Chapter 15 'Ugh, this one smells like stale corn chips.' The disdain in Miles' voice has me giggling, then stifling a gag as he waves the scent card in my face. 'No! Get that away from me!' I laugh, pushing his arm. 'I'm turning the page, this is ridiculous.' After meeting with Cam, he handed us back over to Pearl who led us to a room not unlike where I spend most of my days at work. There's a large stack of binders in front of us, and we've started going through them. We've been through two full ones at this point and have pulled out three scent cards that don't make us gag. Part of me wonders if this is all some kind of sick joke, because what are the odds that out of over two hundred scent cards, we'd only find three that were unoffensive to both of us? If it weren't for my parents warning us we might be particularly picky and think alphas' scents are especially repulsive now that we've found each other, I might not have believed it. 'Oh, that one's a pack,' Miles points to the card at the top of the next page, labelled 'Pack 4532'. We've only come across a few packs so far, but I sigh, pulling the sleeve out of the binder. 'I swear, if this is another mix of popcorn and smoky leather, I'm gonna-' All the air exits the room when I open the airtight pouch. There is leather, but it's crisp and clean smelling. Cedar. Spearmint. A damn rainforest. Lavender. The scents hit me like a damn freight train, and I swallow roughly, glancing at Miles as my perfume blooms around us, despite the scent neutralizers in the air. Despite the gut-deep feeling that there's something missing from the combination of scents, my mouth waters. His pupils are blown, and I'm sure if I looked in the mirror right now, mine would be too. Blueberry and dark chocolate mixes with my raspberry and hibiscus, and if we're not careful I'm sure we'll end up mixing our scent all over these binders. 'That's not bad...' Miles chokes out, and I find myself nodding in agreement. 'Not bad at all.' I clear my throat, willing my pounding heart to calm the fuck down. 'I'm sure if they were present during my heat, it would be...' 'Completely acceptable,' he finishes for me, nodding his head once like he's in a business meeting and not trying to hide the raging erection in his shorts. 'Yes.' I nod in agreement, squirming a little in my seat. 'Satisfactory.' The extremely scent sympathetic pack's card taunts me. What would it be like to be between all of them? Pack Hansen kept to a pretty strict schedule on what nights each alpha was allowed into my bed so there wouldn't be any cross-over, but I won't be tolerating that for my heat. Images of Miles taking my ass while a lavender-scented alpha fills my pussy, as well as a third set of hands fondling my breasts flood my mind, and I shiver, nodding once again. 'Yes. Very satisfactory.' A slow smirk appears on my mate's face. 'You wanna tell me what you were just thinking about, little nymph?' My cheeks flush at how easily he's able to read me. 'I have no idea what you're talking about.' I can't help but smile into the words, and I have to remind myself that we probably won't even need the alphas. We'll give our selection to the heat clinic, but Miles is going to be my advocate, so unless he pulls the trigger, there won't be any volunteers. It's exactly what I want. So why does the thought of making it through my heat just the two of us fill me with a slight sense of disappointment? We exit the heat clinic hand-in-hand, feeling good about our decision. We handed in Pack 4532's scent card as our top choice and were informed there are three alphas and beta registered to the pack, which should be more than enough knots if it comes down to it. The other three cards we were the least offended by were also turned in as our backups. Now that we have this sorted out, all we have to do is wait until I'm in full heat. 'What the fuck is this?' A familiar voice, one I haven't heard in over six months, has my head snapping up. Pack Hansen. 'Tucker?' I ask incredulously. At one time, I had looked at them and thought how lucky I was to have a pack so prestigious. I thought I was in love with all of them. Looking at them now? There's nothing left of the alphas I thought I was in love with. They're all looking at me with varying degrees of incredibility, holding cups of coffee, dressed in their work suits. How did I forget their office is down here? 'Bethany,' Preston says, taking a step forward, and Miles' hand tightens in mine. The minuscule action draws his attention to our joined hands and his gaze shifts to Miles, his eyes widening. Their slightly woodsy scents, the ones that I used to hold on so tightly to, now make my nose itch. Grayson looks between us like he can't quite believe his eyes, and Chris has this calculating look on his face, as usual. 'Is this some sort of revenge scheme?' Tucker spits, motioning between Miles and I. 'What are you planning on doing? Getting together and forming some kind of campaign to slander Pack Hansen?' My brows shoot up, because wow, that's crazy, even for him. Miles bristles at the tone I'm too used to hearing come from Tucker. 'Damn, someone thinks they're the center of the universe,' he snaps, and Tucker's eyes widen. I never talked back to him. Guess it's time to start. 'If that's the leap you make from seeing the omega you tried to cheat on happy and thriving without you, then you might need therapy.' Tucker's eyes narrow at me. Before he can spit more crazy theories at us, Chris interrupts us. 'How did this happen? I don't see how....this,' he waves a hand in our general direction, 'works out. You're both omegas.' His words are incredulous, like he might actually be questioning if we are both omegas. 'We're aware,' Miles says coolly, angling himself slightly in front of me, a move that doesn't go unnoticed by my old pack. 'And not that it's any of your business, but that scent card I sampled at the OMS? Turns out Bethany had left it at work with her signature all over it. Yeah, it was her scent on it that triggered my instincts. She's the one I was drawn to, and we're a true scent match.' Preston scoffs. 'Two omegas can't be scent-matched. Do you really expect us to believe that?' I frown at him. It's not as hard as I thought it would be to stand up to the men who once ruled my life. Not that I realized it was happening at the time. 'I don't expect you to believe anything, considering like Miles said, it's none of your business. But you know my parents are a scent-matched omega pair.' 'Sure they are,' Preston rolls his eyes, 'so that's where you get this attention-seeking streak from.' Is he really going after my parents right now? Miles practically snarls at them. 'Don't you dare speak to her like-' 'Listen.' Grayson steps forward with his hands splayed out, like he's trying to keep the peace. I really should know better. 'All I'm hearing is that you set us up for failure. You're the reason our scent card re-entered the OMS database, but then you left us for accepting a date your own actions orchestrated. Now, seven months later, you're with that same omega.' 'Your point?' I ask, my tone much more confident than I feel. It may be easier to stand up to them now, but three years of learned behavior is screaming at me that I'm going to make them angry with me. 'Don't you think you owe it to not only us, but yourselves as well to try it again? With both of you? No misunderstandings or secrets between us? If things were really going that well, you wouldn't have to be going to a heat clinic.' He can't keep the disdain from his lips on those last two words. 'We could help you, you know. You wouldn't need to rely on...strangers.' Miles doesn't even try to hide his snort. 'Like you helped Bethany through three years of heats? Um, fuck off. No.' The rest of Pack Hansen's eyes flash in anger, but even as their scents sour, my mate keeps going. 'In case you forgot, I ran out on that date. Not to mention, the only one who kept secrets during your courtship, if you can call it that, was you. I'd ask what kind of alphas don't bond their omega for three years, but I already have the answer. Spineless, asshole, cheater ones. I don't owe you a fucking thing, and Bethany owes you even less. So,' he looks at the group of alphas in front of us, 'and I mean this with all the respect you deserve-go fuck yourselves with a long, hard, prickly cactus because you won't be getting anything from either of us.' With that, Miles marches me past the dumbstruck group of alphas, which thankfully is in the direction of where his car is parked by a meter. We turn the corner, the alphas too shocked to come after us, and as soon as we're next to his car, I launch myself at my omega, my arms wrapping around his neck as I kiss him breathless. There are people passing by on the sidewalk, but I can't bring myself to care. This man, this beautiful, spectacular man, just stood up for me in the one way I didn't even realize I needed. His hands are gripping the back of my knees as he pulls me up and leans me against the side of his car, his mouth devouring mine. 'I love you,' I tell him on a breath between kisses. We've never said the words before, not since Miles jokingly asked if it was too soon to say it. We've skirted around the 'L' word like it might bite us, and I know it's fast, but I also know what I feel for Miles. What I've felt since the moment he asked me to move in with him. Love barely even covers it. He draws back, his eyes soft as they look at me with pure adoration. 'I love you too.' Then, breathing heavily, his expression turns anxious. 'This is a weird moment to say that for the first time. You're not mad?' My brows shoot up. 'What? Why would I be mad? You just handed Pack Hansen's asses to them on a silver platter.' I almost laugh at the memory of their faces when the words, 'long, hard, prickly cactus' left his mouth. 'You should have been able to do that without me running my mouth,' he looks remorseful as he presses a kiss to my temple, 'you're the one they fucked over. I don't know why I got so intense about it.' 'Because...' I draw the word out, looking up into his eyes with a little smirk, 'you love me?' 'More than I can even comprehend,' he sighs as he captures my lips again, and just like that, I'm not as worried about my heat as I was twenty minutes ago. As long as I have Miles by my side, I know everything will be okay. A Fated Encounter movie summary talks about Emma Brown who is forced by her father Henry to take her sister Bella's place and marry Tommy Anderson to save her business. Unlike the rumor Tommy turns ou...