Chapter 20 Beth
Beth
Mason's truck is idling at the curb when I push through the clinic doors.
Arthur's behind the wheel, one arm draped over it, grinning at me through the open passenger window.
"You look like you just got a grade back," he says.
"C-minus." I climb in. The vinyl is cracked along the seat edge and warm from the sun. I buckle my seat belt and press the side of my face against the headrest. "So Mason really let you borrow his truck, huh?"
"This took precedence over his remodeling job." He says it simply, like the idea of not being here didn't cross his mind. "Plus, a co-contractor could pick him up this morning."
Arthur pulls out of the lot and the clinic shrinks in the side mirror. I still can't believe I had to close the shop for this. But then again, this might not matter for much longer anyway.
"So," Arthur says. He drums his fingers on the wheel. "What'd the doc say?"
I twist my hair over one shoulder. "I have a rare condition called an omega stress haze. Chronic stress suppresses my scent, like a dimmer switch."
He tilts his head, eyes on the road. "Huh. Never heard of it."
"It's apparently, and I quote, 'quite uncommon,'" I say.
He glances over. "But then how come—"
"How come my scent broke through?" I cut in. "Well, the doctor's best guess is that it happened in both instances where I felt truly safe... home." I turn the words over in my mouth. "And she thinks alcohol probably helped too."
A pothole. The truck rattles.
"She asked if anything traumatic happened to me recently." I look out the passenger window. "Since my fiancé left me a few months before our wedding, I guess that qualifies."
Arthur takes the turn onto the main road. The valley opens up on our left.
"So how does it go away?" he asks, serious.
"By feeling truly safe and comfortable. Long term." I lean my head back against the seat. "Personally, I find that a little too vague for a cure. Especially since there's no timeline. Could take weeks, months, even years."
"So the prescription is wine and scent matches in the meantime?" He grins, but it softens when he looks at me. "How are you taking it?"
I stare out the windshield. "I just feel... broken."
He reaches over with his right hand and squeezes my knee. Solid, warm. "You're not broken, Beth. You went through something, and your body found a way to protect you. That's not a malfunction."
I press my hand against his, close my eyes and exhale. "Sorry. I don't mean to—"
"Hey." His thumb presses once into my kneecap. "Don't apologize."
I open my eyes. Arthur's watching the road, jaw set, but there's a crease between his brows.
"I might have a thing," he says. "A thing that could help."
I shift in my seat to face him, squinting. "Is it food?"
"It's not food," he says.
"Then I'm skeptical," I say, folding my arms.
"Remember when I said I'd take you to one of my favorite spots?"
Of course I do. Though I'd half convinced myself he'd forgotten. I was quite bummed he hadn't brought it up again, actually.
"Vaguely," I say.
"You up for it?"
***
I look down at myself. Jeans. Sneakers. The green flannel I've been rotating through my wardrobe. "On second thought, I feel like I'm dressed more for a bookstore than the outdoors."
"It's a hill, Beth. Not Everest." He reaches across and flicks the collar of my flannel like it proves his point.
"You're driving me to a hill," I say flatly.
"The best hill." He takes a left where I expected a right, away from town. "There's a difference."
The road narrows. Trees crowd in, big pines with branches that nearly touch overhead, and the light goes green and dappled. I roll down my window and stick my elbow out.
"Does this hill have a name?" I tip my head toward him.
"Lookout Ridge." He says it with zero irony.
"That's extremely on the nose," I tell him.
"It's a hill you look out from." He shrugs, like this is the most logical name in the history of naming things.
"You could've lied. Called it something with mystique. Eagle's Crest. Shadow Peak."
"Shadow Peak." He turns to me, face scrunched. "That sounds like where the villain sets up his lair in a fantasy novel."
"At least it's memorable," I say.
He pulls off onto a gravel patch I would've driven right past. There's no sign, just a gap in the trees and a narrow trail angling upward.
I hop out. The ground is soft—needles, packed dirt. Arthur comes around the truck and stretches, arms overhead, and his t-shirt rides up just enough to expose faint ridges of muscle disappearing into his waistband.
"H—How far?" I manage, looking away.
"Twenty minutes." He starts toward the trailhead. "Twenty-five if you're slow."
I fall into step beside him. The trail is wide enough for both of us if we stay close, and I'm hyperaware of his arm against mine.
"Is this where you bring all the omegas with rare scent conditions?" I ask.
"Totally. Standard post-clinic protocol." He holds up a hand, ticking off fingers. "Bloodwork, diagnosis, scenic overlook."
"I like me an alpha with a system," I say.
"Efficiency is underrated," he says with a smile.
The trail steepens. The trees thin. I watch my feet, picking my way between rocks, while Arthur moves like the trail was poured around him.
"You come here a lot?" I ask.
"Used to." He holds a branch aside for me. "Haven't in a while."
My foot slides on gravel. His hand catches my elbow instinctively and a warm current shoots up my arm and lands somewhere behind my sternum.
"The shoes," I say. "No grip."
"It's always the shoes," he says softly, his fingers staying a beat longer than necessary before he lets go.
We climb in silence for a while. My calves burn a little but I refuse to mention it. A bird does something elaborate in the canopy above us, and Arthur whistles back at it, three low notes, and it feels like the bird actually answers.
He looks at ease. Even after everything that happened that night after the stag and doe, he's still just being Arthur.
"Almost there," he says.
The trail flattens. Opens. And then ends: a wide shelf of rock that juts out from the hillside.
"Oh," I say.
Lakeview fans out below us. The lake is enormous from up here, flat and blue, and the town clusters along its shore in miniature. The colored rooftops. The church steeple. Mountains ringing it all, snow still on the highest peaks.
I sit on the warm rock. Arthur drops down next to me, our shoulders touching.
We're quiet for a minute. The wind picks up, dies, comes back.
"Can I ask you something?" I say.
"Always."
"When I told you guys." I pull my knees up. "Did it change things?"
Arthur doesn't answer right away. He looks out at the valley, looking like he's turning the question over to make sure he gives it back right.
"I'm pretty sure Mason pulled back," I say before he answers, picking at a thread on my jeans.
A beat of silence. "Doesn't mean he's gone," he says.
I turn my head on my knees to face him. "But how do you know that?"
"Because he gave me his truck today so I could pick you up."
I look over.
"Mason moved his whole schedule around so you wouldn't have to call an Uber," he continues.
I didn't know that. I assumed it was logistics, convenience.
"He won't tell you," Arthur adds. "He'd rather eat drywall than say he rearranged his day for you. But he did."
Something tight in my chest loosens. Not all the way, but a fraction.
"And Knox?" I ask.
"Knox made you that lemon cake yesterday," he says.
"That was for everyone," I say.
Arthur raises an eyebrow.
"That was for me?" I ask.
"A three-layer lemon cake on a Monday night." He looks at me. "Who do you think that was really for?"
I press my face into my knees and laugh. "I feel a bit relieved knowing this, since I ate like half of it."
He bumps his shoulder against mine. "It's good that you did. He'd be devastated if you hadn't."
I lift my head. The wind pushes my hair across my face. I can't smell Arthur now, not really. Not the way I could that night.
But I don't even mind. He's here with me, right now, and that's all that matters.
"Beth."
"Yeah?"
"Can I tell you something?" Arthur says, after a long quiet.
"Of course," I say.
He picks up a pebble, turns it over between his thumb and forefinger.
"My dad bailed when I was eleven. Not dramatically, mind you.
He just stopped coming home on time, then stopped coming home on weekdays, and then one morning his closet was half-empty and my mom told us he'd gotten an apartment closer to work.
" He flicks the pebble over the edge. "Took me about three years to figure out that 'closer to work' meant closer to someone else. "
My hand finds his shoulder instinctively.
"And my mom, she just powered through. Picked up more shifts. Smiled at church. Made sure we never looked like anything was wrong." His voice is steady, but there's something underneath it. "And I took my cue from her. Smiled at church. Didn't talk about it. Got good at being the easy kid."
"Arthur," I say quietly.
"I'm fine." He glances at me, a quick half-smile that doesn't quite reach. "I mean, I am. It's been a long time. But the thing is, I got so good at being low-maintenance that I just... kept doing it."
The wind pushes his hair across his forehead.
"But that night after the stag and doe," he says, and his voice changes, dropping into something more careful, "when I smelled you.
And you smelled us... Something shifted in me.
I don't—I'm not saying I believe in the whole fated-mates, scent-match-means-destiny thing that solves all issues.
I don't think it's that simple." He looks at me.
"And I want the best for you, Beth. Really. But—"
"Arthur, I—"
"But what are you going to do, Beth?" He holds my gaze. "I need to know because the uncertainty is driving me crazy."
My throat aches. I realize I've never seen Arthur so unprotected, and it makes me want to reach across and tell him I want him, even without his true scent reaching me.
My face must express my thoughts, because his hand comes up to my jaw and I lean into it... then into him. His mouth is warm and a little tentative, and I answer by curling my fingers into the front of his shirt and pulling him closer.
He makes a low sound against my lips, surprised almost, and then his hand slides to the back of my neck and the kiss deepens.
His other hand finds my waist, and I feel the heat of his palm through my flannel.
For a few seconds the world is just this: sunlight and Arthur's heartbeat against my chest.
Then he pulls back. His forehead rests against mine, his breathing uneven, his thumb tracing the line of my jaw.
"Beth," he says. His voice is rough. "Things are already complicated right now."
"I know," I say.
"So maybe we just..." He exhales. "Maybe we just sit with it for a while. You don't know if you're staying. So I'd rather not push into something that could wreck us both."
I nod. He's right, which is exactly why it fucking stings. I swallow hard against the tight ache in my throat, trying to ignore the way my blood is still humming from his kiss.
"Okay," I say.
"Okay," he echoes.
We sit there, leaning in until our heads come to rest against each other, admiring the view.