I squint at the profile. Gym selfie. Shirtless. Flexing. Bio sayshere for a good time not a long timewith zero punctuation. "He's illiterate."
"You're not trying to marry him, you're trying to sit on his face."
"Standards, Benji. I have them."
"Since when?"
I shove him. He shoves me back harder because Benji fights dirty even when he's being playful. Milo sighs from the armchair like he's our exhausted single mother, which honestly he kind of is.
I keep scrolling. Gym selfie, gym selfie, bathroom mirror pic where I can see the dirty toilet behind him (instant no), someone whose bio is just the eggplant emoji three times, an alpha holding a fish. Why is it always a fish? Who told alphas that a dead trout was the path to getting laid?
This is the part I actually love, though. Not the hookups themselves, which are hit or miss and mostly miss if I'm being honest, which I'm not, because honesty is overrated. The browsing. The possibility. Every new profile is a little door and behind it is maybe something fun, maybe something terrible, maybe someone who can actually hold my attention for more than four minutes and an underwhelming knot.
That's the goal. Always the goal. Fun, not forever.
I'm not built for the other thing. I figured that out early and I've made peace with it, or at least I've made a version of peace that involves a lot of loud music and louder opinions and never staying past breakfast. I'm too much. Every alpha I've ever been with has loved the show. The flirting, the boldness, the "JudePark is a guaranteed good time" energy. They eat it up. And then they go looking for someone quieter when they want something real.
I learned that at seventeen when the guy I had a crush on picked the soft-spoken omega with the shy smile for his boyfriend, and I went home and ate a whole pizza and decided I was fine being the fun one. Fun is great. Fun is a whole personality. Fun doesn't get its heart broken because fun doesn't put its heart on the table in the first place.
I'm fine with it.
"Oh." I stop scrolling. My thumb hovers over the screen. "Oh, hello."
Benji cranes his neck. "What?"
The profile is anonymous. No face pic, which normally I'd swipe past in a heartbeat because what's the point if I can't see if you're hot. But this one stops me. The photo is just hands. Strong hands with long fingers, blunt nails, a simple black watch on one wrist. They're holding a book open, thumb pressed against the spine, the pages slightly bent. There's something about the image that short-circuits my scroll. The hands look deliberate. Capable. Like they know exactly what they're doing and they're in absolutely no rush to prove it.
His bio is three words:I follow instructions.
"Oh fuck," I say.
"What? Show me." Benji grabs for my phone. I twist away, holding it over my head.
"Nope. Mine. Back off."
"Since when do you not share profiles? You literally screenshot that one guy's bio that said 'will breed on first date' and sent it to the group chat."
"That was different. That was comedy. This is..." I look at the photo again. The hands. The book. The bio. "This is personal research."
Soren peeks over the top of his notebook, brown eyes curious. "Is he cute?"
"No face pic. But his hands are..." I trail off, searching for the word. "His hands look like they could take me apart and put me back together."
Shay finally glances over from his phone. "That's serial killer energy."
"Or a really good Tuesday night. I'm choosing optimism."
I swipe right before I can overthink it. The little KnotMe animation pops up, the cartoon knot tying itself into a bow.It's a Match!Dopamine hit. Pavlov's omega. I love this part. The rush. The possibility. The tiny hit of power that comes from knowing someone saw your profile and wanted you back.
"Matched," I announce, holding my phone up like a trophy.
"You matched with a pair of hands," Shay says. "Congratulations."
"Hot hands."
"You're going to end up on a true crime podcast."
"But what a way to go."