Bobby wasn’t sweating. Not yet. He was a professional. A legend. A caffeine-powered machine in a rhinestone bomber jacket. He juggled the Huntrix’s makeup calls, lighting demands, and Zoey’s last-minute lemon-honey-lavender-tea-but-it-can’t-be-purple meltdown without breaking a smile.

And then they walked in. You. The new production runner.

And Bobby’s whole endocrine system detonated.

His first mistake? Breathing.

He’d only meant to turn and offer a sunny, manager-style “Hey, welcome!” like the affable alpha he usually played on daytime set schedules. Instead, his nose flared like a startled bloodhound.

Scent. Your scent.

It shouldn’t be legal. It was sunshine and peach fuzz and warm linen and… was that? Vanilla cream and rain-washed clover? The air crackled. His spine straightened with a pop. Muscles he hadn’t used since high school baseball clenched like they’d been drafted.

Alpha-brain: Activated. Logic-brain: Rebooting. Please wait.

His second mistake? Forgetting. He had skipped his suppressant dose this morning. Because he’d been up until 4:00 AM hand-embroidering glitter patches onto Yun-Jin’s backup cape. And he’d run out of blockers last week because someone (Zoey, definitely Zoey) used them as sparkle tape for a demon banishment skit.

Which meant Bobby—the most normal, level-headed, “I’m-just-here-to-manage-the-calendar” Alpha on the planet—was standing five feet away from the softest, prettiest, most dangerously adorable Omega he had ever smelled in his life.

And his instincts were having a Black Friday sale inside his bloodstream. Buy one scent, get a lifetime bond free.

He slapped his clipboard over his own face like a riot shield.

“Nope.” He whispered under his breath, backing toward a tower of light stands. “Not today, Satan.”

You hadn’t even looked at him yet, and he was already halfway to fated-mate-induced spontaneous combustion. His hands were sweating. His elbows were sweating. Worse—his scent had started to seep, warm and rich: tonka, praline, a sinful twist of cocoa-vanilla and almond, blooming in waves that absolutely screamed rut was looming.

Mira walked by and sniffed. “Dude. You smell like an expensive bakery.”

He hissed. “Don’t. Say. That. Out loud.”

She gave him a suspicious look and waltzed off with her prop scythe.

And then you turned around. Big eyes. Soft smile. A notepad clutched like a baby bunny. And you waved. Cheerfully. Like you didn’t just bring a fully grown Alpha to the verge of existential crisis-level instinctual frenzy with your Hello Kitty-ass aura and sunshine breath.

He dropped his clipboard. Onto his foot. Didn’t feel a thing.

You walked closer.

He could hear his own heartbeat saying, Mate. Mate. MATE.

“I need… I need a wall,” Bobby muttered, retreating until he backed into a rolling rack of feather boas. “Or a chaperone. Or a—” sniff —You were standing right beside him. Handing him the clipboard with the cutest worried look he’d ever seen.

He short-circuited.

Final straw? You brushed his wrist.

Bobby’s brain: 🔥🥐🧁💍🐝‼️

He inhaled sharply, trying and failing to keep his Alpha instincts behind lock and key, while casually yanking the nearest boa off the rack and throwing it over both your heads like a makeshift tent of shame.

“I’m not flirting,” he said, voice low, tight, and vaguely panicked. “I’m just having a small hormonal emergency in your general direction.”