Never Yours Alpha

CH 4 - Simon

SIMON POV

The reek of the masking spray burned my nose long before the damn thing dried on my skin, and I already hated it. It was supposed to hide my wolf scent, suppress every trace of werewolf essence, but it made me smell like crushed herbs and cold metal. The potions were worse. One drop to dull my eyes, one to sharpen my ears in the fae way, one to curve the shape of my jaw. Another to darken my hair to that pale brown the fae aristocrats adored. I didn’t even look human anymore, much less wolf.

I looked like them.

And I despised that fact more than I thought I would.

But I needed to pass for a fae diplomat, and Sir Augustus Ratlige—Ambassador of the Fae Court to the Werewolf High Council—was the perfect identity to slip into. Mostly because the real Augustus was currently too busy screwing two witches in the Berkshires to notice the world around him. The man hadn’t attended a meeting in three months. Nobody would expect him to show up anywhere sober, dressed, or conscious.

Which made him the ideal ghost for me to wear.

Deer Island was quiet at this hour, just waves punching the rocks and a couple of seagulls screaming at each other like they owed rent. Boston was far enough that only the hum of the city reached us. The portal shimmered between two jagged stones, invisible to human eyes, obvious to mine. My wolf pressed hard against my skin the moment I stepped near it.

'Soon. Soon we’ll be closer to her.'

I ignored him.

I adjusted the ambassador’s cloak—blue and silver with the crest of the Third Fae Court—and stepped forward. The spray clung to my throat like frost. I tasted iron. The glamour held. Perfect.

I was Sir Augustus Ratlige. the most arrogant, entitled, annoyingly fae I'd ever met.

Bailor’s voice echoed in my mind 'this is insane' he'd said.

He had no idea.

Insane was letting Lily marry a stranger.

I stepped through the portal.

Crossing always felt like being shoved through ice water, like every nerve in my body snapped at once. My wolf snarled in my head, a pulse of instinct demanding freedom the second the fae magic touched us. I forced my breathing steady. Not here. Not yet.

On the other side stood two fae guards in decorative armor that probably weighed more than their actual combat experience. They looked at me—looked through me, really—and barely nodded. So much for being royal guards.

“Ambassador Ratlige,” one said with a bored tone.

“Present,” I replied, lowering my voice into a smooth fae drawl, mimicking Augustus’s slurred manner of speech.

“Purpose?”

“My presence is required in the High Court for the Princess’s celebration.” I lifted a hand lazily, exactly like Augustus would. “Our Queen insisted.”

They didn’t ask for documents.

Didn’t ask for identification.

Didn’t check the glamour.

Didn’t even sniff for magic residue.

They just waved me through.

That alone pissed me off so much I nearly dropped the disguise to growl in their faces.

This was the grand security of the fae realm?

This was how they protected their princess?

This was how they prevented another abduction?

No checks.

No barriers.

No caution.

Freaking nothing!

Just arrogance and laziness.

I walked past them slowly, because if I didn’t, I might have shoved one into the damn portal. And the moment my boots hit the fae soil, everything inside me changed. Not gradually. Not gently. It was a violent shift, a tightening of every muscle, a fire racing through my veins. My wolf slammed into my chest as if he’d been locked in a cage and someone finally removed the door.

'Bailor was wrong to call me paranoid,' I thought. 'They’re the idiots, not me.'

If this was their idea of security, then Lily had been living in a gilded trap, not a fortress. Anything could slip through. Anyone could reach her. And clearly the Queen had no clue.

I clenched my jaw hard enough to crack teeth.

I’d been right all along.

Lily needed protection.

Real protection.

Mine.

I shoved the instinct back with everything I had. I couldn’t shift. I couldn’t run. I couldn’t blow my cover five minutes into entering the realm. I needed to get to the car my spies left for me and drive into court like a civilized fae noble, not a feral animal.

But it was harder than it should’ve been. Much harder.

Because the farther I walked from the portal, the stronger the pull became. A pressure under my ribs. A vibration in my bones. A direction pulling me east, then north, then sharply right. Like a compass point buried under my skin.

I’d never felt it this strong before.

Maybe because I’d never been this close to her in the last eight years.

I struggled to keep my breathing steady as I approached the small path leading to the hidden parking area. The glamour flickered once when my wolf pushed again.

'Find her find her find her—' he was growling, like a mad mantra in my head

Wolves had abducted her, then wolves saved her when she was ten, and I’d been forced to hand her back to a mother who wanted nothing to do with me. If I lost control now, I’d ruin everything I’d come to do.

I reached the car, a sleek dark model that was the usual choice for dignitaries, slid into the back seat and told the driver to take me to the palace. I needed to see her, at least once before her party. A black lamborghini flashed lights ahead and I gripped the door handle until my knuckles whitened, even the drivers were inappropriate here. I inhaled a slow breath, careful, measured—

And froze.

Her scent hit me like a strike to the spine.

Sweet.

Floral.

Soft.

I missed it, I missed her. My little flower.

It wrapped around me before I could brace myself, dragging every memory to the surface: the trembling child clinging to my shirt, the sound of her small voice whispering my name, the warmth of her little hand gripping my wrist like I was the only solid thing left in her world.

Eight years of pretending I’d buried those memories. Eight years of telling myself she needed space. Eight years of letting the Queen dictate my distance.

It took exactly one breath of her scent to destroy all of that.

My body reacted before my mind did. My pulse hammered. My wolf roared. My lungs tightened like they didn’t know how to take air anymore. I leaned against the car seat because suddenly my body wasn't entirely reliable.

“f**k,” I muttered under my breath. The word came out rough, feral.

She was close.

Close.

Maybe at the palace gates.

Maybe just inside the courtyard.

Maybe steps away.

I hadn’t seen her yet.

But smelling her was enough to unravel me.

Like someone struck a match inside my chest.

I hadn’t been whole since I’d returned her to the Queen. I knew that. I had accepted it as the price for doing the right thing. But the depth of the fracture inside me…it felt sharper now. Raw. Exposed.

I wasn’t here for romance.

I wasn’t here for connection.

I wasn’t here for some stupid idea of fate.

I was here because Lily was in danger. An arranged marriage. Political games. Fae nobles who couldn’t guard a broom closet, let alone their princess. And a court that had already failed her once.

I was the only one who had ever protected her properly.

I knew that.

My wolf knew that.

And deep down, part of me knew she’d always been mine to protect—mine alone, in the way a vow is carved into bone.

I grit my teeth hard enough that my jaw ached. My fingers trembled where they clenched the door. The urge to drop the disguise, shift, and tear through the palace hunting her down like a deranged beast was almost unbearable.

I forced myself to breathe through it.

In.

Out.

Slow.

Controlled.

She was here.

Alive.

And until I saw her with my own eyes, every part of me would be ready to break.

'I need to see that she’s okay,' I muttered in my own head 'I need to meet this supposed fiancé. And I need to get myself under control before I walk into that palace looking like a lunatic.”

Because right now?

I was half a step from losing it.

I straightened, forced the glamour tighter around me.

Tonight, I would see her.

Tonight, I would judge for myself whether she was safe.

Tonight, I would confront the idiocy of fae politics and the man they expected her to marry.

And if any of them thought they could cage her again?

They were about to learn what real danger looked like.

Broken or not, whole or not—

I was here now.

And nothing would keep me from her.