DANE’S POV
I moved first.
Gently, I pushed back through the water to the far side of the pool smooth and easy like I had just been doing a lap. Nothing to see. Just the Beta swimming.
Callum went still beside Keisha. He didn’t move away, he just beca composed.
Keisha was the problem.
She was trembling and her face was shuffling through about six expressions at once and she had backed herself against the pool wall, gripping the edge like it was the only solid thing available to her. Her cheeks were flushed and her lips were slightly swollen and she looked like exactly what she was, which was soone who had been very thoroughly kissed thirty seconds ago.
I kept swimming away and then, the door opened.
Vanessa walked in.
She was in a swimming dress with her hair down and she looked around the pool with an expression of pleasant surprise that arrived about half a second after it should have.
"Oh." She said warmly as she looked at Keisha pressed against the pool wall,then Callum beside her and lastly at across the pool. Her eyes moved between all three of us slowly and carefully and the warmth in her face didn’t flicker but sothing behind it did. "I didn’t realise anyone was in here. Did I miss sothing?"
"Just swimming." Callum said, his voice completely even.
"How lovely." She replied as she moved toward the pool steps with her smile in place. "Room for one more?"
I pulled myself out of the pool. "Fun’s over." I muttered.
She stopped at the pool steps and looked at . "I beg your pardon?"
"Fun’s over." I said again as I picked up my shirt and started putting it on.
"I wasn’t speaking to you." She retorted and the warmth in her voice had thinned. "I was speaking to the Alpha."
"You can speak to whoever you like." I said. "Fun’s still over."
She stared at , her jaw tightened. "You know." She said slowly. "I’ve noticed that you have a very particular attitude." She tilted her head. "I’d suggest adjusting it. Given that I’ll be your Luna, I’d think you’d want to start things off on better terms."
I looked at her. "My Luna?" I repeated.
"Yes." She smirked. "Callum’s mate. Your Alpha’s chosen—"
"Has he chosen?" I cut her off.
She stopped.
"Because I was in that eting." I said. "And I heard him say he’d think about it. I didn’t hear him say he’d chosen." I looked at her. "Did I miss sothing?"
Her eyes went to Callum as Callum stepped out of the pool.
"He’s right." He said simply and picked up his towel. "I haven’t decided. So I’d be careful about the title."
Vanessa looked at him and her expression shifted into sothing harder. Embarrassnt and calculation. Like she was thinking of her next move.
After so long with her, I had grown used to that look in her face. When she didn’t get what she wanted, her eyes always dimd and her voice beca more clipped. But she would never once argue with Callum. Never. She just took whatever he said. Like she was afraid of ruining her chances with him.
Fuckinh pathetic.
"I see." She muttered and her voice had gone very controlled. "So I’ve relocated to this estate. Rearranged my life. Co here on the understanding that—"
"On the understanding that we were eting." Callum interrupted. "Which we have. Decisions take ti."
"How much ti?" She raised a brow.
"As much as I need." He said.
She looked at him for a long mont. Then at . Then, at Keisha still in the pool behind us.
Her eyes stayed on Keisha for a second too long.
"Of course." She said finally and reassembled her smile. It didn’t reach anything. "I’ll leave you all to it." She turned and walked out and her footsteps on the tiles were quick and tight as the door swung behind her harder than necessary.
The pool room went quiet.
I stood there for a mont. Then I looked at Keisha.
She had climbed out of the pool and was standing on the deck with her arms wrapped around herself and she was cold, visibly cold, her jaw slightly tight. I picked my patrol jacket up from the deck, crossed the room and draped it over her shoulders. "Here."
She pulled it around herself automatically.
Callum looked at her. "Go inside." He nodded. "Get warm."
She didn’t move.
She was looking at the door Vanessa had walked through and sothing was moving across her face. Sothing that seed to have been building for a long ti.
"Why do you do that?" She muttered. Her voice was quiet but it had an edge in it.
I looked at her. "What?"
"Act like you care." She said. She looked at Callum, then at . "Both of you. Drape jackets over . Tell to go inside. Show up at my door. Co to my house." Her voice was getting firr. "And then she walks in here and you’re going to let her beco Luna and I’m just—" She stopped and shook her head. "What am I? To either of you. Genuinely. What am I?"
The pool room was very quiet.
"Am I just convenient?" She asked. "Because of the bond? Sothing to use when it’s easy and then set aside when it’s not?" She looked between us. "Because she’s going to be here. She’s already here. And you’re going to mate with her and she’s going to walk around this estate like she owns it and I will have been just—" Her voice cracked slightly on the last word and she pressed her lips together hard. "I need to know. I need one of you to actually tell what this is. Because I’ve been trying to figure it out for months and I can’t and it’s—" She stopped again and pressed her hand to her chest. "It’s too much. It’s been too much for a very long ti."
Oh?
She looked at both of us and waited.
Callum’s face had gone completely still and I stared at her.
I genuinely had not been expecting that.
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