23 - Damage Control

The truck ride to school was suffocating.

Ezra’s silence wasn’t peaceful. It was violent. The kind that made the air thick with pressure and the world unnaturally still. Even the engine seemed to hum quieter, as if cowed by the weight of the Alpha’s mood.

His scent pulsed through the truck like something alive—sandalwood, spice, and the smolder of restrained fury.

It rolled over the children in tense waves, making Caleb grip his backpack with both arms and Camden stare wide-eyed at the dashboard like it might suddenly come to life and say something—anything—instead of their father.

Mia sat beside Ezra, small and folded into herself. The rawness of her earlier breakdown clung to her like fog, her cheeks dry now, but her eyes red and swollen, rimmed with that delicate Omega glaze of lingering vulnerability.

And beneath Ezra’s scent, faint but inescapable, was lavender. Comforting. Soft. Not his.

It clung to his skin like a claim.

The sweet, settling lavender of an Omega’s scent. An Omega who wasn’t present. But who had been. Intimately.

And Ezra, Alpha to the bone, wasn’t even trying to suppress it.

They were late. Of course they were. Because phones don’t shatter in peace, and children don’t confess in convenient windows. Ezra’s knuckles flexed once on the steering wheel, then stayed white.

At the school gate, Ezra didn’t apologize.

He pulled up, leaned slightly across Mia, and growled, “Get your brothers inside.”

She hesitated. “Aren’t you going to—?”

“I want to meet your friends.” His voice was low, but solid with steel. An Alpha’s order. Not a suggestion.

She blinked. “What?”

He turned his head slowly, the air in the truck shifting as his gaze locked on hers. His eyes were sharp, unreadable, a flicker of dominance crackling just under his skin.

“You heard me. You’re going to introduce me. All of them.”

There was no room for protest.

The air outside felt thinner when Mia opened the door with a shaky hand and stepped out. The twins followed in silence, sticking to each other like shadows.

Ezra got out slowly, his presence shifting the atmosphere around him. He was broad, tall, stiff in his dark jacket, boots hitting the pavement like thunder. A storm wrapped in flesh.

The moment he stepped out, the scent hit the other parents. Heads turned.

They didn’t just look—they sensed. The dominance, raw and undiluted, seeping off him like heat off asphalt.

And underneath it, barely masked: Subtle. Clean. Sensual. An Omega’s scent, marked onto him.

Several parents offered polite nods—instinctual deference to the Alpha in the room. Ezra didn’t return them.

Mia’s hair was still a bit messy from earlier, and her steps stiff as she led him across the courtyard. Her backpack sagged on her shoulder, and she avoided the gazes she felt drilling into her from every direction.

A few students waved. She didn’t wave back.

They reached the small group under the trees, gathered near the low concrete wall. Six teens. Four girls. Two boys. Ezra stood half a step behind her, arms folded across his chest. His eyes swept across the kids like he was scanning for threats. Or challengers.

One girl offered a nervous smile. “Hi.”

A boy with round glasses gave a polite nod. Ezra returned it with a flick of his chin, nothing more.

And then there was the second boy.

Ezra didn’t like him the moment he saw him.

Too casual. Shoulders slouched. Hands in his pockets. No scent control whatsoever—his hormones hung lazy and unchecked. He looked at Mia a fraction too long before his eyes finally slid to Ezra.

“Yo,” he said, a half-smirk tugging his mouth. “What’s up?”

Ezra’s stare hardened. The air darkened with pressure. “Name?”

The boy raised an eyebrow. “Zayn.”

“What are you to Mia?”

“Friend.” Zayn’s gaze flicked sideways. “Just friends.”

Ezra stepped forward, his shadow swallowing the boy whole.

“You’re not funny.”

Zayn blinked, a sheen of sweat breaking across his brow. Ezra didn’t growl. He didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t have to. His scent, his presence, was doing the work. One drop more and the kid would be on the ground.

“I wasn’t trying to be,” Zayn said quietly, suddenly standing straighter.

Ezra’s nostrils flared. Zayn’s own scent had soured, tinged with something like fear. Ezra’s expression didn’t shift.

“Mia. We’re done here.”

She didn’t argue. She turned, stiff, walking back toward the main building without looking back.

Ezra followed. Lavender still clung to him. Warm, deeply embedded in his skin. And every Alpha, Beta, and Omega he passed knew. That scent hadn’t come from a casual brush. It was intimate. It was layered.

It was his Omega’s claim. An Omega that had been in heat.

By the time Ezra walked into the PTA meeting—alone, unapologetically late—the room had already begun to buzz with soft conversation. His arrival snuffed it out.

One or two Betas sat up straighter. A Beta mom near the refreshments instinctively tucked her hair behind her ear and avoided his gaze.

There was no Sebastian. No buffer. Just the scent Ezra carried with him like armor.

When Mia’s name came up, Ezra didn’t move. His expression unreadable, carved in stone.

“Mia Anderson is quiet but cooperative,” the teacher chirped. “She’s very bright—”

Ezra cut in, voice low, sharp. The room braced itself.

“That’s what passes for a report these days? Quiet and bright?”

The teacher paused. “Pardon?”

“That’s all you have to say about her?”

“Well, we focus on participation and class engagement. She doesn’t often volunteer—”

“Because she’s invisible to you,” Ezra snapped. His voice wasn’t raised, but it had weight. Gravity. It dragged every eye in the room toward him.

“Maybe if someone had noticed she was pulling away, we wouldn’t be here.”

The teacher shifted in her seat. “With all due respect, Mr. Anderson, if there’s something going on at home—”

“There’s plenty going on. None of which any of you bothered to ask about.”

The lavender scent curled sharper at his throat. A warning. A tether. Ezra stood slowly, every movement measured, dangerous.

“I suggest you start paying attention to your students.”

And with that, he walked out.

Not another word.

Just the sound of his boots. And the scent of sandalwood, spice, and a lavender claim no one dared to question.