The Unchosen Alpha, the Self-Crowned Queen Chapter 09

The Unchosen Alpha, the Self-Crowned Queen Chapter 09

“Ran away.” Lucien said it so lightly-like he’d chewed on that word so many times the bitterness had faded to a thin layer of self-mockery.

I didn’t respond. I knew that word too well.

A week after the retreat, I ran into him at the office printer. He was staring at it, jammed, red light

blinking.

“Open the side panel. Pull the paper out.”

He did. It worked. “Thanks. Is there anything you can’t do?”

“Just trained to fix things.”

He looked at me like he caught the subtext-but didn’t ask.

We got comfortable after that. Not some deliberate closeness-just people working on the same floor. A nod in the lunch line. A word at the coffee machine. A team dinner where he’d sit nearby, sometimes across-never too intentional, never absent.

One day at lunch, he asked, “Do you like spicy food?”

Hooked up. “Why?”

“Cafeteria has North African stew today. I noticed you always pick the spicy dishes.”

I stared at my tray.

All my life, people either didn’t know I liked heat, or they knew and didn’t care. Even Lyanna only

remembered Nerys’s sweet tooth.

“Yeah. I love it.”

He smiled. “Then I know a place. Their harissa is legit.”

The Tunisian spot’s harissa was legit-spicy enough to make my nose sweat and lips tingle, but

warm in my stomach. Lucien sat across from me, chugging water but not stopping.

“You can’t handle this. Don’t force it.”

“Who says I can’t?”

ie finished the lamb stew and downed three glasses of mint tea. “Okay That was actually a lot

laughed out loud- one of those real laughs I hadn’t let out in years. Etiquette class taught me smile showing no more than four teeth. But at that table, no one cared about teeth count.

After that, lunch just became a thing. Nothing formal – we just kept ending up in the same place at

the same time.

He figured out I couldn’t handle cold drinks – bad stomach-and that I had class on Tuesday afternoons, so a hot Americano would show up on my desk like clockwork. And when I worked late and forgot to eat, I’d find a bag of nuts waiting by my keyboard.

Small things. Quiet. Natural.

Senior year winter, Blackridge got a rare heavy snow. Coming out of the library, the sidewalks were sheets of ice. My phone buzzed-Lucien.

“Where are you?”

“Library. Heading to the subway.”

“Wait there. I’ll drive.”

I started to say “don’t bother” but he’d already hung up.

Fifteen minutes later, a silver-gray sedan pulled up. He rolled down the window and handed me a

warm hand-warmer.

“Get in.”

I climbed into the passenger seat, heat washing over me. He didn’t start driving right away-just reached into the back and handed me a scarf. “Your neck’s all red. You’re not cold?”

I wrapped it around me-smelled like him. Clean, subtle citrus, mixed with the warmth of the car

heater

“Lucien.”

“Yeah?”

“Why are you so good to me?”

He gripped the wheel, watching snow pile up on the windshield. Half a minute of silence.