: Part 1 – Chapter 9

ALPHA’S HALF-BROTHER WAS SERIOUSLY hot.

She didn’t know what she’d expected, but a suave, stunning, perfectly sculpted man greeting them at the airport hadn’t been it. And he was a charmer to the boot. He’d taken one look at her, asked Alpha, “Who’s this gorgeous creature on your arm?” and promptly kissed her cheek platonically in greeting. Had she not already been in love with the grumpy giant by her side, she would’ve swooned.

“Where’s your bride?” Alpha asked after introducing her, keeping his distance from her. He’d pulled back after opening up on the flight, taken a step far enough back that she could feel the cold seep in the gap between them, because of his idiotic sense of keeping it platonic or because of his vulnerability on the plane, she didn’t know. And being in a new environment as she was, she didn’t know how to close the gap yet.

Dante grinned. “Letting Tempest have quality time with her grandmother and sneaking a beauty nap. Not that she needs it but motherhood is tiring for her.”

Zephyr looked at the man. She was surprised by the openness of his affection for his wife-to-be. The men she’d encountered rarely wore their love with the kind of pride he did and still managed to pull off the self-assured, cocky vibe that was kinda hot. Damn, the girl was lucky. He was an interesting personality.

He escorted them to a large, black Range Rover, slightly different from Alpha’s back home, and opened the door in the back for Zephyr. Oh, a gentleman too.

Smiling, she thanked him and climbed in, glad she’d worn leggings instead of a skirt. She was surprised though that her husband didn’t just pick her up and plop her down as he’d taken to doing in their city. He was definitely taking the platonic, keeping his distance thing seriously.

She settled in, as did both men, and Dante smoothly pulled out of the airport, another dark car tailing behind them with the security. She wasn’t surprised. From her internet search alone she’d learned Dante Maroni was a pretty big deal in the mafia world, recently having taken over after his father’s death. The only thing she was curious about, however, was how he and Alpha had met, and precisely what Alpha was involved in. It couldn’t have been mafia, because Los Fortis had never really been the center for one. She knew he was into something with security, just not what exactly it was. She’d find out eventually, and she just hoped it wasn’t something she couldn’t live with because there were some lines that just shouldn’t be crossed. Knowing who he had once been though, Alpha had always been a protector. She could not imagine a world where he could be crossing those inhumane boundaries.

All in good time.

Tenebrae City was vastly different from Los Fortis. For one, the climate was more temperate than tropical, the hills in the distance a darker shade of green than the jungles around her city, the cover of the dark clouds something she only saw during the heavy rains.

She rolled the window down, enjoying the cool, dry wind on her face, her eyes taking in everything.

“Thanks for coming,” Dante broke the silence after a while. “It means a lot.”

Alpha grunted. Grunted.

Zephyr observed him quietly from the back, trying to understand why he was more reserved with his own blood. He was more aloof, more rigid than he had been on the flight, and she didn’t know if it was because of her or Dante. Alpha attending something like a wedding had made her assume that he was on good terms with his half-brother. Was that not the case?

“So when did you get married?” Dante went on, seemingly unbothered by the silence, with such ease she liked him immediately.

“Monday,” her husband replied. “Courthouse wedding.”

Dante looked at her in the rearview mirror. “Are you pregnant?”

Zephyr loved how everyone automatically assumed she was knocked up because of the whirlwind wedding. She shook her head. “No, we haven’t even—”

“It’s just for six months,” Alpha interrupted her, quite rudely. “Not a real marriage.”

Ouch.

She knew that’s what they’d talked about, but saying it out loud like that just made it all so… clinical. Reductive. Lesser. Like the little moments they’d had never happened.

Dante was considerate enough not to comment, simply shifting the conversation to include Zephyr, asking her questions about her family, her work, normal generic talk she appreciated more than she could say.

She looked down at the ring on her finger, the beautiful piece unlike any she’d seen, a band of platinum adorned with tiny rubies, amethysts, sapphires, and emeralds, colorful and unique.

‘One day, when I have money, I’m going to buy you the prettiest ring, sunshine.’

Zephyr felt her nose burn and looked out, remembering the whispered promise on the last night she’d seen him before he’d disappeared from her life. The ring was more precious to her than he’d ever realize. She hadn’t expected him to get her one, had been fully prepared to buy one for herself, but he had and it was perfect, and Zephyr tucked that moment he slid it on her finger in a corner of her heart, cupping it like a flame in the fluttering wind, keeping it alive, warm and loved, to revisit if she failed in making him love again.

It scared her sometimes, the enormity of the task she had undertaken. She didn’t know what he’d been through in the years between then and now. She didn’t know what kinds of traumas he had, didn’t know what his triggers were, didn’t know if the walls he’d built around his heart could be scaled at all. She’d bruise and bleed if they could be, drag herself to the corner where he rested and lay her head down with him if he let her. But she had to take her time. He would get spooked and run the other way if he figured out what she wanted—him.

The men talked about something related to work using code words because she didn’t understand a thing. Within thirty minutes, they were out of the city and driving up a rolling green hill towards a large mansion she could see. The tall gates, manned by security guards who nodded at Dante respectfully, opened and it looked like a different world inside. The huge mansion, a few buildings off to the other side, all over the green hill and fenced within a wall was like a movie set. Her entire neighborhood could’ve fit in the area easily. People were bustling about decorating the venue, some carrying chairs, some carrying boxes, and some carrying guns.

Zephyr had never seen so many guns in real life. She’d seen one in Victor’s jacket when she’d interrogated him, but that had been it.

The driveway stopped and Dante pulled the car right next to the mansion’s double doors. Zephyr jumped out without waiting for anyone to open her door, taking all of it in.

Wow.

A member of the staff ran to them, and Dante directed him to get their luggage to the guest wing. They had a wing for guests. Bougie shit.

An older woman with graying hair came out with a tiny bundle wrapped in a green blanket in her arms, and Zephyr watched in awe as Dante took the baby from the woman, cradled her against his broad chest, uncaring for the drool he got on his suit, cooing to her. “You missed daddy, didn’t you, princess?”

Then the fluffiest cat she’d seen walked out and rubbed against Dante’s legs, getting fur over his pants.

Zephyr’s ovaries melted. What was it about a big man with babies and kittens? It was like catnip, pun intended.

Dante finally turned to his guests, his smile huge.

“Alpha, Zephyr, I’d like you to meet my princess, Tempest. Tempest, this is your uncle and aunt.”

Aunt.

She was that little baby’s aunt. Holy shit, she’d never been an aunt before.

She looked at Alpha and saw that it had affected him too. Dead heart, my ass.

Knowing what she did about his family, she couldn’t imagine what being an uncle must be doing to him. Quietly, she took his large hand in hers and gave it a squeeze, and though he didn’t squeeze it back, he didn’t let go either.

“Oh my god, she absolutely scrumptious!” Zephyr stepped forward since Alpha seemed frozen in place, and touched Tempest’s soft cheek.

The baby yawned, her eyes like emeralds opening wide, her mouth opening in a wet, gummy smile at seeing her father. She made those happy baby noises and flapped her arms before her eyes went to the larger, scarier-looking man.

Zephyr took Alpha’s hand she was holding and brought it up, making his fingers touch Tempest’s soft skin, praying that the baby didn’t cry.

She didn’t. Little Tempest Maroni gurgled and drooled and gave Alpha the same gummy smile, and she saw her husband get wrapped around her minuscule pinkie.

Oh yeah, it affected him alright. He didn’t even try to hide it on his face.

“You came,” a husky tone of surprise made Zephyr look up at the entrance, and her jaw dropped. A stunning, and she meant stunning, goddess of a woman walked toward them with the grace of a swan gliding through the water, a gentle smile on her perfect face, tall and classy and oozing poise, her glinting green eyes popping against her tan skin, her dark hair voluminous with natural waves and curls. That was some good hair. She didn’t think women like this could exist outside of mythologies.

The woman, clearly Tempest’s mother and Dante’s bride, took in the man beside her.

Zephyr looked up at him and saw him watching her with a look she knew.

Chemistry.

He’d liked her liked her.

Zephyr had never really been jealous, especially never of other women. Her family had beautiful women, she saw absolute knockouts at work every day, and she loved making women feel good about themselves on a daily basis. Jealousy was an entirely antithetical emotion to that. But standing there, at the side of the man she had loved once and wanted to love again, a man who had just moments ago reduced her attempt at making their future into something lesser, a man who clearly didn’t remember her but remembered the goddess in front of her, something ugly took root in the pit of her stomach. Not anything against the goddess, who was clearly in love with Dante and happy with her family, or even against Alpha for admiring something even she admitted was admirable.

No. The ugly was old insecurity, one she’d fought off for years and thought had laid to rest, an insecurity that maybe she wasn’t enough. Maybe, she’d never be enough. Maybe, anything she did wouldn’t make a difference. She loved too much, trusted too easily, got hurt too often, and maybe she needed to harden herself. But she would lose the essence of who she was if she did, and so she never did. Feeling hurt was more acceptable than feeling dead. The ugly in her head got awful.

‘Almost thirty and no boyfriend? There must be something wrong with you.’

‘Such a nice girl, how has no man fallen in love with you?’

‘Flings and flings, and your one long-term relationship? He cheated.’

‘The one man you truly loved left you. He doesn’t even remember you. You were that inconsequential.’

‘Your husband doesn’t want you.’

Zephyr blinked the burn away and withdrew her hand, pasting a smile on her face as introductions were made. Dante put a hand around Amara’s waist and Zephyr hoped her husband would touch her, maybe hold her shoulder, do anything to indicate she was with him. He didn’t. Dante asked Alpha for a quiet word.

Zephyr, already a bit lost and a bit sad, simply told them she’d take a look around the grounds, and excused herself. Diaz followed her at a safe distance.

She hated when she got like this sometimes when something completely random would trigger her down a spiral of questioning her self-worth even though she knew it wasn’t real. It felt real.

Walking around the mansion towards the gazebo where people were putting up the frame for the wedding, she took her phone out from her pocket and called the one person with who she could be honest about everything.

“Zee! How was the flight?” Zen’s happy greeting immediately had her heart feeling lighter. Even though she was five years younger, Zenith was her best friend. Since they were kids, they’d had a ritual of snuggling together every night and talking about everything that had happened in their day, from a lame catcalling to a serious crush to bad clients. Now, they did their night routines while chatting. Though it had only been Zephyr doing the sharing in the beginning, over the years Zen had joined in. Now, Zephyr knew she was her sister’s person and vice versa.

“Really good,” Zephyr told her, walking around the hill, her eyes taking in every facet of the mansion.

“Oh no,” she heard her sister mumble. “What happened?”

“Nothing really,” Zephyr felt her lips tremble. “It just… I wish he remembered me sometimes.”

“Oh, honey.” Zen knew exactly how she felt. Zen had been the one who’d looked out for her every time she’d snuck out, the one she’d spilled everything to when she’d returned. Zen knew it all, from the first time she saw him to the last. “Are you sure you want to do this? You can still back out, you know.”

“I have to try,” Zephyr whispered, her chest tight. “He’s different now but I have to try, Zen. I can’t live knowing I found him again and didn’t do anything.”

Zen sighed. “And how’s that going for you?”

Zephyr huffed a laugh. “He wants us to be roommates only.”

Zen was quiet for a moment on the other end. “Then be his roommate. Be the best roommate he’d ever have. You know him, Zee. You know his buttons. Push them, test them. If anyone can make a scary man like that fall in love, it’s you.”

Zephyr sniffled. “This is why you’re my favorite sister,” she declared into the phone and heard Zen chuckle. ‘I’m your only sister.’

They talked for a few minutes, mostly about her mother believing Alpha was the devil’s kin who had brainwashed her, and how she couldn’t ‘wait for him to get out of her life.’ If she did end up separating, she knew one person who would be happy. At least Zen had convinced her father to keep a more open mind. That counted.

Zephyr bid her sister goodbye, her mood still low, and asked a staff member for directions to her room, heading to the guest wing. The sun was setting down, the sky more dark than light, portions of the hill completely submerged in the shadows as she made her way to the building, her eyes taking in the mansion.

Her perusal came to a stop at a large window of some kind of study. Dante and Amara sat with another couple, her husband sitting with his back to her, all having a drink, Amara laughing at something, the fluffy cat napping on the windowsill.

Zephyr stood outside at a slight distance, alone for the first time in a new city of strangers, watching it all. And she didn’t know why but it hurt her. She may have married him, but she wasn’t a part of whatever this group was. She wanted to be.

Stop wallowing, she chided herself. She’d chosen this path, and she knew it wouldn’t be easy.

Dante, the only one facing her, looked up and locked eyes with her. She saw him glance at where Alpha sat before looking at her again, something akin to compassion in his dark eyes.

Zephyr gave him a little smile that hopefully looked reassuring, pretending she was completely unbothered, and went on her way to her room, married, miserable, and alone.