Chapter 3 - Wren

Wren

I feel it before I understand what it is.

One second I'm standing where I'm supposed to stand, back against the wall in the kitchen hallway with the rest of the catering staff, watching some rich guy get engaged through a gap in the doorway because Briar wanted to see the dress. The next second there's a burn under my ribs so bad I almost drop the tray I'm still holding.

"Ow," I say out loud, stupid, because that's the best my brain can come up with.

"You okay?" Briar's next to me, elbow against mine. She doesn't look at me yet, still watching the ballroom, still chewing gum like nothing's wrong.

"Something hurts,” I say.

"Something hurts," she repeats, flat, like I said something dumb. Then she actually looks at me, and her face changes fast. "Wren. You're white as a sheet."

I don't answer her because I can't. The burn's spreading now, up into my chest, up into my throat, and under the pain there's this pull, this yank, like a fishhook caught right behind my sternum and something on the other end just started reeling in.

I turn my head before I decide to. I don't choose it. My whole body just does it without asking me. And I see him.

The Alpha. Bron Ashborn. Standing at the bottom of the big staircase with Adrien Conrad's hand locked around his, and even from here, even through a hallway full of people and a room full of noise, I know. I just know. The second I look at him, his whole body goes rigid, as if he got hit by something, and I feel it too, feel it happen in my own chest at the exact same time, like we're both plugged into the same wire and somebody just flipped the switch.

"Oh no," I say.

"What?" Briar follows my eyes across the room. "What, what is it?”

"That's him.” I let out weakly.

"Him who?"

"Briar." My voice comes out wrong, thin and shaking. "It's him. The bond. It's him."

She goes still next to me. Really still, which for Briar is basically a five-alarm fire, because Briar doesn't do still.

"No," she says.

"I'm not lying,” I tell her.

"I know you're not lying; I'm saying no like… No, this can't be happening, no, this is bad, no…”

"I know it's bad.” I let out as the fire spreads.

"Do you? Because you don't look like you know it's bad; you look like you're about to walk over there…”

I'm not about to walk over there. I don't think I am. But some part of me, some stupid animal part I've never felt before in my whole life, wants to, wants it so bad my legs actually shift my weight forward before I catch myself and grab the doorframe instead.

Across the room, he turns. Slow, like he's fighting something. His eyes are moving over the crowd, over all those pretty girls in their pretty dresses standing by the terrace waiting for their own bonds, and I watch his face do something confused, something angry almost, like none of them are what he's looking for.

Then his eyes come straight to me.

I don't move. I can't. It's like getting caught in headlights except worse, except it's not just my eyes that are stuck, it's everything, my whole body locked in place while his eyes go from dark to silver right in front of three hundred people, right in front of every single phone in that room, and every single one of them is pointed at him, which means some of them are pointed close enough to catch me too.

"Wren." Briar's hand closes hard around my wrist. "Wren, we need to go, right now…”

"I can't move.” I let out.

"You can, you're going to, come on…”

She yanks. Hard. Hard enough that my shoulder actually hurts, and that's what breaks it, that's what snaps whatever's got me frozen, and suddenly I'm moving, stumbling, letting her drag me backward through the kitchen doors while my whole chest screams at me to turn around and go the other way instead.

The kitchen's a wall of noise and heat, pans banging, someone yelling about a mistimed course, and none of it touches me, none of it's real. All I can feel is that hook under my ribs, straining tighter with every step. Briar pulls me away from him, like there's an actual rope between us and somebody's stretching it thin enough to snap.

"Service stairs," Briar says, already moving. "Now."

I follow her because I don't trust myself to make my own decisions right now. My legs are doing the running, my lungs are doing the breathing, but the part of my brain that's supposed to be steering feels like it got left behind in that hallway, still staring at silver eyes across a crowded room.

We hit the stairwell, and Briar shoves the door shut behind us, presses her back against it like that's going to stop anything, chest heaving.

"Okay," she says. "Okay. Talk to me. What did that feel like?” She asks, her tone full of curiosity.

"Like getting stabbed and set on fire at the same time." My voice comes out shaky, not even close to steady. "And now it just… it hurts. Like something's pulling me back toward him. Like a hook."

"That's the bond doing that?” She asks.

"I don't know! I've never felt it before; how am I supposed to know what it's supposed to feel like?” I let out.

"Okay, okay, hey." She grabs both my shoulders, ducks her head so she's right in my eyeline, and for once her voice isn't loud, isn't sharp; it's just scared, plain scared, which is somehow worse than if she'd been yelling. "Breathe. You're gonna pass out."

I try. It doesn't really work. The burn's still there, dull now instead of sharp, but it hasn't gone away, hasn't even really faded, just settled into something heavier, something that sits right under my ribs like it's decided to live there.

"He's the Alpha," I say, because saying it out loud might make it feel real instead of like some nightmare I'm about to wake up from. "Briar. He's the actual Alpha. And he's engaged. Right now. Tonight. To that Conrad girl."

"Was engaged," Briar says. "I don't think that's happening anymore, going by what I just watched."

"That doesn't make this better; that makes this so much worse…”

"I know.” She says.

"His whole pack just saw his eyes go silver. On camera. That's not something that just goes away. People are going to want to know who. People are going to look."

"I know, Wren.” She tells me as if I am stupid.

"And when they find out it's me…” My voice cracks straight down the middle. I don't even manage to finish the sentence, because I don't need to, because we both already know exactly how that sentence ends.

Omegas don't get bonds like this. Omegas definitely don't get bonds to Alphas, not without it turning into something ugly, fast, whether that's jealousy from every ranked wolf in the pack or worse, whether that's Bron's own family deciding a servant girl bonded to their heir is a problem that needs fixing.

I think about the mark on my shoulder that Miriam's told me a hundred times to keep covered, the one she's never explained, and for the first time in my life I wonder if that's connected to any of this, if there's some reason bigger than bad luck that the bond just picked me out of an entire room of proper pack daughters.

"Hey." Briar shakes my shoulders gently, dragging me back. "Don't do that. Don't spiral. We've got maybe five minutes before somebody notices two kitchen girls are missing from their post, and we need a plan, not a panic attack."

"What plan? Briar, there is no plan for this.” I let out.

"There's always a plan. Rule one, we get you out of that hoodie in case anybody clocked what you were wearing. Rule two, you're not going back out there tonight; I don't care what Marta says about finishing the shift. Rule three…”

The stairwell door behind her rattles. Somebody's testing the handle from the other side. We both freeze. "Rule three," Briar breathes, barely a whisper now, eyes locked on the door, "we run."

The handle turns.

I don't wait to see who's on the other side. I grab Briar's hand, and we're already moving, feet pounding up the service stairs two at a time, my heart slamming so hard I can feel it in my ears, that hook under my ribs pulling tighter with every step that takes me farther away from him.

Somewhere behind us, a door bangs open.

And a voice I don't recognize deep, controlled, way too calm for the situation says the six words that turn my whole night into a nightmare. "I know you're up here. Wren."