A Broken Contract (Alpha's Secret Regret)

Sara POV

The next day, I gave Alex his morning bath in a ridiculously sophisticated bathroom. After preparing him for school, we were both ready to begin the day earlier than the usual time. Except for the feeling of being watched, I saw no sign of Nick before leaving his penthouse suites. According to him, the mechanic discovered some faults with my car, and he would never let me drive Alex around in "that thing" anymore. Since I refused to drive the new one he replaced it with, he assigned someone to be our chauffeur. Not one, but two females. One of them is a gamma.

After dropping Alex in school, they insist on taking me to work, so I let them.

My phone buzzed with a message as soon as I entered my office building. It's my boss. He'll want answers, but I wonder if I'm ready to share the latest development in my life with anyone right now.

"See me in my office," his message read.

Missing work and then calling 911. I should've known that would raise a lot of questions and concerns.

"You're at work. That means everything's gonna be alright, right?" he asked once I entered his office.

"Yeah, of course," I replied. Silence followed.

Then he spoke again. "It's about Alex's father, isn't it?"

I didn't respond.

"I'm a wolf, too, you know, and far from blind. The resemblance is striking, Sara," he said. "Also, your father confirmed it. Although all he said was, 'It's about the child's father."

When I still didn't say anything, he muttered as if deep in thoughts, "Your child's father is alpha Reign, huh?"

He looked like it's hard to believe. I still don't what to say, so I remained quiet with my head bowed. After the silence passed, he sighed, and I knew what would follow. Thank Goddess, I've prepared my response for this one. "If you want to get off the team, I -"

"No, Jeremy, please," I cut in. "He's the head of a multinational. I doubt he'll have time to stick around this small town. We'll be dealing with his men, not him. You said so yourself,"

I didn't want to get off the team. I loved my job, and especially now that my life was getting interrupted, I needed it to hold on to my sanity.

Nick couldn't be here all the time. He'd be scarce. I could avoid him at work and in his resort.

"What about Alex?" he asked gently.

"What about him?"

"You rang the police, Sara. Are you sure the dust has settled? What if he decides he doesn't want his pup living in here in this humble town?"

"He hasn't decided that yet," I replied.

Nick's mother must've returned to L.A. by now. There's nothing to worry about once I go through his list of rules and sign it.

"I called the police because I wouldn't let him near Alex, and he threatened to take him away, so I panicked. Nothing more. All of that is settled now, I promise. He wants the child right here for now," I told him. Jeremy nodded. "I hope you're right. This is important work, Sara. I don't want your love life interrupting the flow."

"It won't because I don't have a love life, boss!" I didn't mean to snap, but he needed to be clear about that.

Thankfully, that line of discussion ended soon. After a few instructions about the day's duties, he dismissed me.

Break-time came, and Jane had to skip lunch to meet a deadline on her report. I decided to rush to my dad's instead of going to where we normally ate.

It was a busy time at the food truck

because of the time of day. I was about to go round and enter the

then I spotted a familiar figure

getting out of a police car

Avery didn't immediately see me, so I took the time to take in his features. He's tall and broad, though not as proud and intimidating as Nick. His strong, narrow jaw and full mouth give him the type of look that

any woman would be satisfie xx

in a lover. Tiny specks of blue

with

shimmer in his honey brown eyes

when he smiles, but then he's

half-werewolf.

I wondered how he came to be here in Orphic. Most packs didn't welcome half-bloods, so maybe he's had a hard life.

He caught me staring and smiled as he approached the food truck.

"Hey, Sara. I didn't realize you came all the way to your dad's shop for lunch."

"I don't. Not always, at least," I replied. My dad gave me a side look.

"Hi, Mr. James," Avery greeted him.

He nodded and smiled in return.

"How's it going?" Avery asked me.

"Fine, I guess."

Minutes later, we both stood by his patrol car, eating our tacos as we chit chat.

"Glad to hear it's going fine. I was worried when I heard you'd called the station yesterday," he said, not meeting my eyes.

I gave him a look, and he seemed to see the question in my eyes and replied,

"This isn't a big town, Sara. I happened to hear that you weren't at work... And we had a date. I couldn't reach you to hear your excuse."

'Shit!' I had completely forgotten about that. The bad part was that I had no words with which to offer him an excuse.

He waited for me to volunteer information about what happened yesterday. Since I had no intention of doing that, I bit into my food and looked away from him.

"You can call me anytime, you know," he said when I wouldn't speak. "If you're in trouble or if someone threatened you..." his voice grew serious as he trailed off. "Thanks, Avery. But everything's alright now. It wasn't serious. I just panicked," I lied.

We finished the rest of our lunch in silence. As I looked at my wristwatch, there's still some time left for my break before I returned to work. I was considering checking on

Ala

when Avery spoke.

"See? Eating with me wasn't so bad, was it?"

""Who said it was?"

"You've been making excuses to avoid it, so I couldn't help but think that you feel that way," he replied.

I returned his smile. "No, Avery. Eating with you isn't bad at all."

"So you'll let me buy ice cream then. There's still time, and I know a great place. C'mon."