Who's My Triplet's Alpha Daddy? Novel

Chapter 43 Dec 18, 2025 POV: Lysander Monday morning and I'm watching Claire through my office glass while pretending to review contracts that don't actually need reviewing. She's doing that thing where she organizes her desk with military precision. Pen cup at perfect right angles. Files color-coded by urgency. Coffee mug positioned exactly where it won't spill on anything important. She catches me staring and smiles. Not the megawatt performance smile Caroline deployed at The Pink Peacock. Just quiet warmth that says I see you and I'm here .

My chest does something complicated that I'm aggressively not examining. I look down at my own desk. Every document signed where it needs signing. Every email answered with professional efficiency I definitely didn't manage myself. Client files organized in a system I didn't create but somehow always know how to navigate. All Claire. Every bit of it. She does this not because her job description demands it. Not because she's angling for promotion or trying to prove something.

She does it because she wants my life to run smoothly even when I'm actively sabotaging it with emotional unavailability and grocery store collisions. Eighteen months of this. Eighteen months of stability, calm weekends, knowing exactly where she'll be and what she'll do. No surprises. No chaos. Just consistent, reliable presence that I could set my watch by. Then I think about Caroline. Hurricane in pink cashmere who crashed into my Tuesday afternoon and made me try honey lavender lattes in establishments that offend my wolf's sensibilities.

Who sees through my bullshit and calls me textbook while admitting she's equally disastrous. Who I'm seeing again Wednesday despite absolutely zero progress on the Claire situation. My office door opens. Claire walks in carrying more files and that concerned expression she gets when she's noticed I'm spiraling but is too polite to call me out directly. "Hey." She sets the files on my desk, leans in to kiss my cheek. Her lips are warm and I should feel something beyond general fondness for a person who organizes my chaos. "You okay?

You've been weird since Sunday." "Weird how?" I'm already deflecting. It's reflex at this point. "Distracted. Like you're solving quantum physics while I'm talking about normal human things." She sits on the edge of my desk-familiar territory, comfortable intimacy we've built through eighteen months of routine. "What's going on in that head?" Everything. Nothing. The complete destruction of whatever ethical framework I thought I had. "Just work stuff," I lie with practice that should concern me more than it does. She studies my face with those too-perceptive eyes.

Doesn't buy it but won't push because that's not who she is. Steady. Patient. Endlessly accommodating of my emotional dysfunction. "Speaking of work." She pulls out a specific file, slides it across my desk. "This came through yesterday. Large legal firm expanding from LA. Montgomery Legal Group." My brain trips over the name. Montgomery. Caroline's last name is Montgomery. Fuck. "They want a meeting," Claire continues, oblivious to my internal crisis. "The director personally.

No email, no phone call, no letter-just showed up at reception asking to schedule time with 'the Fenris heir managing Colorado operations.' Very formal. Very corporate." "That's unusual." I'm flipping through the file, reading details that aren't registering because my brain is stuck on Montgomery. "Most firms go through proper channels. Multiple contacts before requesting face time." "Right?" She's watching me carefully. "I thought it was weird too. Like they're either extremely confident or extremely desperate.

Maybe both." "What did you tell them?" "That I'd check your schedule and get back to them." She pauses. "What do you want me to say?" Wednesday. Caroline Wednesday. Second coffee at 10am where I'm supposed to have figured out my complicated situation before she decides I'm not worth the emotional investment. "Tell them Wednesday. Noon." The words come out before I can stop them. "After lunch." After Caroline. After I do whatever the fuck I'm doing at The Pink Peacock for round two of flirting with disaster while technically dating someone else. Claire's eyebrows lift. "Wednesday? That's fast.

You sure you don't want more time to prepare?" "No point delaying." I'm already spinning strategies, running probability calculations. "If they're expanding into Colorado, they're either scouting acquisition targets or measuring competition. Either way, I want to know their play before they establish position." "Always three moves ahead," she says with something that might be admiration or resignation. Can't tell which. "That's the job." She stands, smooths her skirt with hands that are steady and competent and completely unaware that I'm about to fuck up everything we've built.

"I'll confirm Wednesday at noon. Want me to sit in? Take notes?" "Yeah. That'd be good." Having her there means maintaining professional boundaries, means I can't do anything stupid if Caroline Montgomery shows up representing her father's firm. Wait. "Claire." My voice comes out sharper than intended. "This director. Did they give a name?" She checks her notes. "Caroline Montgomery. Daughter of the founder. Apparently she's running the expansion personally." My stomach does this fun thing where it tries to escape through my throat. Caroline.

Caroline fucking Montgomery is the director of the legal firm trying to move into my territory. Caroline who I'm meeting for coffee Wednesday morning. Caroline who doesn't know I'm one of the Fenris heirs because I introduced myself as just Lys and she never asked for more. "You okay?" Claire's hand touches my arm. "You look weird." "Fine. Just processing." I'm not fine. I'm the opposite of fine. "Noon Wednesday. Confirm it." She nods slowly, still watching my face with that perceptive expression that misses nothing. "Okay.

I'll handle it." She leaves and I sit there staring at Caroline Montgomery's business card-the pink one with her cell number that I've been texting like a teenager with his first crush. Wednesday at 10am I'm having coffee with a woman I'm actively interested in while technically dating someone else. Wednesday at noon that same woman is walking into my office representing competition that wants to either merge with or buy out the empire I've built.

And Claire will be sitting right there taking notes while Caroline figures out I'm not just some guy with cute not-kids and a taste for reluctant lattes. My wolf perks up with interest. My brain screams warnings about professional boundaries and relationship ethics and approximately seventeen ways this could detonate. My phone buzzes. Text from Caroline: Counting down to Wednesday! I stare at the message. At the enthusiastic energy that's either genuine or the best act I've seen in years. She has no idea I'm the competition she's coming to negotiate with.

No idea that coffee Wednesday morning just became exponentially more complicated. I should cancel. Right now. Text her that something came up, reschedule, create distance before this becomes the professional disaster it's clearly heading toward. My thumb hovers over the keyboard. Types instead: Can't wait. Send. Claire walks past my office. Waves through the glass with that smile that says she trusts me, believes in us, has no idea I'm actively building toward spectacular self-destruction. Wednesday's going to be a shitshow.

Coffee with Caroline where I either come clean about who I am or keep lying by omission. Then a business meeting where she discovers the truth anyway while my girlfriend watches. I can see exactly how this ends-professional catastrophe wrapped in personal disaster tied with a bow made of my own terrible decisions. My wolf is practically wagging its tail. And I can't fucking wait. Archer