Zalyric sat with the list of names Dylan had handed him, the names of the servants who had once worked under the late duke. His eyes moved over the ink on the parchment but his mind refused to stay tethered to the task.
Instead, it wandered and betrayed him when his mind slipped back to that night.
Rowan's face, soft in slumber, lingered vividly in his memory, as did the dangerous closeness they had shared, the way it had nearly gone too far.
"Argh." The sound escaped him before he realized it then his hand pressed hard against his temple as the memory burned.
He could admit it, at least to himself.
He wasn't blind to his own flaws.
Yes, he was a man of appetite, a restless beast when it came to desire, maybe even a little twisted in the way his mind wandered but even beasts had standards.
He always had.
And Rowan?
Rowan wasn't supposed to fit any of them.
He was a beta, not an omega. Not the kind of person Zalyric was drawn to—
or so he had believed.
