Chapter 2

A few coworkers I was close with were spamming the group chat, tagging me over and over and insisting that we all go out for drinks after the gala.

By the time I got to the upscale steakhouse downtown, everyone was already tipsy.

Mia, the intern sitting next to me, suddenly choked and nearly sprayed her martini across the table.

"Holy shit! Valentina just posted something?"

She slapped her phone down on the table. On the screen was the Instagram story Valentina had just posted.

Two tickets to a VIP box at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. The caption was a single word: Official.

At the edge of the photo, a man's wrist with elegant, well-defined bones stole the whole shot.

He wore a Patek Philippe. Just below the watch band peeked a silver cufflink set with tiny diamonds.

I stared at that cufflink. A sharp, burning ache rose behind my eyes.

I had bought that pair at a Sotheby's auction last year with every cent of my savings. Engraved on the inside were the letters A & E.

I had begged him for six months to wear them in public, as proof that we were mates.

And what had he said?

"Elena, don't bother me with cheap little trinkets like that. Wearing them would lower my standing."

But now he was wearing them every day.

I had thought he'd finally accepted me in his heart. Looking at it now, it was the cruelest joke of all.

My coworkers had already crowded around the phone, buzzing.

"Who's the guy? It's not our big boss, is it?"

"Valentina and Edric have been joined at the hip. They're moving to headquarters together next month. I'll bet my whole bonus for the second half of the year they're sleeping together."

I cut into my rare filet mignon and said calmly, "It's Edric."

The lively table went dead silent. Every gossiping face turned to frightened sympathy.

"Elena... why are your eyes so red?" Mia asked carefully.

I lowered my head and took a sip of water. "They put way too much black pepper on this."

The words had barely left my mouth when the steakhouse's glass door swung open.

Edric and Valentina walked in, one after the other.

Her expensive Hermès bag hung from his shoulder, and he was carrying her coat for her.

A server hurried over to greet them. Valentina flipped through the menu and laughed sweetly. "Babe, let's get the couples' set menu. It looks like a better deal."

"We knew something was going on between you two!" a few of the drunker executives hooted.

Edric saw me sitting in the corner.

He paused for exactly one second. Then, as if nothing at all had happened, he casually pulled out the chair next to mine and sat down.

"What a coincidence. Mind if we join you?"

He was so open about it.

So open that it felt as if all the humiliation existed only in my own head.

Someone worked up the nerve to ask, "So are you and Valentina really together?"

Edric glanced at Valentina's phone and let out a low, sexy laugh.

"You mean this?" His gaze swept the table and landed, aggressively, on my face. "She just announced that she's going to the symphony with me. You don't seriously think there's something going on between us, do you?"

Valentina blushed and gave him a coy little shove. She didn't deny it at all.

Only I stared at the glossy smear of lip gloss at the corner of his mouth.

Under the table, Edric reached out the way he used to, to squeeze my fingers.

I jerked my hand away. His hand froze in midair, and his eyes darkened.

He pulled his hand back and shifted toward Valentina instead, until their arms were pressed together.

For the rest of the meal, the conversation revolved entirely around the golden couple heading to New York.

Someone asked whether they'd already decided to move into a penthouse in Manhattan together.

Someone else joked that if the strongest Alpha on the East Coast mated with a high-ranking Beta, their pups would probably rule all of North America.

I sat beside them like a ridiculous outsider.

I wanted to leave, but Edric was sitting on the aisle side, blocking my way out like a wall.

All I could do was keep my head down and mechanically cut my steak. The weakness of my heat, on top of my period cramps, kept twisting my stomach into knots.

Valentina bent over her dessert, and her long hair slid forward over her face.

Edric casually pulled the custom cufflinks off his wrist, set them on the table, and produced a black hair tie from somewhere. He deftly gathered her hair and tied it back for her.

I looked at that hair tie and remembered how, when I'd begged him to wear the cufflinks, he'd called it "sentimental schoolgirl nonsense. Pathetic."

Valentina picked up the glass of iced whiskey beside her. Before she could drink, Edric frowned and took it away.

"You're on your period. No alcohol." He turned and asked the server to bring her a hot mulled wine instead.

Everyone froze for a beat, and then the table erupted loud enough to lift the roof.

"You even keep track of her period?!"

Valentina turned bright red and swatted his chest.

Edric just laughed and caught her hand. Then he glanced at me, as if he had only just remembered I was still alive.

"Why is your face so red? Is your heat starting?" He pushed the iced whiskey he'd taken from Valentina in front of me. "Have something cold. It'll cool you down."

I looked at the amber liquid, still giving off a cold mist, and the corner of my mouth twitched.

Today was the first day of my period too. I had severe endometriosis. One sip of anything cold could leave me doubled over in pain until I passed out.

He used to set reminders in his calendar and make me hot cocoa a week ahead, with a heating pad and painkillers ready. Now he had forgotten all of it.

I didn't take the glass.

Edric ran out of patience completely. His scent flared out all at once, carrying the suffocating pressure of an Alpha.

"Elena, are you done yet? Stop making that corpse face in front of our coworkers."

I swallowed the sob in my throat, grabbed my bag, and stood. "I'm not feeling well. I'm going home."

Valentina immediately set down her glass, looking as if she was about to cry. "Is Elena upset because of me? It's all my fault..."

Edric's face went cold. He slammed the whiskey glass down on the table.

"Leave her. She's a spoiled brat."

"She always has to blow some little thing up until everyone's miserable. It's unbelievable."

I covered my mouth, and the tears finally broke loose. I shoved my chair back and ran out of the steakhouse without looking back, leaving Edric's angry voice behind me.