Chapter 23 #3
Large arms wrap around me more fully, pulling me in so I sit in his lap, resting my head on his shoulder.
I can’t stop my heart from swelling, or the way I realize I could live thirty more years as long as I have this shoulder to rest on.
My mind is overstimulated and overwhelmed, but my body registers that my alpha is here for me.
I mean, he built a freaking tiny Yule feast for me.
"Tell me a good memory," I say quietly. "Something real.”
He's still for a moment, and I feel something thrum through the bond—surprise, maybe. Pleasure. Like the inner animal in him loves to hear that his omega wants to see more of him, and in that, my heart aches for him.
"Before Dominion," he begins slowly, "I was in my early twenties.
Right after I fled the Steelborn. It was that brief sliver of time where no one mattered, which fucked with me while also making me feel free.
I just roamed on my bike, driving through the country.
I stopped for the night by a creek. It was warm enough that I didn't need a fire. I just laid out under the stars with nothing but the sound of water and insects. And then a dog came up to me. He was missing part of an ear. A German shepherd, I think. It was my venison jerky that he wanted, so I fed him, and he drank from the creek, and then he just... laid down beside me. It didn’t take long for me to find a sidecar for him, so Boone could ride with me.
"I'll never forget that feeling. Lying there in the dark, his back to the dirt, the dog breathing slowly beside me.
No hunger for power. No fear. No one trying to kill me or use me.
Just silence and an animal who didn't want anything from me except heat and space. I had never experienced anything in my life like it before then.”
His hand comes up to stroke my hair. "I go back to that memory sometimes. Before I have to do ugly things. It reminds me that peace exists somewhere, even if I can never have it for long."
Those words weigh so damn heavily between our bond, and all I want to do is make him all the food he loves, tell him he’s handsome, that I—
“Wait, you really drove around with a dog in a sidecar?” I ask with a smile, suddenly envisioning such a bizarre thing.
His laugh radiates through his chest into me.
“Yeah." His voice thickens slightly. “Boone loved it. Eventually got him goggles. He died of old age a few years ago. It was with him that I found the Witch Doctor. He got shot about five or six years ago, and he wasn’t healing well. I drove his ass all the way to the Black Mirage. She healed him just fine, but she wanted to make another deal with me, and that’s how I ended up with the black rose tattoos... And how I couldn’t stop imagining what a scent match would be like, realizing she, too, would have a bond with me that had no other purpose other than to exist with me. ”
“Judge,” I say, like I’m almost mad at him for feeling like he just executed the shit out of any hesitation I ever once had. “I’m so sorry you carry that weight. Maybe even sorry I treated you like an ass, then?”
We both start laughing, because I know damn well why I received him the way I did. And yet it doesn’t erase some of the guilt for not knowing what I meant to this man. “If you had just led with that,” I comment, although there’s no judgment in my tone.
“If I had done that, then you’d know it was a fucking imposter.”
We both laugh a little before settling into silence for a while, the fire crackling, the lights swaying gently in the winter breeze. His purr continues, a constant rhythm that slowly pulls me back together.
“If you must know,” he says, and I’m honestly a little shocked he’s continuing to be so open.
“I don't have many that are just happy. Except for Boone. Maybe when I learned that Rust was my half-brother and we both like the same things.” My eyes widen, because all I did was throw dagger eyes at that man.
“Then after that, it was when you looked at me like I was your alpha. "
The words hit me deep in a place that’s soft and unguarded. I pull my head back and look at him, letting my body absorb through the bond what else he’s not saying. The longing. The hope. The fierce, possessive affection, maybe even love, he's been carrying for longer than I realized.
"Really?" I whisper.
"Then all I could do was worry about your ass,” he comments, his expression completely relaxed.
"I'm sorry I worried you.”
He quirks a brow. “Not going to apologize for running?"
I smile despite myself. "Nope. I think I needed that.”
He playfully rolls his eyes. “Could have arranged for you to do it safely."
I lay my head back against his massive shoulder. “Well, there’s no thrill in that.”
It may take me years to fully appreciate who Judge really is. That I may never fully know this man. That he's capable of things I can't predict, decisions I might not agree with. But his purr is a lullaby no one else could ever replicate. “Thank you for this evening,” I say.
“You deserve it, sweetheart.”
I can’t help but wonder why he went all-in for this, unless it’s just an extension of an apology.
Either way, the tension eases until my breathing slows, until the fire burns low and the stars wheel overhead in their ancient patterns.
His hand keeps stroking my hair, rhythmically and soothingly, and eventually, my eyes grow heavy.
The last thing I feel before sleep claims me is his arms around me, solid and warm and safe.
Judge’s omega.