All Chapters of Reject Me, Alpha Tate: Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

The lady in the green dress at the ball gave me a strange sense of déjà vu. I didn't sleep. Every time I closed my eyes I thought about her.The moments our palms touched, I sensed something unusual.But I was sure I didn't know any lady who looked so gorgeous and glamorous as her, she was really intriguing. I tried to get her contact after the dance but I was interrupted, before I could glance up she was gone, as if she disappeared into thin air.Soon morning came, by seven I had asked four people at the institute indirectly, the way I had learned to gather information without appearing to want it — whether they knew about the lady I had danced with yesterday but none of them did. Jonathan found me in the corridor at half past eight with his expression arranged in the careful neutral he used when delivering news he expected me not to enjoy. "You have the meeting this morning," he said. "With the research team."I had forgotten. The mate bond neurological trauma research — I had bee

Nicole's POVWhen the path ahead felt like standing at the edge of something with no bottom, I went to Parkville.I had been doing this for years — arriving at his door with some version of the same weight, and leaving lighter than I came. He never asked me to explain myself before I was ready. He simply opened the door, and the room was always warm, and somehow that was enough to start with.He was at his desk when I knocked, his reading glasses pushed up his forehead the way he always forgot them, and he looked at my face for exactly one second before reaching for the kettle."Sit down, Nicole," he said, and I sat.The tea was the same blend he had always kept, something with cardamom that his wife had liked. I wrapped both hands around the mug and let the warmth work its way in. The afternoon light moved slowly across his bookshelves. Neither of us spoke for a moment and I was grateful for that."You look like you haven't slept," he said finally."I slept.""Poorly," he said, witho

Nicole's POVI made it to the library in four minutes and forty seconds. I know because I counted them, the way I counted everything when panic was trying to get the upper hand.I did not forget my mask. Even in those four minutes, even with my heart doing something unpleasant in my chest, I stopped at the corridor cabinet where I kept a spare and put it on, because years of careful living had made certain things automatic. The twins being lost was terrifying. The twins being found by the wrong person would be worse.I was almost at the entrance when I saw them.Tate, and Jonathan just behind him, coming out through the library doors with the purposeful stride of men who had somewhere to be. Close — close enough that if I had arrived thirty seconds earlier I would have walked directly into him.My feet made the decision before my mind caught up. Keep moving. Don't slow down, don't change direction, don't give his peripheral vision anything to lock onto. I walked straight, mask on, hea

Tate's POVMarlon did not like me.He was professional about it. He never said anything discourteous, never gave me a reason I could point to. But I had spent enough years reading rooms and people to know the difference between a man who was neutral and a man who had decided something about you and was keeping it to himself. Jonathan agreed when I mentioned it, which meant it wasn't my imagination.It didn't matter, what mattered was that when he called me into the small meeting room at half past ten, his expression was the careful neutral of someone delivering news they had decided to deliver and he said, "Dr. Carter has agreed to include your mother in the trial."I sat with that for a moment."The conditions," he said, sliding a document across the table, "are non-negotiable."I looked at the contract, it was thorough — more thorough than I had expected. Non-disclosure across all parties. No interference with protocol. No withdrawal without written medical justification reviewed b

Nicole's POV The rooftop lab was quiet. Parkville was already there, his wheelchair angled toward the window with afternoon light across his hands. Marlon came in behind me and closed the door. Neither of them spoke right away and I knew from that alone it was going to be that kind of conversation. "You were impulsive," Marlon said, he set his copy of the contracts on the table. "The clause. Pushing back on Tracy through the terms instead of letting me handle it quietly, she is going to fixate on that." "She was going to fixate regardless," I said. "Nicole." He turned to face me properly. "A woman like Tracy is a ticking time bomb. She's arrogant, she treats people like crap, she’s going to make life hell for the nurses and staff because she has nothing to do all day except find something to be angry about. If anything goes wrong with the protocol later anything small, anything minor — she will make it about Dr. Carter refused to appear. She will make it personal." Parkville was