Boundaries

Chapter 1

Orion shifts on the spot anxiously, rolling his shoulders back for what feels like the eighteenth time in ten minutes and Kieran, his Beta and second in command, shoots him a withering glare.

"Would you stop?" He murmurs.

Orion sighs heavily, raking a hand through his hair. His tight curls are longer than they had been when he was a child. He wonders idly if he will notice. If he'll like it.

"I can't." He mutters.

Kieran's hands land firmly on his Alpha's shoulders, his eyes peering into the taller man's soul.

Orion Vice has been Alpha of Ironwood pack for nearly ten years now, and time has changed him little. His frame is a little stockier that it had been then, his features are a little sharper and his tread a little more assured. The confidence that the last decade had instilled in the Alpha did more to heighten him than years of growing in stunted ground could ever offer.

But right now, he shrinks. He looks...nervous, a look that Kieran isn't accustom to seeing on his, frankly, regimented and surly best friend. He looks like the boy of seventeen again, the boy who's unsure and frightened and so in love...

"I know what you're thinking, but the pack has to come first. Getting him to sign this agreement will change everything. I know that you know that. But trust in him too. You knew him once, trust in what you know, what you remember." Kieran says quietly.

Orion's eyes narrow.

The only reason he's not kicking his Beta's arse right now is because he's right.

Kieran's eyes drift over the taller man's shoulder and he nods, signalling that they're here.

Orion barely registers his Beta's hands leaving his shoulders, instead inhaling deeply and getting lost in a flood of memory.

He can smell him. That fresh, familiar scent of him. It's citrusy and refreshing, like a cool spring breeze. He tries to remember the face associated with it, the face he's not seen in nearly ten years, knowing that it will have changed and that he will regret every second that he's missed. It's hazy, but it's there. Chubby cheeks and a disarming dimple in one cheek, and the brightest blue eyes you've ever seen.

His presence makes Orion's body burn, their proximity to each other causing him to thrum with an invisible electricity and he can't ignore it anymore.

He exhales heavily, opening his eyes as he turns to face him.

Their eyes meet and for a split second he is reassured.

Light blue, just as he remembered, with lashes so long that it should be a crime. The eyebrows that lay above them raise almost imperceptibly and Orion is impressed by his ability to control his expression. Because surely he can feel it too. The connection between them is magnetic, almost unbearable and unmistakable.

Soulmates.

Orion's eyes wander his mate's face.

To his dismay the chubby cheeks are gone, replaced by hard, defined lines. That dimple that he fell in love with all those years ago is hidden beneath a stoic expression.

The Bluewood Alpha's features are subtle yet masculine, his shoulders filled out and his body lean and defined. He looks like a swimmer, quick and disarmingly strong. He wears blue shorts and a white linen shirt, only half buttoned up, his feet bare. The sight makes Orion's heart ache in familiarity.

His hair is darker than Orion remembers, but still looks just as soft and wayward, kept shorter and neater on the top now than it ever was when they were kids.