Rise Above ✓

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-One

 

Markus has never felt this nervous in his entire life.

His heartbeat was extremely loud in his ears and his hands wouldn’t stop shaking, not to mention an awful amount of sweat had gathered underneath his shirt collar and was beading across his forehead and upper lip. He had to keep dabbing at his face and neck with a dark handkerchief. Even the fact that he was sat on the private balcony of the most prestigious restaurant in Sendorai did nothing to reduce his anxiety; the cool breeze of the evening not helping in calming his racing pulse or stop his skin from breaking out in perspiration.

He’d already given the specially wrapped box to the Maître d’ and all that was left now was for Dallas to arrive and their dinner to begin.

Markus has never done this before. In all honestly, Dallas was his first everything. Getting him a collar was something serious and Markus didn’t have any past experiences to compare with, to tell him that what he was doing was okay. All he knew was that he wanted it so badly – he wanted Dallas to be officially and wholeheartedly his. How long has he dreamt of this since he was a kid? How often did he stare at other were’s collars, wondering how they got it and when he was going to give his own?

The time was now and he felt like he was about to lose his lunch.

He nearly jumped out of his seat when a waiter popped his head through the sliding glass doors leading to the private balcony of the prestigious restaurant.

“Your mate has arrived, Mr Rowan,” he said with a curt bow.

Markus suddenly felt faint, distractedly wiping his sweaty palms on the carefully pressed material of his suit pants. “Oh, right, okay, thank you,” he replied, flushed, standing up quickly and taking in deep breaths, gaze flittering around the space nervously to make sure everything was in place. He wanted this to be perfect.

He smelled him before he saw him, that sharp zesty, spicy scent that was just completely and uniquely Dallas and Markus felt his lips part when the omega finally walked through the doors that led to the balcony.

Fucking hell, he looked astonishing.

It was the first time Markus was seeing the other man in a suit and Dallas being Dallas, with his weird love for neon colours and all things bright and distracting, the stupid suit was a startling blood red that somehow emphasized on the richness of the omega’s olive skin and the contrast of his stark silver hair, the colour also bringing out the fire blazing in his cognac brown eyes.

The undershirt was black and he’d refused to wear a tie, leaving the top two buttons of the shirt open to expose a bit of his chest and fucking hell, did he even realize what he was doing to Markus?

The alpha was trying not to pant like a fucking dog at the way Dallas’s throat was bared, sweetly defined collar bones exposed, like he was taunting the alpha, fucking teasing him –

“Markus?” Dallas’s voice brought him out of his stupor and he felt his cheeks burn at the teasing arch of one of the omega’s eyebrows.

“Sorry, I’m – sorry, you just, wow, you look incredible,” Markus said, taking a few steps forward and then abruptly stopping, his hands jerking out and then back to his sides and it was pretty fucking obvious he didn’t know what to do with himself.

Dallas was confused about what was going on but he couldn’t help the amused chuckle that escaped his lips at the sight of the alpha being so out of his element. It hadn’t yet clicked to him that Markus requesting he wear a suit and come to the balcony of the one and only Peachy Keens was a big deal and something life changing was about to happen. At least for Markus it was.