Knight Life In Vegas (Sin City Omegas #3)

Chapter 4

D oing the walk of shame to pick up my children wasn’t something I’d been planning on. I’d originally intended to only stay snuggled up for a few minutes and then leave, but once all the stress had flooded out of me, I had fallen straight to sleep in Francisco’s arms. In the morning I’d woken with a jolt and slipped away as quietly as I could so I wouldn’t wake him.

I’d done what I’d set out to do: reclaim a part of myself I had let go quiet during my marriage. Except now that I had let some of my omega nature out, I didn’t really want to stuff it back inside the box.

I took a deep breath and parked in Ava’s driveway. After double-checking my makeup and pinning my hair, I ventured inside. Luckily the dress I had worn last night was perfectly suitable for an event today.

My attendance probably looked strange from the outside.

For a few short months I had thought that Lucy—Ava’s daughter and today’s birthday girl—was going to be adopted into my family before everything had come to light. It had taken me so long to have our boys, so many interventions, and Andrew had known how much I loved being a mother. Taunting me with a third child almost broke me, over and above the betrayal of his affair. That was probably the cruelest lie my husband had told.

Both of my sons perked up when they saw me, running full speed to crash against me. I sank down to my knees and hugged them both.

“Did you two have fun sleeping over at Auntie’s house?”

“We swam for hours!” Ollie beamed.

“And watched movies and ate ice cream.” Sammy grinned, pressing his messy face into my stomach. I quietly hoped the ice cream wasn’t so recent that it was smeared all over my dress now.

“They were both great,” Bryce, one of Ava’s alphas, assured me.

Ava came over with her baby in her arms. Lucy’s birthday was an odd day for me since she was born the day my whole life had been ripped apart. She was a sweet, happy baby, though, and I loved the opportunity to still be in her life even if she had never ended up being one of my children.

“I’m so glad you’re here! Did you have fun last night?”

“Probably more than I should have.”

Ava’s eyes gleamed. “Why don’t you come get some coffee with me and the pack can wrangle the boys for a few more minutes.”

“Coffee sounds amazing.” I kissed each of my boys’ cheeks. “I’ll be right back. I’m just going to get a drink with Auntie. Go play with your uncles for a bit.”

Neither of my children needed to be asked twice, taking off at a full sprint and throwing themselves at Micah and Luke, who seemed to take as much joy in the boys’ exuberance as the boys did getting the fatherly affection they had been missing out on with Andrew. Ava handed Lucy over to another of her alphas, Jesse, and pulled me into the kitchen.

“Spill.”

“It’s not that exciting,” I promised.

Ava poured me a fresh cup of coffee. “You have to at least explain what it means that you had more fun than you should’ve had.”

“I may have gone home with an alpha.”

Ava squeaked, absolutely delighted, and snared me into a hug. “Oh my god! That’s such a huge step. How do you feel?”

How did I feel? I stirred some sugar and cream into the coffee, staring at the swirling pattern. I craved Francisco down to my bones and I already wanted to go right back to him, which was not remotely an option. “I’m not really sure. He, and the whole experience, was so radically different from what I’m used to.”

“In a good way?” Ava tilted her head, examining me.

“Definitely.”

Ava gave another excited squeak. “Are you going to see him again?”

“That’s basically impossible.”

I kept the knowledge of him being a scent match to myself. Ava’s pack had deep connections in the city and I was pretty sure if she had his name, one of her extended relatives would dig him up somewhere.

“Why impossible?” Ava asked.

“I didn’t get any of his contact information before I left. I might’ve been ready for this step, barely , but I don’t think I’m ready to actively date.”

“I suppose that’s fair. I’m really proud of you either way. I know it’s not easy.”

“Thanks.” I sipped the coffee, letting the sweet caffeine flood my system. “It was really nice to just be out in the world. I was buttoned up so tightly in New York that alphas never gave me a second glance.”

“And now you got way more than a glance.” Ava grinned. “We had a great time with the boys. We’ll watch them anytime you want to have a Charlotte night, or a day, or a weekend. The point is, you don’t have to worry about your kids if you do run into someone you want to pursue. I know eventually the kids would have to meet whoever you were into, but it can be super stressful in the early days?—”

I laid my hand over hers, cutting off her nervous rambling. She’d gotten a lot better over the last year, but I was pretty sure every so often the knowledge of why we knew each other snuck up on her and she fell back into trying to hastily explain everything running through her head. “That’s very sweet. I’m not going to take advantage of it often, but the breathing space was appreciated.”

A ruckus sounded from the main room and Ava peered past me. “Sounds like everyone’s arriving. Feel free to finish up your coffee. I’m going to say hi.”

Ava’s pack had a lot of family and they had all welcomed her in. I had never been particularly close to my family besides my parents, but they had passed before Ollie was born. I sucked in a slow deep breath. I still hated that he would never get to meet them. Sammy didn’t remember them, but at least I had pictures.

My world in New York had gotten so small. It was much bigger and louder in Las Vegas, but I was still hovering on the periphery. My tenuous connection to Ava aside, none of the people at the party today, besides my children, were mine. They weren’t here to see me. If I disappeared tomorrow, they would probably never notice.

I wanted someone to notice.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I sipped my way through the rest of my coffee, trying to stop the flood of tears. By the time I reached the bottom of the cup, I felt steadier. I couldn’t hide in the kitchen for the whole birthday party, however tempting that was.

I slipped out into the main room that was now full of Ava’s extended pack family. I always got the sense that a good portion of them wondered why I was here, but at least it wasn’t the sneers and gossip I’d experienced back in New York when news of Andrew’s arrest had blown through the company. I could handle a few confused looks a lot easier.

I kept to the edges of the group, settling myself on one of the many couches. Eventually Sammy got overwhelmed by this sheer amount of people and came to sit with me, nestling into my side while he sucked down a juice box.

“Lucy gets so many presents,” he commented.

“She’s the first baby of her generation for most of the people here. Everyone always gets excited about that.”

Sammy looked up at me with wide hazel eyes that matched mine. “Did people get excited for me?”

“Of course they did.” He let me draw him onto my lap. “You’ve seen the pictures of your first birthday. We almost lost you in the mountain of gifts.”

That was one thing Andrew’s parents had been good for. They were free with their wallets for my children, but they had the personalities of pit vipers. I’d always spent as little time around them as possible. With their son in prison, and us officially divorced, they’d cut contact so I would never have to see them again.

It was cruel that they got to live while my own parents had died in a car accident. My parents were the grandparents a child would dream of: hand-knitted baby blankets, sleepovers, over-the-top parties, and endless affection. I tried to make up for their loss myself, and while the boys enjoyed it, it made my own pain that much sharper. I was still half convinced that my grief at the time had unleashed a new level of awfulness in Andrew. It was one thing to pretend to be faithful to the perfect wife, but a grieving one? His appearance of loyalty didn’t stretch that far.

I kissed the top of Sammy’s head. Ollie was parked next to Ava and Lucy, helping open presents since Lucy, at one year old, didn’t quite have the motor skills required to do it herself.

“Can we have a family nap when we get home?” Sammy asked.

“Sure, baby. We definitely can.”

Family naps were a tradition we had started when Andrew had begun to travel more and I would bring the boys into my bed to push back the crushing loneliness. We would have snacks, sometimes watch a movie and get some good snuggles in. Now they loved it as much as I did, and it was a lovely way for us to all recalibrate and connect.

“Good. I’m gonna get another juice box,” he said, sliding off my lap.

“Only one more. Water after that.”

Sammy wrinkled his nose. That boy would drink his weight in juice in a day if I let him.

The doorbell rang and Bryce went to answer it, greeting his father. He was as tall as his son, which meant he towered over me, and had golden brown hair with strands of silver mixed throughout and blue eyes so bright I could see them from here. He looked so little like his son. Maybe Bryce got all of his features from his mother?

Someone brought over a glass of wine, passing it to the elder Mr. Carlton. Sammy barreled straight into him on his way back from the kitchen, spilling the wine all over both of them. It didn’t matter how often I told him not to run in the house; he never listened for long. I was on my feet and instantly tucking Sammy behind me with an admonishing look.

“I’m so sorry,” I apologized on Sammy’s behalf. I’d let the energy diffuse a bit before getting him to do it himself. Andrew had always gotten snappy when the kids made a mistake and I didn’t want to take the risk that anyone else would talk to him like that.

“Charlotte, this is my dad, Beau. Dad, this is Charlotte, a friend of the family.”

That was one way to put it.

Beau’s gorgeous eyes pinned me in place and his wine glass shattered in his hand.

What the hell was up with that?