Taming the Wild Beast of Alamina

The dress arrived in the late afternoon.

Sylvia found it laid across the bed in the room she shared with Thomas at the Lancaster estate, accompanied by a pair of matching shoes and a short note written in his perfectly controlled handwriting.

Dinner. Seven.

There was no explanation of where they were going or why he had chosen the dress, but that was not unusual.

Thomas had done this before Sylvia became a dominant omega.

The first time had been after Sylvia complained that she had nothing appropriate for a new restaurant he wanted to try. A dress had appeared the following morning, along with shoes, a coat, and reservations made before she had technically agreed.

The second time involved a concert.

The third had somehow ended with horseback riding.

For Thomas, buying her clothes was a tactical method of eliminating every possible obstacle between Sylvia and whatever new experience he had decided they should attempt.

The dress was deep red, simple, and elegant, with a square neckline, fitted waist, and a full skirt that fell below her knees.

When Sylvia came downstairs, Thomas was waiting in the front hall.

He wore black, as expected, but had abandoned his usual uniform for a tailored evening suit, a white shirt, and a dark red tie that matched her dress perfectly.

Sylvia stopped on the last stair.

Thomas looked up.

His expression barely changed, but his attention settled over her in a slow sweep that warmed her more effectively than any obvious compliment.

"The shoes fit?" he asked.

"Yes."

"The dress?"

"Also yes."

He held out one hand.

Sylvia took it and descended the remaining step. "You could tell me I look beautiful."

"You already know."

"That is not the same as hearing it."

His thumb moved over her knuckles. "You look beautiful."

"Much better."

Thomas leaned down and kissed her temple, then guided her toward the waiting car without a word.

Sylvia did not ask where they were going.

She had learned that Thomas considered an unexplained destination part of the experience, and there were only so many times she could interrogate a man who responded to every question with either silence or an answer technically accurate enough to be useless.

The drive into the capital took less than an hour.

Evening had settled by the time they reached its central district, where older stone buildings stood among modern towers, their upper floors illuminated against the dark outline of the mountains. The car stopped before a discreet entrance beneath a bronze awning.

The restaurant occupied the highest floor of one of the city’s historic hotels.

Thomas had reserved a private dining room overlooking the capital.

A small table stood beside the broad windows, set for two, with candles burning between crystal glasses and a view of the city spreading beneath them.

It was exactly the kind of place Thomas preferred: private, controlled, elegant, and unlikely to have anyone who could interrupt them.

Sylvia removed her coat and glanced through the glass.

"You chose well."

"I usually do."

She looked back at him. "That confidence must be exhausting."

"It is supported by evidence."

The food was excellent. The wine was better. Thomas remained entirely himself, speaking about the parts of the capital Sylvia had not yet visited, answering her questions about Rohan’s military academy, and refusing to confirm whether Marianne truly possessed childhood photographs of him.

"She does," Sylvia decided.

"She claims she does."

"That means yes."

"It means Marianne enjoys psychological warfare."

"Daniel said there is one of you asleep beneath the dining table."

"Daniel cannot be trusted."

"He appears very trustworthy."

"That is how he operates."

Sylvia laughed and reached for her wine.

Nothing in Thomas’s manner suggested nervousness. He did not watch the door, adjust his cuffs, or stare at her with suspicious intensity. His field rested around her as it always did now, warm at the edges where their bond connected them.

He asked whether she wanted to visit the northern gardens the next day.

She told him she wanted to see the bakery whose window he had broken.

He said the matter had been resolved twenty years ago.

She informed him that historical crimes remained relevant.

By the time dessert arrived, Sylvia had become her old bubbly self.

Thomas waited until the plates had been cleared.

Then he poured the last of the wine into her glass and looked through the window at the capital below.

"I spent most of my life believing permanence was something created through discipline," he said.

Sylvia glanced at him.

The words were serious, but Thomas often became serious without warning. She waited.

"If a structure was maintained, it endured. If a position was defended, it remained secure. If a person controlled himself sufficiently, nothing essential could be taken from him."

"That sounds like you."

"It was."

His gaze returned to her.

"I was wrong."

Sylvia set down her glass.

Thomas did not rise immediately. He remained seated across from her, broad shoulders relaxed beneath the black jacket, his expression as composed as it had been throughout dinner.

Only the bond revealed the depth beneath it.

"You entered my life without asking permission," he continued. "You changed my routines, occupied my home, argued with my decisions, and treated my silences as temporary inconveniences."

"They usually were."

"Yes."

A faint softness touched his mouth.

"I did not recognize what was happening until you had already become the part of my life around which everything else was arranged."

Sylvia’s throat tightened.

Thomas had told her he loved her.

He had shown it in a hundred ways before he ever found the words: in meals left waiting when she worked late, in the coat he placed around her shoulders without comment, in the way his body always turned toward danger before hers could.

But Thomas rarely spoke of love for long.

He seemed to believe feeling something deeply made each word too important to waste.

"The bond did not create that," he said. "Neither did the mark."

His gaze moved briefly to the place at her nape before returning to her eyes.

"I would have chosen you without either of them. I had already chosen you. I was simply too slow to understand that choosing someone once is not enough."

Sylvia’s chest ached.

"What are you saying, Tom?"

"That I want to choose you deliberately."

He stood.

Still, Sylvia did not fully understand.

Not until he moved around the small table, stopped beside her chair, and reached into the inner pocket of his jacket.

Thomas Lancaster went down on one knee with the same confidence with which he did everything else.

Sylvia stopped breathing.

He opened the dark box in his hand.

The ring inside was in three pieces.

At the center sat a deep red oval stone, dark as wine in the shadows and brilliant crimson where the candlelight entered it. Diamonds surrounded it in an ornate crown, arranged in pear-shaped and round cuts that framed the central stone. The band was yellow gold, warm and solid beneath the setting.

Above and below it rested two separate curved diamond bands, shaped to embrace the central ring. Each followed the outline of the red stone, completing the design so that the three pieces appeared made for one another while remaining distinct.

Sylvia stared.

Thomas had chosen a ring that became complete only when its separate parts were brought together.

"This is not because we bonded," he said.

His voice remained steady, but through their connection Sylvia felt the single hard beat of his heart.

"It is not because anyone expects it, and it is not a consequence of what happened to you. I want you to know that before you answer."

Her eyes burned.

Thomas held her gaze.

"I love you. I want your arguments in my house, your books in every room, and your unreasonable opinions interfering with my decisions. I want every ordinary morning you are willing to give me and every difficult year that comes after them."

Sylvia’s lips trembled into a smile.

"I want to be your family by choice as well as instinct." His voice lowered. "Sylvia Croft, will you marry me?"

For one suspended moment, she could only look at him.

At the man who had once believed pain should be endured in silence because crying would not repair a broken bone.

At the commander who had built himself into a wall and then, somehow, made a door for her.

At Thomas, kneeling before her without embarrassment or performance, asking for a future as directly as he would ask for anything that mattered.

"Yes."

The answer escaped before she could make it graceful.

Thomas did not move.

Sylvia laughed through the tears gathering in her eyes. "Yes, Tom. Of course I will marry you."

Thomas’s shoulders eased, and his field surged around her with such profound relief that Sylvia felt it against her skin.

He removed the last diamond band first and slid it onto her finger, followed by the central ring and the last band, fitting them carefully around the red stone until all three pieces settled together.

They fit perfectly.

Sylvia turned her hand beneath the candlelight.

"It is excessive."

"You like it."

"I love it."

Thomas rose, and Sylvia caught the front of his jacket before he could say anything further, pulling him down into a kiss.

His hands closed around her waist.

The city disappeared beyond the windows. The candles, the wine, and the untouched remainder of dessert ceased to matter.

When Thomas finally drew back, his forehead rested against hers.

"You said yes," he murmured.

"You sound surprised."

"I was not certain."

Sylvia stared at him. "You brought me to the capital, gave me a beautiful dress, offered me a ring designed in three interlocking pieces, and somehow remained so completely normal that I suspected nothing."

"That was intentional."

"You planned an ambush."

"A successful one."

She looked again at the ring, then back at the man who had placed it there.

"You are incredible."

"And engaged."

Sylvia smiled.

"Yes," she said, drawing him closer once more. "You are."