Page 9 of Unmarked

Chapter Three

Rhea

Islide into motion, weaving between servers balancing champagne flutes and women in silk gowns so tight they might disintegrate if anyone exhales too hard.

I duck my chin, let the crowd swallow me whole, and hope it takes the scent-trail of whatever unholy alpha-related nonsense just curled inside me.

Music hums from a corner stage. Crystal glasses flash in candlelight. Someone laughs near the bar; loud, sharp, and tryingwaytoo hard.

Click. Smile.

Compliment someone’s earrings like I wasn’t just hit with an existential wave of scent-driven doom.

Flash.

Shift angle. Chase the light.

Pretend you weren’t just tempted to purr in public.

I let my feet carry me while the camera keeps me anchored. The tension still hums under my skin like a trapped bee, but I bury it beneath autopilot and beta-face.

“Isn’t the floral arrangementinsane?” someone coos as I pass.

“I heard they flew the orchids in from Osaka,” says another.

I nod like someone who gives half a damn about internationally trafficked houseplants and lift my camera again.

I slide deeper into the crowd, my heart still unspooling -

And my instincts throw up every alarm I’ve spent seven years training them to ignore.

The second alpha steps into the room. And this one?

Oh, I knowexactlywho this one is.

You don't forget that kind of face.

Not when it’s been burned into half the billboards in the city.

Not when it’s featured in luxury magazine spreads.

And certainly not when it’s starred in at least three of my financial anxiety spirals.

Lucian Vale.

The name alone sounds like a threat wrapped in a brand deal.

CEO before twenty-five. Fortune bred, not built. Cold-blooded heir to a dynasty with more control issues than a medieval empire.

He's a seventh-generation alpha. Every male in his line an alpha, every daughter an omega -

And every single one raised like power is a birthright and feelings are a design flaw.

He doesn’t just walk in - hematerializes.

A black-on-black suit tailored so precisely it could double as a weapon. Thick, wavy hair the color of midnight slicked back with all the charm of a closing argument.

Cheekbones sharp enough to file paperwork, a mouth that looks like it’s never once saidplease, and eyes so dark and stormy they should come with a weather warning.

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