinet, I’m already pulling out plates.
I know where they are now, which is its own kind of alarm.
White plates on the second shelf, next to the bowls with the little blue rims. He has matching silverware.
Not the random collection of stolen forks and mismatched spoons that passes for a cutlery drawer in my apartment.
“You own things,” I say, setting two plates on the counter. “Like, for a kitchen.”
“I live here.”
“That’s not what I mean. You have a whisk.”
He glances at it, sitting in a ceramic crock next to the stove. “It’s a whisk.”
“Jude has one fork and a mug that says ‘World’s Okayest Omega.’”
A faint smile touches Declan’s mouth. “I’ve seen the mug.”
“Of course you have. He probably left it here.”
“He did.”
Declan slides a perfect sheet of scrambled eggs onto my plate, then reaches past me for the toast. His chest brushes my shoulder, just for a second, and a full-body stillness takes me over.
It’s not a flinch. It’s worse. It’s a quiet, cellular yes.
His forearm is right there, corded with muscle, and the heat coming off him feels like a brand.
I think about those arms pinning me to the mattress, the sheer ease of it, and the want is so sharp it’s almost pain.
He pulls back, but the feeling of him stays. He hesitates. “Sorry.”
“Don’t apologise for being in your own kitchen.”
He meets my eyes, his steady and green and seeing far too much. His throat works on a swallow, and I watch the faint jump of his pulse. My own throat feels tight.
“Okay,” he says, his voice quiet.
That one word undoes the anger. I hate it.
We eat at the small table by the window.
It only has two chairs. The setup feels intentional, like a stage waiting for two people to sit down and play house.
My mom did this a dozen times. Sat across from a dozen different alphas in a dozen different kitchens, pretending this one was the one that would stick.
I take a bite of eggs. They’re good. Of course they are.
“This is annoyingly good,” I say, just to break the silence in my head.
The corner of his mouth lifts. “Thanks.”
“Don’t look so pleased with yourself.”
“Trying not to.”
“You’re failing.”
He just takes a bite of toast, his eyes holding mine.
There’s no music on. No game playing on a TV in the other room. Just the sound of forks on plates and the low hum of the city outside. The quiet should be a problem. Silence is usually a weapon or a warning. This just… is. It feels solid.
I drain my coffee mug and look down at the street. A couple of students wander past, looking too awake for a Sunday.
I put my fork down. “Your snack inventory is a problem.”
Declan looks up from his plate, brow slightly furrowed. “Is it?”
“You have a bowl of lemons but no actual food.”
“There are crackers in the pantry.”
“I’ve had them. They taste like drywall.”
“You ate half the box yesterday.”
“I was angry-snacking,” I say, pushing my empty plate away. “It’s a different metabolic process. You should add snacks to the relaunch plan. Under ‘community-facing hospitality optimisation.’”
A low laugh rumbles in his chest. “Right. Better crackers.”
“Don’t mock the process.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
He’s mocking it. I can feel the smile in his voice without even looking at him.
When I take my plate to the sink, Declan is there a second later, reaching for it. I turn, holding it away.
“I can wash my own plate.”
“I cooked,” he says, his voice quiet.
“You set the table. That’s not an equal division of labour.”
“It’s fine, Shay.”
“It’s not about it being fine.” My fingers tighten on the ceramic.
His hand closes over the edge of the plate, not pulling, just…
there. His thumb brushes mine. The contact is nothing, and it’s everything.
His hand is warm and broad and makes mine look small.
For a long, stupid second, we just stand there, holding a dish between us.
His expression softens. That’s the worst part. It’s not pity, it’s just this quiet, steady patience.
“You don’t have to earn your breakfast,” he says.
The words are so gentle they feel like an accusation. I let go of the plate.
“I know that.”
“Okay.” He doesn’t look at me, just turns on the water.
“Then why say it?” The question is sharper than I mean it to be.
He keeps his back to me, but his shoulders tense slightly. “Because knowing it isn’t the same as believing it.”
I want to hit him with something sharp and clever, something that puts the wall back up. But my throat is tight, and there’s nothing there.