BONUS CHAPTER FROM FALSE CATCH #2
"No." Jackson's eyes are locked on mine, intense and uncompromising. "We're not going back. We can't go back."
"We don't have a choice." My voice comes out sharp and cruel. "If Coach is already asking questions, how long before someone higher up starts looking into our situation? How long before they decide a female coxswain is too big of a risk regardless of my designation?"
"Then we're careful," Bo says. "We figure out how to make this work."
“How?” I ask. “Eight Alphas. One Omega. Under the same roof. No one’s buying the just-friends act.”
The question hangs in the air, unanswered and unanswerable.
Tyler closes his book with a snap. "We don't."
Everyone turns to look at him.
"We don't make it look normal," he continues, his voice calm and analytical. "We make it look like something else."
"Such as?" Gray asks.
Tyler's eyes find mine. "Protective teammates looking out for their coxswain. Nothing more complicated than that."
"That's what we've been doing," Zane points out.
"No," Tyler shakes his head. "We've been acting like Alphas protecting their Omega.
There's a difference. The possessiveness, the territorial behavior, the way you all tense up when other guys talk to her.
.." He shrugs. "It reads as romantic attachment. We need it to read as team loyalty. There’s already someone following her.
We just play that up as the excuse for our behavior. "
Smart. Tyler's always been the strategist among us, the one who sees patterns and solutions where the rest of us see problems.
"So what are you suggesting?" I ask.
"We dial it back. Way back. We treat her like any other teammate in public. No more carrying her stuff, no more hovering, no more death glares at guys who look at her sideways. And maybe..." He hesitates. "Maybe Reese should consider moving back to campus housing."
Each suggestion makes my chest tighten. Leave the team house, where I can hear them breathing through the walls and know I'm not alone. Pretend I don't know what it feels like to be surrounded by their scents, their warmth, their absolute certainty that they'll keep me safe.
Pretend living here hasn't been the first time in my life I've felt like I belonged somewhere.
"That's not happening," Gray says flatly.
"It has to happen," I say, hating myself for agreeing. "Tyler's right. We're too obvious."
"Reese—"
"No." I cut Bo off before he can argue. "This is exactly what I was afraid of. We let biology make our decisions, and now we're all compromised."
"Biology?" Jackson's voice is dangerously quiet. "That's what you think this is?"
I meet his stare, even though it feels like looking directly at the sun. "What else would it be?"
Something flickers across his face, hurt or anger or both. "Right. Biology."
The temperature in the kitchen seems to drop ten degrees. I can feel the others watching us, waiting to see how this plays out.
"We need to get to practice," I say finally. "We can figure the rest of this out later."
"There's nothing to figure out." Gray's voice is clipped, controlled. "You want to go back to playing teammates? Fine. But don't expect us to pretend we don't know better."
He stalks out of the kitchen, leaving his half-cooked eggs on the stove. A moment later, the front door slams hard enough to rattle the windows.
The silence that follows is deafening.
"Well," Beckett says finally. "That went well."
I look around the table at the wreckage of whatever understanding we'd built over the past few days. At Jackson's shuttered expression and Bo's hurt confusion. At Eli's worried eyes and Cameron's careful distance.
At the space where Gray was standing, his anger and hurt lingering after him like a ghost.
"Practice is in twenty minutes," I say, my voice steady despite the chaos in my chest. "We can’t be late."
I walk out before anyone can respond, before I can see the disappointment in their faces or smell the confusion in their scents. Before I can change my mind and take back every word I just said.
The suppressants are working perfectly. My body feels normal, controlled, mine again.
So why does everything else feel like it's falling apart?
I make it to my room upstairs before the tears start, biting my lip hard enough to keep the sob threatening to break from leaving my throat. Through the thin walls, I can hear the others moving around downstairs, getting ready for practice. Getting ready to pretend we're just teammates again.
Getting ready to lie to everyone, including ourselves.
The suppressants might be working, but Tyler was wrong about one thing.
We can't go back to normal, because normal never included the way Gray looks at me like I'm something precious.
Never included the way Bo's presence makes me feel safe enough to sleep.
Never included the way Jackson suddenly looks like he wants to protect me.
Normal never included any of this.
And now I have to figure out how to pretend it does.