My phone vibrates in my pocket about the time I’m considering banging my head on the desk, and I fish it out quickly to notice Mackenzie’s name flashing across the screen.
MACKENZIE: Did something happen? You seemed kind of weird.
If she only knew the half of it.
ME: Just some shit with Dennis. Figured it would be good to be seen together.
MACKENZIE: Oh. Good call. Nice touch with the kiss. I think you gave Liam a heart attack. Everyone on my floor is pretty sure you’re a serial killer in your spare time.
I take a few seconds more than I need to as I contemplate how to answer that, chewing on the inside of my lip as I try to reason out myself why in the hell I kissed her. I heave out a sigh as I resignedly tap out a lie.
ME: Just playing the part.
I drop my phone on the desk without waiting for her reply, finally giving in to that urge to let my head hit the wood as I groan into it. Of all the tumultuous emotions I have experienced today, none of them can compare to the frightening realization that I might be in over my head here.
I really don’t think it’s a good idea, I’d told her. It could make things very complicated, I’d said. And I’d meant it, at the time. I truly had.
I just never imagined that it might potentially be me making things complicated.
11
Mackenzie
“So, you were just . . . stuck?”
Parker’s expression is equal parts horrified and intrigued—his brow furrowed in thought as he leans across the table in the hospital cafeteria.
“Basically,” I confirm. “Honestly, I assumed that part had been mostly exaggerated in the biology textbooks, but it’s pretty much exactly how it sounds.”
Parker’s face screws up like I’ve just told him that I spontaneously lay eggs. “And what the hell did you do during that time? Play checkers?”
“No.” I laugh. “We just went to sleep afterward. I’ll say this for Noah, he really knows how to wear a girl out.”
“How could you possibly go to sleep like that?”
“You know, it’s weirdly comforting? Like that best kind of after-workout sleep.”
“So he gets his rocks off, and then it just . . . swells up like a balloon.”
“That’s one way to put it, I guess.” I smile around a bite of my flatbread. “Had me feeling like a bottle of wine.” Parker cocks an eyebrow in question, and I grin mischievously. “Corked,” I clarify.
He makes a sound of disgust. “You’re heinous.”
“That’s what they tell me,” I laugh.
He shakes his head as he turns his attention to his lunch, stabbing his salad with gusto. “I still can’t believe you had sex with Noah fucking Taylor.”
“At least I’ve given validity to your constant abuse of his name.”
“Hilarious.” I frown as I turn my neck, and Parker cocks his eyebrow at me. “What?”
I shake my head. “Just a little stiff. Maybe I slept wrong.”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to say,” Parker scoffs.
I grin, rolling my shoulders to shake out the weird tightness I’ve been feeling this morning. “Oh no. That part was absolutely right.”
He rolls his eyes, pointing his fork at me. “Have you even thought about how weird this is going to make things?”
I make a face as I chew. “Why would it be weird?”
“You went to school two times longer than I did,” he huffs. “You’re supposed to be smart.”
“Wow, thanks.”
“I’m just saying. You already had a weird web of lies going on with this guy, and now on top of that, you’ve thrown sex into the mix. And with an alpha! What happened to you being worried he’d stake some wolfy claim on you?”
“I think maybe I overinflated the issue in my head,” I tell him with a shrug. “Noah seems fine.”
“Uh-huh.” Parker hmphs. “I’m sure the newly unsuppressed alpha is just peachy after knotting his first omega.”
“Can you keep your voice down? You might as well stand up on the table and start shouting about Noah’s dick.”
A body dropping into the chair beside me gives me a start, and I tense until I spot a grinning Priya settling at our table. “Oh, are we talking about Noah’s dick?”
She leans in excitedly as she sets her tray on the table, tucking her dark tresses behind her ear and looking like we have a present she wants to open.
“No,” I assert quickly, shooting Parker a look to let him know this is all his fault. “We weren’t.”