Three knocks on Stella's bedroom door snapped her out of the new book she was reading, and although she had been curious to explore the house for a while, she had refrained from poking around, as she might come across something she wasn't supposed or didn't to see and upset the wrong people.

"Come in!" She shouted, leaving The Psychoanalyst aside. A blond-haired head appeared from behind the door.

"Styles," he said excitedly, jumping into the room, "do you want to go explore the house? I'm kind of bored and I thought 'I shouldn't let my best friend's sister get bored alone in her room. What do you think? You can even accompany me to make some simple and totally not dangerous deliveries if you want."

The beta hesitated for a second, Niall seemed quite nice, and she really wanted to explore the house, plus she didn't really have anything to lose. The beta nodded and started to put on her shoes.

"Great! Do you think we could go out to deliver the merchandise first? It's a bit far, but we can get something to eat on our way back. Here between us, Harry doesn't even have time to spend it with me anymore, but the Styles are very funny." He took her hand animatedly and started to run outside, they reached the outside of the house where a black van was already waiting for them.

They got on and the bodyguard started driving down the road, Niall told Stella anecdotes from his childhood, and there she confirmed what Harry had told her; Niall was very talkative, and any opportunity to tell about his life was perfect for the alpha. Stella also told him some things and anecdotes with which he could make fun of Harry for a while.

"Did they really have to pick him up from school because he was embarrassed to ask permission to go to the bathroom?" He asked in the middle of his laughter, Stella agreed laughing too.

"He was a very shy boy," she admitted with a smile that contained nothing but affection, "a bit annoying at times, but still my brother. Harry has always been the purest soul I have ever known."

"Curly is a very special lad." Niall agreed, and the truck stopped. "Well, wait here for a minute, I'll make the delivery quickly and I'll be right back."

Stella nodded and Niall got out of the car with a briefcase in his hand. In the distance I saw him talking to a very serious man, he had a few grey hairs and, from where I was, I noticed that he was an omega. Could omegas go and do that kind of thing? Are they common to see in this business?

A few minutes later the alpha returned to the car with his usual smile, closed the door and looked at the beta next to him.

"So, do you want to have some burgers?" He asked playfully, but before Stella could answer, the omega who he was some seconds ago stood up right away from the truck, right where Niall was sitting. "Oh no."

He lowered the glass of the window and his expression drastically changed from a smile to a frown and straight lips.

"Mr. Horan, I think something is missing from the briefcase." The man said.

"I beg your pardon? Mr. Kleist, I personally reviewed your order, and it seems to me that everything is in order. You asked for four bottles of our merchandise and three bags of cocaine. Now tell me, am I correct?" A shiver ran down Stella's spine upon hearing the alpha's tone, she had never known him in that serious facet.

"We'll see," the omega checked the briefcase with the help of a bodyguard who was accompanying him, an embarrassed smile appeared on his face, "I'm sorry, Mr. Horan, everything is in order."

"Be more careful next time, Kleist. We don't like people saying that we did something wrong, especially when we are totally sure that what we did or delivered was exactly what they asked for." The blond muttered and went up the window without waiting for a reply, he looked at Stella again and his smile returned. "Burgers then?"

After two hours they finally returned to the house, Stella accompanied Niall to Louis's office to leave the money. There they found her brother sitting on the alpha's lap, the beta smiled a little at the image of her brother smiling radiantly with a mark on his neck and his alpha holding him tight. Her little brother was already a grown up, he was a strong omega from the head to the toes.

"They look like gum, always stuck to each other. That's how you're going to see them every day, Ella, they seem like an extension of each other." Niall said, leaving the briefcase on the desk. "And they forget that they have brothers and a best friend to hang out with."

"Don't be dramatic, Ni," Harry said with a smile, "I hope you're treating my sister well."

"The funniest Styles," answered the blond alpha, giving the beta a hug, "we had a great time, we kicked some butt and then we ate hamburgers."

"I thought I was the funniest Styles." Harry joked.

"Um, you are in a tie. Well guys, we leave you here with your love because we have to go see Zayn, see you later!" The blond left the office together with Stella, and they both walked to the omega's office, where he was talking to an elderly beta, with a lab coat and some papers in his hands.

Zayn looked stressed, checking the papers over and over again and arguing with that man.

"Are you absolutely sure about this? We've never had mistakes like this." Zayn said.

"Very sure, sir, something must have gone wrong or those in charge of choosing the roses did not know how to choose, but there are two defective batches." Answered the man, very sure of his words.

"Twist! What brings you here? Niall greeted him. "Sorry to interrupt, but I just got back from a delivery, this is Stella Styles, sister of Mr. Tomlinson's omega. She and her lovely mom are here for the holidays."

"Ronan Twist, head of laboratory personnel, a pleasure, Miss Styles." They shook their hands and the men continued talking about the problem caused in laboratories.

A sheet fell from Zayn's desk and Stella picked it up, some equations and drawings of chemical elements were written on it, luckily Stella had studied pharmaceutical chemistry and could understand a little of what was written, and she could notice some errors in the annotations .

"Excuse me." She spoke barely to be heard, Zayn looked wide-eyed at Stella holding an important sheet. "I can see that there are some mistakes here, the branches don't correspond to the compounds it should contain and the equations are wrong, they aren't balanced."

Ronan checked the sheet with Zayn and they both nodded, looking puzzled at the beta.

"It's true. Stella, what did you study?" Zayn asked.

"Pharmaceutical chemistry engineering, but this is basic chemistry." The beta scoffed and Ronan laughed.

"You had to be a Styles, didn't you?" The omega mocked and advanced towards her. "Do you want to help us a little in the laboratories? I need you to help me teach these inept people who are doing everything wrong how to do they own jobs."

A smile spread across the beta's face and she nodded, following Zayn out of the office with Ronan.

"Mr. Twist, could you do me a favour and let my mom know I'll be with Mr. Malik?" Stella asked somewhat embarrassed.

"Of course, it won't be a bother."

"I'll go with him, I'm already missing Mom Styles." Niall said and started to walk outside accompanied by Ronan. They walked through the garden until they reached a small table where Jane was drinking some tea. That day the weather was a little calmer and it wasn't too cold. Both men approached the table and earned a surprised look from the omega.

"Niall, what are you doing here? I thought you were with Stella and..." The omega's eyes lingered to the beta's, distracting her mind from what she was saying.

"You must be Mrs. Styles," Ronan approached the omega with a smile on his face, took her hand and placed a soft kiss on it and separated, "your daughter, Miss Styles, asked me to tell you that she would be with Mr. Malik in the laboratories of the house." The omega was almost spellbound by the words of that beta, she couldn't believe that such neat and detailed men existed.

"Thank you very much, but I'd rather you call me Jane. I haven't been Mrs. Styles for a long time." She commented and the beta nodded with a smile.

"Well, it's a pleasure to meet you, Jane, my name is Ronan Twist and I'm under your orders." Niall watched the scene as he sat down and took a cookie. His eyes narrowed a little as he understood what was happening, "But I won't take more of your time, if you need me I'll be in the kitchens." He said before he began to walk to the door of the house again, Niall was looking carefully at Jane with his head resting on his hands and a huge smile on his face.

"What's wrong, Niall?" Jane asked in confusion.

"I saw what you did, Mom Styles. You were flirting with Twist." Jane snorted and laughed at his words.

"You do talk some nonsense sometimes, don't you, Niall? Why don't you tell me what you did with Stella today?"

"Oh no, you're not going to change the subject with me," he moved his chair a little closer to Jane's and looked both ways making sure there was no one to hear them, "between you and me, Twist is single and he's a Good man, he's always worked with Zayn on all that brainiac stuff they do in the basement, but he's a big-hearted beta, you wouldn't lose anything in trying something with him, and if he does anything to you." He raised his hands and clasped them together, shaping them like a gun, followed by making a sound simulating a gunshot. Jane shook her head and laughed.

"Then I hope he doesn't do anything wrong."

☺☻☺☻

The lab was one of the most hidden rooms in the house, because it was where all the tests and experiments with the alpha essence were done, and it was the second place where Zayn spent most of his time. The omega and the beta went up to the second floor and entered a room that could only be accessed with a password, in there were several lab coats and plastic glasses, as well as various medical equipment, it could easily be confused with the Nursing.

"Okay then, I'm going to need to blindfold you. It's not because I don't trust you, but because there are several things that would be better for your own goof if you didn't see them." Zayn said this time with a more serious tone, Stella nodded without being too sure of wanting to accompany him, but curiously she trusted him. With the little time she had known him, she had realised that he was really a good person.

The omega took a black blindfold from one of the drawers in the place and covered the eyes of the beta, took her hand and slowly guided her to another part of the room. It was a huge wall full of medicine and chemistry books, in a quick movement Zayn took one of the books and a small creak let him know that it was the correct one, the shelf began to move backwards, allowing to see a metal door in the room. that there was a little scanner where he put his thumb and pressed some buttons with another password. That was one of the rooms with the highest security, there were cameras everywhere and only a few knew about that entrance.

"Okay, we're going to walk about five steps and then there will be stairs." The omega warned and Stella nodded in response, and still holding her hand, they both began to walk.

It took them about five minutes to reach solid ground, Zayn opening a few more doors and finally removing the blindfold from the beta's eyes. Both were in the famous laboratory of Icarus Rose, where everything they did made sense, several betas and alphas walked from one side to another with liquid samples that Stella could not distinguish. The whole place smelled like alpha, but it was strange, it seemed more like a neutral scent, it was impossible to properly describe it, an omega approached Zayn in a white coat and helped him put it on, and then did the same with Stella.

"Welcome to my laboratory." He said with a smile. "This is where I spend most of my time, in fact I have spent almost my entire life here." He spoke as he walked to one of the rooms in the place, there were several tables with test tubes and rose petals of different colours. "Since I was a boy my father brought me here to teach me a little about the business, and as I grew older I began to be interested in chemistry and biology, all the sciences if I'm honest." Stella listened to him with attention while observing everything around him, trying to discover a little of what exactly they were doing in the place.

"And did you study something related to chemistry?" She asked curiously as she sat down at one of the tables.

"Yes, I'm a chemical engineer, among other things." The last thing made them laugh. "My father always wanted us to educate ourselves well so that no one could see our faces, and he sent us to the most prestigious schools he could find."

"So you didn't go to the same school?"

"No, we all studied different things that would help us with work, for example, Niall has always been good at talking and persuading people, my father saw that he had potential as a salesman and suggested that he study sales or commerce, and now he has a marketing degree." Zayn took some things from a shelf and put them on the table, then sat down in front of Stella.

"And what about Louis?" She asked with curiosity, the omega smiled and began to take out some test tubes.

"He's good with numbers, he takes care of everything that has to do with mafia money. He has a degree in accounting and finances." A bit of confusion appeared on the beta's face and Zayn laughed. "What? I know he doesn't seem to be very smart, but he's the best with numbers. But let's stop talking about my brothers and focus on this." With that said,and  with the help of a dropper, he placed some of the liquid that had supposedly gone wrong during the process and observed it closely. "Do you have any idea what this is?"

"No... but it smells like... alpha?" A satisfied smile appeared on the omega's face.

"I present to you one of the greatest inventions of my father, and mine, the alpha essence." He said proudly. Stella watched that liquid filling with questions. "Of course, this one came out defective, and I actually have no idea why..." He took some of the notes that Ronan had made along with his team and looked at them." Here it says that the effect doesn't last as long as it normally does, and that instead of generating an alpha-like scent, it neutralises the scent that is already possessed... mhm..."

Zayn handed the pages to Stella who watched them rigorously until an idea came to her mind, she stood up and began to search among the things that were in the cabinets under the omega's watchful and curious gaze; she took several bottles and put them on the table, lit one of the lighters that were there and with the dropper he took a part of the essence and put it in a beaker, Zayn looked at her trying to discover what she was doing.

The beta mixed many of the things she had taken, and heated them with the help of the lighter, once the mix was ready, she walked to the table where she had seen several flower petals, something inside her was telling her that the roses were the most important part of all of that, so she walked back with a handful of dried petals and crushed them a bit until they were dust. The omega stood up and walked over to get a closer look at what the beta was doing.

"Have you ever thought about going beyond just making alpha essence?" She asked with some emotion in her eyes, the omega ran to one of the cabinets in the place and took out a black leather notebook.

"A while ago I thought about changing the formula a bit to see what would happen, but I could never do it." He showed her his notes and experiments, Stella smiled and looked at him again.

"What happens is that they focus on making the scent as long-lasting and alpha-like as possible, and we all know that alphas have an intoxicating scent and sometimes it's too strong, but..." she poured some of the powder into the liquid and mixed it, "if they focus on making it more effective rather than making it stronger." She put the glass back on the lighter and it began to heat up creating a cloud of steam that gave off an alpha aroma.

"How did you do it?" He asked, confused.

"When I entered the laboratory I saw that many were working with the fresh petals of the roses, but once these are dry, it has a different effect, and although I cannot verify at this moment that the effect is going to be more effective than the that you already have patented, I am almost eighty percent sure that it will work."

They both looked at each other with emotion, but after the aroma that came from that mixture changed, they both turned their heads towards the glass, which was bubbling due to the heat, and frowned.

"You smell that too, right?" Stella questioned and Zayn nodded. A sweeter aroma had begun to come out, the omega ran to close the door of the room and returned to the table. Using some twisters, they removed the glass from the heat and let it cool a bit until it could be touched.

"Stella, I think you've just made a great discovery." Zayn commented as he picked up his glass and brought it to his nose so he could smell the aroma better. His eyes widened in surprise and he looked at Stella with a smile.

"What is this?" The omega handed her the glass and she breathed in that sweet aroma that was so recognizable. "It smells like... omega." Zayn nodded excitedly.

"Stella Styles, you just created an omega essence, and you didn't even know how alpha essence is made... Have you ever considered working with this?" The beta laughed and shook her head.

"What are you talking about? Of course I've never considered doing...whatever it is that you do here." The omega walked around the table and stood in front of Stella.

"Think about it, with your great intelligence we could do amazing things, you've just created a product with which you'd earn millions... plus you'd spend a lot more time with Harry and have the opportunity to do what you're passionate about." The beta looked at him with some disapproval. Without a doubt, her offer sounded tempting, as a scientist she could say she was living anyone's dream, but as a beta and a daughter she didn't know if following in her brother's footsteps was the most appropriate thing to do. "You don't have to decide right now. You can think about it for a while, you know that we are not bad people and we try to do things in the best way... I am not going to tell you that we are not mobsters, traffickers or murderers, because I would be lying to you, but I think that we are grater than that, and with your help we could achieve even grater things."

"I'll think about it, but thanks for the offer." Zayn nodded happily and returned his gaze to the liquid.

"Then..." He inserted the tip of his finger into the small glass and, intending to taste it, brought it to his mouth, but with a nimble movement Stella hit his hand and stopped him. "Ouch." He complained to himself.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" She questioned with annoyance. "You're expecting a baby, Zayn, you can't be the guinea pig of any experiment." She took the glass in her hands and dipped the tip of her index finger, to later take it to her mouth and taste the liquid that they had just created.

Zayn looked closely at the beta, waiting for some reaction and praying that nothing bad happened to her, because if something happened to her he would never be able to forgive himself. But a change in the scent of the room took them by surprise, a huge smile appeared on their faces.

"You smell like an omega." Zayn said softly, and small tears began to fall down his cheeks, Stella looked at him somewhat scared by his reaction and left the glass on the table to take hishands.

"Zayn, are you okay?" She asked him, the omega trying to control his sudden sobs.

"Yes, I think... It's the hormones." They both laughed. "I... I don't know what's wrong with me, lately I've been crying over everything, but I'm fine, don't worry." He sighed and took the mixture, poured it into a jar and put it closed well, then he took a marker and wrote on a small label 'Omega Essence, Stella Styles Prototype', then he attached the label to it and put the bottle in a safe. "We should go back," he looked at the time on his watch, "they must be looking for us." He approached Stella again and made sure no one was listening. "We should keep all this between us, I don't want someone else to get into our business, and something like... you know, I don't want to put them in danger."

"Okay then, we have to come back to continue experimenting with this, don't you think?" She said with a playful smile and Zayn hugged her.

"I think the idea is perfect." Having said that, they both returned to the house through another door.