"Your bag's by the closet," he says.
"I know where my bag is."
I cross the room and grab the undershirt and pull it on. I can feel him watching me the entire time, and I hate how much I don't hate it.
We finish getting dressed, back to back, not speaking. I do my tie in the mirror by the desk. Ray buttons his shirt and fights with his bow tie behind me, and I watch his reflection struggle with it and don't offer to help because helping would mean standing close to him and putting my fingers near his throat, and I am not doing that tonight.
"This thing is trying to kill me," he mutters.
"It's a bow tie, not a python."
"Easy for you to say. You probably came out of the womb in a Windsor knot."
I don't laugh. But I almost do, and he sees it in the mirror, and he grins, and the tension loosens between us. Not all the way. But enough to breathe.
He gets the tie done. He shrugs on his jacket. I put on mine. We stand side by side in the mirror and we look — god help me — like we belong together. Him in his rented tux that somehowfits perfectly because the universe is cruel, his dark hair pushed back, his jaw clean-shaven for once. Me in my tailored black, my hair in place, my face neutral.
"Ready?" he asks.
"Ready," I say.
We walk out the door and toward the elevator, side by side, and I don't think about the bed waiting for us when we get back. I don't think about the pills in the bathroom. I don't think about the way he looked at me in a towel like I was the only person in the room worth seeing.
I press the elevator button and wait, and my shoulder throbs under my shirt, and the hum under my skin gets a little louder.
Ray
Ihave no idea what I'm doing here.
Everyone in this room went to a better school than me. I can tell by the way they hold their drinks — loose, practiced, like they've been attending black-tie events since they were old enough to tie their own shoes. The ballroom is all dark wood and candlelight, with a string quartet playing in the corner and waiters circulating with trays of food I can't identify. I grab what looks like a cracker with stuff on it and eat it in one bite. It's either amazing or disgusting, I honestly can't tell.
I feel like I'm playing dress up. I keep tugging at the bow tie and resisting the urge to shove my fists in my pockets. Devon would laugh his ass off if he could see me right now. Alex would probably give me that quiet look of judgment he does, which would somehow make it worse.
And then there's Miles.
Miles at the gala is a different species from Miles in the office. In the office he's sharp and cold and contained. Here, he's all ofthose things turned up to a whole other level. He moves through the room like he owns it, shaking hands, making conversation, his smile precise and his posture perfect. He's got a glass he's barely sipping and he never looks uncomfortable, not once, not even when a senior partner twice his age talks to him like he's a promising intern instead of a peer.
I watch him from the edge of the room, nursing a beer I grabbed from the bar because I'm not drinking whatever's on those trays. He's talking to a cluster of older attorneys, and one of them cracks a joke, and Miles laughs. It's not his real laugh, but it's enough like the real thing to fool everyone who doesn't know the difference. I know the difference. I don't know when I learned it, but I do.
He's beautiful. I know that's not a helpful thing to notice at a work event, but it's true. The tux fits him like a glove, and his hair is perfect. He looks untouchable. He looks like every alpha in this room would ruin their career for a chance with him, and they don't even know the half of it. They don't know what he sounds like when he comes. I do.
I take a long sip of my beer and try to stop thinking about that.
A woman in a red dress introduces herself to me as a paralegal from another firm, and I talk to her for a while because she's nice and I'm grateful for someone who isn't terrifying. She asks what I do and I tell her I'm a legal assistant and she doesn't look at me like that's a lesser thing, which I appreciate. We talk about the resort and the mountains and she tells me about a hiking trail that's apparently incredible, and I nod and smile and the whole time I'm tracking Miles over her shoulder.
I can't help it. He's magnetic in this room. Every time he moves to a new group, every time he tilts his head to listen to someone, I follow. It's not even conscious anymore. My eyes just find him, the way they've been finding him for months across the office, except tonight he's in a tux and I've had my fist around hiscock and the combination is doing things to my brain that I'm not equipped to handle.
A waiter passes and I swap my empty beer for a full one. The paralegal excuses herself to find her colleagues, and I'm alone again, leaning against a pillar like the world's most overdressed wallflower. I could mingle. Ishouldmingle. Miles told me not to talk to senior partners unless spoken to, but there are plenty of non-terrifying people here. Associates, other assistants, people my age who also look slightly lost in their formal wear.
I don't mingle. I watch Miles.
He's at the bar now, and there's an alpha next to him. Tall, silver-temples, in an expensive suit that makes mine look like the rental that it is. He's leaning in close to Miles, one elbow on the bar. From across the room, it looks like a normal conversation between colleagues. But I've been studying Miles Covington's body language for months, and the angle is wrong.
Miles is turned away. Not dramatically — just slightly, his shoulder shifted, his weight on the far foot. It's the kind of stance that says I'm looking for an exit without making a scene. The alpha doesn't notice, or doesn't care. He leans in closer and murmurs near Miles's ear, and Miles's smile gets tighter, and his fingers on the bar curl into a fist and then uncurl.
I don't remember putting my drink down.
I'm moving before I've decided to, and I don't really have a plan. I just know that some alpha is standing too close to Miles and Miles doesn't want him there, and everything else — the insecurity, the rented tux, the feeling of not belonging — drops away like it was never there.