Chapter 2
Alice doesn’t getto meet Grant until the following morning when she shows up to work, twenty minutes early for once. She slides into the elevator just as it’s about to close and doesn’t recognize him at first. As a rule, she tries not to make eye contact in elevators in case the stranger on board wants to start a conversation that they won’t have enough time to finish. Grueling.
“Alice?”
She looks up at the massive man who’s built like a fucking linebacker for some reason, and recognizes the short dark hair, the mustache, the crooked smile. He’s got a small gap between his teeth she hadn’t noticed in their digital meetings. It might be the cutest thing she’s ever seen.
“Grant! You are . . . so much taller than I thought you’d be.”
“And you are just as tall as I thought you would be,” he says.
“Really?”
“No, I thought you would be shorter. Your height is much more average than I expected.” Alice grins at the admission. She’s always liked Grant; he’s sweet, sends emojis in his Slack messages, and always compliments her newsletters. He’s a lot like a golden retriever if golden retrievers had sleek black hair, gray-blue eyes, and could probably squat two hundred and fifty pounds.
“I’m 5’8”,” Alice says. “Some call that tall.”
“Oh, I’m sure they do,” Grant winks—honest to God, a wink before 9 AM. It disrupts Alice’s breathing. “I’m glad to have run into you. You seem like just the person who can show me how to use the coffee contraption in the kitchen.” Grant bumps his arm into hers as the elevator door slides open to their floor. She’s still smiling up at him when she steps off and almost runs directly into Caleb Everett. Caleb’s hand settles on her bicep to steady her.
Standing so close to him, Alice feels that recognition again, the connection on a cellular level drawing her to him as an Alpha. She knows better than to listen to that feeling, though, and steps backward.
“Good morning,” Caleb says.
“Yeah. Morning,” Alice mutters and readjusts her shoulder bag. Her shirt is damp and sticking to her stomach under her bra, thankfully covered by her puffy jacket. It doesn’t matter what she wears, nothing feels like it lies on her skin right, especially with an Alpha standing in the small hallway.
“You two have met, then,” Caleb says. Alice swears the look he’s giving Grant is a meaningful one, like the men have a language gained from years of knowing each other. Maybe Lily was right about them being boyfriends after all.
“Yes, I was just hoping Alice here would show me how to make a cup of coffee without ruining the fancy machine,” Grant says, his face breaking from the secret conversation at hand to turn his charm back on Alice.
“Let me just put my stuff down. I’ll meet you there in five?”
“Great,” Grant veers off from Alice and, after a moment of hesitation, Caleb follows suit.
Other than the incident in the morning, Alice effectively avoids Caleb for the rest of the day. She’s mostly stuck in meetings with various product teams which isn’t ideal since she has three projects that need to be delivered before lunch tomorrow. This means another evening in the office.
Logan snaps his fingers and sings her praises as he leaves promptly at five, notably not offering help or an extension on any of the tasks he’d assigned to her. Lily tries to get Alice to call it, but eventually acquiesces and gives her a few snacks from her desk before leaving.
It’s seven before Alice stands up again, a draft of what she’s been working on sent to both Grant and Caleb for review first thing tomorrow if possible with a fervent peppering of no worries if that deadline is too tight! though she is totally worried.
Stretching her hands over her head, she looks around at the empty desks and the vacant private offices with their automatic lights long clicked off.
Her body isn’t made for this. She’s weary in her bones, even her spine is tired from pushing too far and on so many meds blocking her heat cycles. She needs to get home and shower then snuggle into a bundle of her favorite blankets with no concern if anyone will smell her perfuming for the rest of the night.
Her computer pings with a Slack message just as she’s fantasizing about calling in sick to sleep in.
Caleb Everett
Just received your memo and report.
The screen shows that he is typing, then stops typing. No message comes through.
Alice Walton
Thanks. Please review it tomorrow morning if you can. Enjoy your night.
His reply is immediate.
Caleb Everett
Sure.
Are you still in the office?
Alice debates replying to the message when a third comes in.
Caleb Everett
Did Logan ask you to stay late? You shouldn’t be there later than 5:30 if he’s not.
Alice Walton
Just wrapping up. See you tomorrow.
Alice watches the chat, waiting for a response and wondering what the hell is wrong with him. Plenty of people work past five! Well, maybe not plenty, but probably some. Depending on the department. Either way, who is he, an overtime cop? She’s salaried, so it’s not like she’ll get more money for her extra efforts.
Caleb starts and stops typing four different times before his account goes offline.
Alice heaves a sigh and shuts her laptop. She won’t bring it home, it would be too tempting to do more work in the hopes of making tomorrow easier. No, she needs to rest, to sleep for as many hours as she possibly can, and somehow get through the rest of this week. The weekend is for locking herself inside and hibernating as long as she needs.
Alice rubs her eyes as she slides on her coat, mentally calculating how long until the next bus and if she has time to stop for a hotdog or not. Probably not. It’ll be spicy noodles for dinner again, and if she has the energy, she’ll add some vegetables and an egg.
It’s nights like this when she sees the appeal of a relationship, a pack to help bear her burdens and make her dinner sometimes. Or even to just pick her up in their car. That way she doesn’t have to fight to keep her eyes open on the humming, bumping bus with her head resting against the cold and fogging window.
Better yet, if she worked from home, she wouldn’t have to brave public transport at all. Maybe then she wouldn’t have a boss clapping and snapping and asking her to do his shit all the time. And if she was the boss, she wouldn’t have to deal with one at all! She could only dream.
Alice brambles her way through the building and into the cold night air, heavy with unfallen snow. She daydreams about a blizzard so strong that nobody can leave their house and the wifi goes out. In this fantasy, she can burrow beneath a heated blanket with no possibility of an email or an unplanned Slack call pinging on her laptop.
She remembers days like this from her childhood when the weather was so bad that school was canceled and her family snuggled up together in the living room under a sea of blankets and pillows. The safety and warmth of the memory make her ache.
Standing beneath the bus stop, she wonders if Caleb has a pack at home, an Omega he takes care of. If they traveled here with him the same way Grant did. She jolts with what she should have thought of sooner: is Grant an Alpha, too? She hadn’t spent long enough with him to even catch a whiff of his scent, and she hadn’t gotten close enough to touch his skin, not even a handshake.
It’s prudent that she spend as little time with them as possible. The further away she stays from them, the safer she will be. Her heat suppressants are barely working as is, she doesn’t need to add the hormones of Alphas into the mix. The cocktail of suppressants, scent blockers, and deodorizers is an impermanent and, frankly, unsafe solution; the clock is rapidly ticking down to her inevitable first heat.
She needs to think about it, make a plan, and after that, a backup plan. She needs to figure out which one of those damn heat clinics she’ll go to and probably schedule time off to make it happen—but not tonight. Tonight, she needs to get home, eat something, numb her brain, and snooze her alarm many times in the morning.
The bus pulls up, and as she mills on, her phone buzzes in her pocket. A work email.
From: Caleb Everett
To: Alice Walton
Date: Tuesday, November 12, 2024 at 7:32 PM
Subject: Re:Incentive Plan Notes
Alice,
Edits on your memo and incentive plan for tomorrow are attached. There aren’t many.
Caleb