Parker had said yes. Which was both great and horribly, horribly awful. In my panic to get out of the mess with Andrew, I had set my pants on fire. I knew it would come back to bite me in the ass. I mean, how could it not? The best I could hope for was they would let it go, which was ridiculous. When it had slipped out, I assumed the worst that could happen was that my parents would find out I lied. How naïve I’d been.

I was still reeling at the audacity of Andrew inviting me on a date through my father while he could see me with my date. I was in the very same room as Andrew, with a sexy, successful, and intelligent man, who had his arm wrapped around me most of the night, and Andrew thought that was a good time to see if he could weasel his way into a sporting event with me? In an enclosed box no less. Asshole. His boldness apparently knew no bounds. Worse, it put the very real idea into my parents’ heads that they could decide whether my chosen date was acceptable or not. Not that they needed much prodding in that department.

On paper, Parker was great, and when Dad had come clean about his follow up conversation with Andrew, I laid it all out. Parker was rich and successful, or at least his family was rich, and he had a great career. He was good looking and educated. And we’d known each other since college. Perfect mate material.

Not even just on paper, but I tried not to dwell there too long. Thinking of Parker finding someone else for even a nanosecond was too long, even if Parker had been the one to abandon me when I needed him most. Parker would always be “the one.” That was just the reality of it.

It perplexed me that my dad could think Andrew was worth a second glance. Sure, they were friends, or at least that was my guess, but come on. He was my dad’s contemporary and leered at his only son unabashedly. On a checklist for perfect mate material for your only child, I was confident those qualities were absent.

Now, I was spending my lunch break waiting in a diner for Parker, hoping we could fill in the last few years’ of distance with enough knowledge to get through family dinner this weekend. I even made him a list of important facts about me. As the waitress brought my coffee, I glanced at my phone. I was still ten minutes early and shouldn’t be allowing all of the what ifs to spin up my thoughts. What if he didn’t come? What if he changed his mind about dinner? What if he still hated me for what happened? What if I couldn’t emotionally handle being around him?

I scented him the moment the door swung open: vanilla and cinnamon. The man was just begging to be licked. Which was not going to happen. Nope. If I could restrain myself through the entire gala, I surely could restrain myself for a mere lunch break.

I turned to see him walking my way. He was wearing a suit similar what he’d been wearing that first time I’d seen him at Om, his tie my favorite shade of green. I tried to not read too much into that, but it was hard with him smiling at me.

“Hi,” I greeted him lamely. What did you say to an ex who was going to fake being your future as a favor?

“Hi.” He slid into the seat across from me.

“I really appreciate you doing this. I made a list.” I handed him the paper that had taken me hours to create. I had no idea what might come up at dinner, and I needed to cover every base to keep my parents from uncovering my lie. It hadn’t been easy; figuring out what I wanted Parker to know versus what he needed to know had raised me to an entirely new level of stress. “You know, so you could know things about me they probably would expect you to.”

He took the paper without a word and stared at it for what seemed like forever. The waitress came by and we ordered coffee and pie. We had done that nearly every Thursday my final semester with him. There was a cure little diner down the road, and they always had my favorite—coconut cream—on Thursdays, so after our last class of the day, it was almost guaranteed we ended up there. I pushed the memory down. I shouldn’t be thinking of him as the sweet guy who made sure I got my favorite pie on Thursdays to make Friday more bearable. No good could come of it. I needed to remember him as he was near the end, or I chanced forgetting that this wasn’t real.

“Thorough.” Parker laid down the list. “You even mentioned where we met. I do remember that, you know.” A small smile crept on his face and I began to blush. “You, running out of the commons with your backpack slung over your shoulder and your sandwich in your hand, bumping into me and stealing my heart.”

That was not what he was supposed to do. I just couldn’t go there. Not now. Probably not ever.

“Don’t.” My voice was weak, far from the firm command I intended it to be.

“Don’t what?”

I saw the moment he put it together. He hadn’t even realized the line he crossed. He’d never been great at holding in his thoughts when it came to me. Oftentimes it was good, but then there were times… no I wasn’t going to allow my memories to travel that path.

“Don’t bring back all the feels.” My words were but a whisper.

“The feels?”

Was he that clueless? He’d always been more open than me when it came to emotions, which from what I saw from the rest of his life, had been exclusive to me. He had to grasp that now just wasn’t the time.

“You know what I mean. Let’s stick to the facts. Facts I can handle.” That was my first slip. My first emotional slip, anyway. I wanted to kick myself. I’d worked and planned so hard to avoid this. I’d even created a stupid list, and then I showed him my weakness.

“Done.”

My shoulders relaxed. He didn’t flinch at my confession that anything more than facts were still too raw for me. He simply moved on. That was the Parker I remembered, from before things turned south.

“I see you were working for a very good firm before coming here. You skipped why you left.”

I had hemmed and hawed about putting that on the list. It was embarrassing, and something I highly doubted my folks would bring up… ever. That didn’t mean it wasn’t a topic Parker could inadvertently bring up, though. It was need to know. I just didn’t want him to. I wanted him to think well of me, for some perverse reason. I wanted him to see I was more than the typical omega, the kind my parents wanted me to be.

“I was let go.”

“I can’t picture that.” He leaned in closer, his eyes showing an emotion I couldn’t quite place, his face almost blank. Had I disappointed him? I couldn’t handle that. As sick as it was, I still craved his approval. “You were always so capable.” He stumbled on that last word.

“And I was.” Which was the truth. I was the best non-partner lawyer in the firm. Had I been an alpha, or even a beta, there was no doubt I’d have been offered a partnership. That was ultimately my demise, because jealousy over a mere omega getting better cases had been the true seed of my firing. “Excellent, even, but then I went to work a little too close to my heat and… let’s just say, the alphas made it known to the partners that I was not professional enough to be there.”

What they had said was that I “was a fucking whore trying to seduce them to get their clients,” which was not something I wanted to repeat to anyone, much less Parker.

“I sense you skipped a lot there.”

“Intentionally. Anyway, that is how I ended up back here, working for my dad’s firm. Bar reciprocity is tricky, but it doesn’t matter because my dad thinks I should spend the time looking for an M.R.” I flinched at confessing the low opinion my father still had of me. It was one thing for him to feel that way about a young unaccomplished graduate, but I was an attorney, and I had earned the right to be thought of more than just a potential spouse for some alpha.

“I remember you complaining how they wanted you married off young. Is that why—never mind.” He took me aback with his recollection of our past. Did he remember everything like it was yesterday, too? If so, I felt bad for him. Being unable to forget sucked and made for a lonely life.

“Is that why what?”

“Is that why you never told them about our baby?” His hushed tone was only for me and he didn’t even try to hide his hurt. It was easy to forget we both lost that night, even if things hadn’t been all sunshine and roses before I stupidly crossed the street trusting the walk light and not even looking first.

“Yes. I needed to be more than a house omega.” How could he remember the little things, but not something that huge? It had shaped so many of my decisions back then, including the decision to transfer schools.

“Even if you choose to be one, you will always be more.” He reached out for my hand that was fidgeting with my glass, and I gave it to him, soaking in the comfort he offered, the familiarity of his touch not waned at all over the years.

We snapped apart as our pie was delivered, but his touch lingered on my hand. This was so not good.