Knight Life In Vegas (Sin City Omegas #3)

Chapter 5

N o.

No, no, no.

What the fuck kind of joke was the universe playing?

Charlotte’s sweet lemon meringue pie scent stabbed me right through the heart. Primal knowledge of who and what fate intended her to be to me rocked me to the core, almost as strongly as the fear that followed it.

I was not going to go through this again. I fucking refused.

Hadn’t I suffered enough for one lifetime?

An alpha scent clung to her, too: orange liqueur and clove. There wasn’t a bond bite to be seen on her, and no indication that the alpha who had left that scent on her was here. Nothing in the air matched it besides her dress.

My wine glass shattered in my fingers, sending everyone around me leaping back as pain sliced through my hand.

“Shit.” My son held up his hands. “No one move. I’ll get a broom.”

“Oh my god! Are you okay?” Charlotte reached for me, but I drew my hand sharply away.

Charlotte gave me a dubious look, picking up the child who had run into me and spilled wine all over my freshly pressed suit. The wine was all over him as well, no doubt soaking into her dress as she held him. The boy buried his face against her, unwilling to meet my gaze.

I stood frozen, unable to move or speak until Bryce’s return. I let him sweep around my feet before taking a hasty step back and heading to the kitchen to wash my hands.

My breath was shaking as I turned on the tap, my heart pounding a mile a minute.

Multiple scent matches weren’t common. For alphas, anyway. Omegas tended to match to an entire pack, but as a general rule, alphas only matched to one omega in their lifetime, assuming they were lucky enough to find them to begin with. I had already found and lost my omega, and it had destroyed me. I couldn’t, wouldn’t take that risk again.

Jesse, one of my son’s pack who worked as a paramedic, followed me into the kitchen and helped me pluck a shard of glass from my skin before bandaging me up.

“Are you doing all right?” Jesse asked.

“Jet lag,” I said gruffly. A lie. I’d have preferred any excuse besides fate thinking it was funny to offer me a second chance at destruction. The only blessing was that Charlotte wouldn’t know I was her scent match with blockers hiding that from her. I couldn’t stand to look her in the eye right now with that knowledge hanging between us.

“The kids get rambunctious, sorry.”

“The children are fine.” I hissed when Jesse checked the binding wasn’t too tight. “Bryce spilled something all over me ten times a week when he was that small. Too much energy and not enough coordination.”

Jesse laughed. “You’re not wrong about that. Do you have any fresh clothing with you, or should we see what we can find upstairs?”

“My clothes are at the hotel.” They had offered to let me stay at the pack house, but I hadn’t earned my place there yet. I’d behaved like an absolute ass when my son had bonded into this pack, letting my grief and fear run roughshod over me. I had apologized, and they had accepted, but keeping this small bit of distance seemed far safer for everyone.

“Did you want to borrow something, or would you rather leave?”

I wouldn’t be able to behave normally with that woman here, and even though I didn’t want to leave, I wasn’t certain what other option I had.

“I should leave. I’m not feeling very well.”

Jesse eyed me speculatively. “You came all this way and you’re leaving after a few minutes?”

“Being unwell puts me in a terrible mood. I don’t want to risk taking that out on anyone. Perhaps the wine is a sign I shouldn’t have come at all.”

“I feel like you’re not being entirely honest, but I’m not going to push you. Bryce probably won’t take kindly to you leaving this quickly, though.”

“I’ll give him my apologies.”

Jesse very obviously wanted to say something to me, but instead he sighed and nodded.

The small boy who had run into me did the exact same as I stepped out of the kitchen. He looked up at me with enormous saucer eyes filled with tears, his lip wobbling. God help me, I almost drowned under a tsunami of memories of my own son at that age, looking at me just the same. Shit. I shouldn’t have come here. I wasn’t ready. A lifetime of pain hovered between my son and me, and I had no idea how to go about unraveling it to make up for what I had put him through.

“Are you leaving?” the boy asked.

“I have to go get new clothes,” I stated calmly, though I felt the opposite.

“I’m sorry.” A tear slipped over his cheek and I found myself sinking to bring myself to his eye level.

“Mistakes happen.”

“Are you mad at me? I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to.”

“Now, now, it’s all right. Clothing can be cleaned. Did you get hurt by the glass?”

He shook his head.

“That’s the important part. What’s your name?”

“Sammy,” he said with a hiccup.

His mother watched from a safe distance, ready to step in, but otherwise letting her son handle the interaction. I couldn’t let my eyes linger on her for more than a second. Too many questions surged up, along with longing I remembered like a whispering echo but thought I would never experience again. She wasn’t for me. Couldn’t be for me.

“It’s nice to meet you, Sammy. I’m Beau. Try to be more careful. Not everyone you run into will be forgiving.”

Sammy nodded. “Please don’t leave. I’m sorry. Maybe my mom can wash your clothes and you can stay.”

I ruthlessly shoved down the mental image of disrobing for that golden-haired goddess. “It’s better for everyone if I leave.”

I got back to my feet with a pop of my knees and patted Sammy’s head before maneuvering through the crowd as far away from Charlotte as I could manage in order to reach my son.

“You’re going?” Bryce asked the moment I came upon him.

“Yes.”

Hurt flickered in his brown eyes—the exact same shade as his mother’s. He looked so similar to her I was punched breathless every time I saw him. I couldn’t help it, but Bryce didn’t deserve that reaction. I used to love how much he resembled Emily. The two people I cherished most in the world were practically twins separated by almost twenty years. After she had died, looking at him was a particular sort of agony I didn’t know how to cope with.

“If I’m feeling up to it, I’ll come back later, or tomorrow. I think I must’ve eaten something contaminated on the plane.”

It was a lie, of course, though I was definitely feeling queasy now.

“Well, thanks for at least showing up.”

“Thank you for inviting me.”

Coward that I was, I offered him a handshake instead of a hug, turning on my heel to leave a moment later.

I managed to make it around the corner in my vehicle before my eyes blurred too much to safely drive. I pulled over, my chest tight and my throat burning. Emily would hate the man I’d become without her. I’d spent years after losing her wishing I’d been the one taken instead. I didn’t know how to exist in a world that didn’t have her next to me.

We’d been best friends growing up across the street from each other, had dated all through high school, totally unprepared for her to present as an omega and go into heat when she did. She’d ended up pregnant with Bryce and we’d been bonded to each other before our nineteenth birthdays.

But we’d been happy. Blissfully so, for almost a decade afterward.

Until she got sick.

I shoved it all down. The only way I could get through things was to not think about it. I knew it wasn’t healthy, but that was what I did.

I took myself through a breathing exercise until I could finally see again.

“Get your shit together,” I snapped at myself.

I didn’t know how to do this. The only place I had a handle on things was the business world, and my son had made it exceedingly clear I couldn’t treat my relationship with him the same way. It would’ve been so much easier if I could. Business was cutthroat with clear rules. Parenting? That was a waiting game to see exactly how and how badly you’d fucked up your kids. At least I hadn’t ruined Bryce to the point that he couldn’t be happy with a pack.

Things might have been different for me if I’d had one. Our pain would’ve been shared, but I wouldn’t have wished that on anyone either.

A knock on the window scared the shit out of me and I turned to see Sammy’s face pressed to the glass, his mother and I assumed a younger brother standing on the sidewalk.

“Are you okay?” Sammy asked through the glass.

I rolled down the window. Dread snaked through me as Charlotte’s lemon meringue scent floated into the car toward me. “What are you all doing here?”

“Mommy’s taking us on a walk to tire us out,” Sammy replied.

Charlotte bent down, looking at me through the open window. “You don’t look very well.”

“I’m not,” I croaked out.

“I don’t think you should be driving,” she said after a moment. “Get out. I’ll help you into the passenger side and drive you back to the pack house. I’m sure someone can get you safely back to wherever you need to go.”

“I’m fine, really.”

“You literally just said you’re not. Out.” She hauled out the same voice for me I’d expect her to use on her children. “I’m not letting you be a danger to yourself or anyone else on the road.”

She had a point. I grumbled and climbed out of the vehicle, reluctantly moving over to the passenger side as quickly as I could manage so she wouldn’t try to physically assist. Charlotte tucked each of her boys into the back seat before climbing into the driver’s side.

“But, Mommy, we don’t have boosters!” said the younger of her boys.

“We’re just going up the street, Ollie. It’s not far.”

“But the rules!”

“We’re breaking them just this once to help Mr. Carlton.”

I held my breath while she was so close. This near, I could take in the shades of gold in her hair and the crinkle around her hazel eyes. Her mouth was a perfect pink pout. I dragged my gaze away and faced forward for the agonizing thirty-second drive back to my son’s home.

“Sammy, run in and find Bryce, or any of Auntie’s pack for me. Tell them to come outside, please.”

Sammy nodded solemnly, apparently taking his duty very seriously. He raced off and returned a moment later with Micah and Luke.

I couldn’t decide if I was more embarrassed for them to see me like this than I would be for Bryce to.

“You doing okay, Mr. C?” Micah asked.

“I think it would be safer for someone to drive him to the hotel,” Charlotte said.

Shame burned hot in my chest.

“I’ll be fine,” I protested.

“Zip it.” Charlotte leveled a firm gaze on me. “Let someone help you.”

“Let me check with Bryce to see if he’d like to drive you himself,” said Luke, briefly disappearing inside and returning with my son.

“Thanks, Charlotte,” Bryce said to her. “I’ll drive him to the hotel. Luke is going to follow and bring me back. Go ahead and enjoy the party.”

I held my breath as Bryce traded spots with her, and Charlotte collected Ollie from the back seat.

“You’re actually sick?” Bryce asked as we pulled out of the drive. “Not running away?”

“Would I be letting you drive me right now if I was fine?” I evaded.

“Fair. Do you need a doctor?”

“Just rest.”

Bryce nodded. The drive was uncomfortably quiet, neither of us willing to break the silence once it settled in. He parked in the hotel lot and we stood awkwardly facing each other. Bryce was braver than me this time, offering a hug that I accepted. He deserved a better father than me, and I was going to try, but I wasn’t strong enough to be that person. At least, not yet.