Chapter 2
CHAPTER
TWO
Reece
The moment the words leave my mouth I regret them.
Marigold can be anywhere she wants, of course. This is her family’s home.
What a stupid thing to say, but…God. Marigold is beautiful. So damn beautiful she takes my breath away. A ray of sun in a space I’ve claimed as mine, a place I’d happily share with her for the rest of my life.
If the world was a different place.
Sweat breaks out over me as I watch her smile bloom and fade. “Sorry. I-I didn’t mean to accuse… I’ll just go—”
Before I say anything else that’ll get me in trouble.
Fiddling with the extra string of lights I came in here to fix, I turn.
“Don’t be silly, Reece,” she calls out. “I was looking for a quiet place to draw before the party officially starts. I’m sorry I spooked you.”
Why is her voice like music? I’ve no idea why, but it is.
It’s not like a tune, just a melodious sweetness to it, and it can somehow paint wisps of pictures in the air, behind my eyes.
But I smile because this time the pictures in my head are summery, with a light shower slightly cooling the humid air.
She’s a vision in that dress the color of a sunrise, complementing her hair, her eyes, her delicate features to perfection.
Heat curls inside me.
“Reece?”
My smile wobbles when she comes close, and I’m trapped in her scent—that musky, fruity, herbaceous flower of her namesake, elevated with the brightness of citrus—and it consumes all of me. Makes my insides swoop and dive.
“Stay,” she whispers, and something fragile in her voice makes me hesitate.
I don’t dare look at her; I can’t allow it. One glance into those bright eyes and I’ll be lost.
She’s the one thing you can’t have.
I’ve repeated those words for years, since our unlikely friendship began.
She’s an Omega. I’m a Delta.
She’s from a wealthy and well-known family. And I’m…
I’m not.
Derrick and I only have each other and have had to work our entire lives. After our mother died, we did what we had to do to survive.
Mari and I come from different worlds, and the reminder slaps me in the face every single day.
“Okay.” I nod and walk over to my work table, still holding the string of lights.
As she sits, graceful and lean, in the old camping chair, I run my fingers across the wires looking for the issue. It’s got to be the wires, not the internal mechanism in the globes like Derrick insisted. He doesn’t know about this kind of stuff. I don’t know why he pretends he does.
I find the problem relatively quickly then reach for the small wire strippers and the pliers. “I’m surprised you’re not out there, getting ready to party with everyone else.”
Marigold shrugs. “Is that how you see me? A party girl?”
I think on it. “No…and yes. Maybe.” Fuck, I’m bad at this. I try to clarify: “Not the type of party girl that’s shallow or craves attention. That’s not you.”
No, Mari can walk into any event and be the center of attention. Every eye draws to her naturally, so she is the party, in a way, but she doesn’t crave the attention. It happens without her trying.
I want to tell her all of this, if only my tongue would work.
Mari’s nose scrunches in confusion. “I don’t think I understand.”
How to put this…
“You’re the spark in every room you enter,” I mutter, keeping my gaze down. “One can’t help but notice you.”
Mari laughs a little. “I don’t think that’s me, Reece.”
“Maybe.” I never talk this much. Just with Mari.
And, I realize with a pang, if she’s mated this Season, I won’t be seeing her anymore. She’ll move away to be with her Alpha mate, only to come back here for visits with her many Alpha and Omega children.
I tinker with the lights because it’s safer to keep my fucking mouth shut.
Only a minute or two passes before Mari sighs loudly and puts her pad down. “I’m not feeling very much like a spark today,” she admits.
“It’s only the start of the Season,” I say. “I’m sure you will. If I had money to bet, I’d put it on you being chosen as Luxe.”
She scoffs. “That would be a stupid bet to make.”
Mari doesn’t sound convinced, which makes me bite down on a smile.
“Nah, I’d be rich,” I say.
“There’s a lot of competition. And with everything that happened with Iris last year…”
“She’s working on the Council now. That gives you another in.”
“Or her having two Alpha mates and living on the Lower Side could hurt my chances. It’s still frowned upon.”
“People are hopeful things will change.” I glance over my shoulder at her to find her staring at me intently.
“Not fast enough,” she whispers, and something hopeful flutters awake inside me. “In my opinion, at least.”
The truth is, even if the Council changed things to allow more cross pairings on Sabine, Deltas and Omegas could never be together. Not in a true mated relationship.
Omegas have heats. Their bodies are made for Alphas, because only Alpha knots and stamina can soothe the pain that comes with those heats and the ravenous need to fuck and breed.
I’m not built that way. So being with Mari is impossible on every level.
Desire curls down my spine, awakening things it shouldn’t, and I clear my throat to try and steer the conversation back on track. “The Monarch will pick you. I know it.”
Marigold smiles the kind of smile I find I don’t like. It’s dazzling, softened by a dreaminess that says she’ll agree to anything to stop the boat from rocking. Fake.
“Maybe.” She pushes to her feet and comes over to my side. Her gaze sweeps over the odds and ends I’ve been tinkering with during my rare moments of free time until she finds something that interests her. It’s electromagnetic and—
“What’s this?”
“Trash really,” I say. “It’s my first attempt to build something from scratch.”
Instead of just fixing what’s broken. An original design.
She studies it. “What is it supposed to do?”
“Good question.” When she passes the small black box to me, I hold it up to look at it more closely. “I’m really not sure. Right now, all I can get it to do is vibrate. Nothing really revolutionary.”
She laughs. “You’ll figure it out. I know you will.”
This time, her smile is the one I love. Quietly dazzling. Real. Yes, this one is much better.
Which makes it even more dangerous.
“It sounds like we’re better as each other’s cheerleader,” I say, “instead of our own.”
“You cheer for me, and I’ll cheer for you?” She offers it like a compromise.
I tamp down a smile. “Always.”
“Can you show me what you were doing with the lights?”
“Sure.” Putting down my failed invention, I pull the lights closer again. “The wires are delicate and need to be connected, but these must have got caught somehow and were pulled apart beneath the plastic and—”
She puts a hand on my bicep, and I freeze. My stomach flips.
The moment is breathless, intimate. But it’s only a moment, though, and the only person it registers with is me.
I think.
Has to be only me.
“I mean,” Mari says, “I’d like to try fixing it. Show me what to do. I’d like to learn.”
“Oh, right.” I stare at her. “You mean you want to avoid your mother’s guests.”
She laughs, tossing her hair as she looks up at me. Who needs the sun when you have Mari?
It’s all in my head, I remind myself as she steps in front of me and takes the string of lights in her hands.
I try not to think how she’s pinned between me and the workbench, or how close her ass is to my groin, as I take the pliers and place them in her hand.
She waits for me to guide her through the steps, touching her, moving her hands like they are extensions of mine.
Her body presses against mine, and my heart rate skyrockets. I force myself to stay focused on how she’s wrapping a small frayed section in electrician’s tape and cutting off the extra with a small but sharp pair of garden shears.
When she’s done, she peers up at me, and our faces are so close… Her mouth is right there, right there, beckoning for me to kiss her. To claim her.
To finally taste the lips I dream about nightly.
We’re friends.
Friends.
My thick brain will get the message soon enough.
But she’s leaning closer to me, tilting her chin up, and her eyes flutter closed.…right as the shed door opens.
“You got those fucking lights working, you moron—?”
I untangle from Mari and hold up my hands, staring at my brother, shaking my head. “It’s not what it—”
Derrick growls. “Are you out of your fucking mind? Get the fuck away from her, right now.”