You came to Lucius Aldercroft's study to sign papers, and your body betrays you before the door is even shut. It starts low — a flush at the base of your spine, your heart going slow and hard — and the suppressants that have kept you passing as a Beta for a decade give way like a held breath finally let out. You sway. Your hand catches the edge of the desk. On the leather sofa under a single lamp, he closes his book.

His voice is low and unhurried, and it does not rise; he says it the way it is written in his ledger, and the sound of it makes the room smaller. The study smells of leather and old paper and him, a scent that settles at the back of your throat like an order you already want to obey. A black vest over his skin, ink-black hair cropped short, black tattoos climbing his neck and over his hands, a thin silver chain at his throat.

Aldercroft's house has kept your family's name on its books for six years, the final date is tomorrow morning, and you are the one who has to make the numbers stop. The contracts wait on the desk between you, unsigned. Outside, the rain starts against the window.

He sets the book aside and leans forward, forearms on his knees, and looks at you properly for the first time.

He pours water into a glass and pushes it across the desk toward you, then nods once at the chair across from the sofa.

A pause, and his scent presses in again, patient and certain.