Page 3 of The Cheerleader

Chapter Two

Abel

They think I don’t notice. That I sit behind the desk upstairs counting drink profits and pretending not to see what happens on my floor. Idiots.

You don’t run a place like Dark Side of the Moon for twenty years without knowing every damn detail, who’s high, who’s hunting, who’s slipping through the cracks of the rules I wrote in blood and bone.

And Juliet is slipping.

I watch her on the screen, top right feed, backstage corridor. She’s walking fast, shoulders tense, that fucking ivory scrap of silk she calls a robe clutched around her body like armour. That sugary, schoolgirl routine she pulls on stage? That’s a mask. But underneath? Something dangerous. Something familiar.

I shouldn’t be watching her. She’s nineteen. Just a girl. Just a dancer. Just ... my best friend’s daughter. I drag a hand over my face. My jaw’s clenched so tight it aches.

I should’ve said no when she showed up here six months ago, looking like trouble in black eyeliner and that too-old-for-her swagger. But she was alone, freshly shifted, and her scent was sealed up tight. Beta, she said. That’s what the file says.

I knew better. I just didn’t want to admit it.

She doesn’t smell like a beta, not exactly. Not like a true one. She smells like static. Like nothing. A blank slate. Only one kind of shifter wears a scent that flat on purpose. Omegas.

And now, watching her on that feed, I know for sure she’s masking. Not just with charm or clever lies. But with tech. With omega suppression patches. Which means she’s been hiding what she is. Right under my nose. Under my roof. Under my fucking protection. And she isn’t the first one to do it either. I must be slipping in my old age.

I slam my fist on the desk. The wood groans. Somewhere downstairs, someone knocks over a chair but I don't care. There are rules in this club. And I made them for a reason. For their safety. For my customers. For me.

No humans allowed. No drinking on shift. No dating the customers. All dancers must wear scent suppressants.

And then, my single unspoken rule. This one is more for me than anyone else: No messing with the talent. All that has ever brought is drama and confusion. It’s simply a messy situation.

Juliet is every kind of complication I don’t need in my life or my business. And yet, when I walked into that dressing room earlier, and she was half-dressed, lips parted, jaw tight with defiance, my instincts howled.

Something deep in me clawed upward, furious, possessive, starving. My wolf damn near lost his mind, fighting me for control. I wanted to throw her over the damn counter and tear the patch right off her. I long to know her true scent. But that’s not normal. That’s not control. That’s primal. That’s insanity.

I stare at the screen, jaw ticking, blood pounding hard in my ears. She’s sitting now, hands shaking as she puts on her knee-high socks. Her fingers keep brushing her throat. The patch must’ve slipped again.

The feed glitches for a second, a sharp burst of static, and for a moment, I swear I catch it. Just a flicker. Not her stage perfume. Not that almost nonexistent scent she tries to play off as a beta scent. Her real scent. Warm. Soft. Home.

Fuck.

I push back from the desk so fast my chair skids. I need air. I need space. I need to get away from this cursed building before I do something I can’t take back. That is what my logic is trying to tell me to do but my feet carry me to the stairs. Down the hallway. Past the velvet curtain and into the dark, pulsing heat of the club.

She’s not on the main floor, thank God.

But I can still feel her. That invisible thread, that pull under the skin that makes no fucking sense. I’m forty. She’s nineteen. And I’m not some goddamn pup in his first rut. I’ve been through enough heats, enough heartbreak, to know what it means when the instinct snaps awake.

Juliet isn’t just trouble. I lean against the wall, fists clenched, every cell screaming for me to go to her. My wolf growls in the back of my mind as I fight him back for what feels like the millionth time.

She has no idea what she’s doing to me. And she sure as hell doesn’t know what it means if the patch ever comes all the way off. Because once I smell her unmasked, once my wolf locks in...

There’s no going back.

Chapter Three

Juliet

Something’s wrong with the patch. I can feel it. The edges are peeling, just barely. Not enough to sound the alarm, not enough to rush backstage in a panic. But enough that my skin itches, hot and raw under the adhesive.

I press a cold bottle of water to my neck, praying no one notices the spike in my scent. No one should. Not if I hold it together. Not if I breathe through it, keep moving, keep performing. Smile, Juliet. Swing those hips. Show some teeth.

The moment I get on stage the difference is clear. Tonight’s routine is tighter. Meaner. The Cheerleader’s got claws now. And the crowd fucking eats it up.

---