Chapter 19
19
BENJAMIN
Instead of an office, my Manager of Finance title gave me a large cubicle at the end of the aisle facing the CFO's glass-framed wooden door. The door remained closed more often than not. Today, Brian hadn't bothered to show up at all. He was working from home, Mr. Barclay said, before leaving for yet another business conference this evening.
My assistant Sid stopped by my desk around ten with a printout. He was a nervous omega who liked to wring his hands, which often led to crumpled paperwork. "Here's your itinerary for tomorrow."
I blinked up at him. "What?"
"Mr. Barclay wants you to attend the conference with Brian, and it starts tomorrow. You're flying out at eight tonight."
"The hell I am." The words died in my throat as a wave of nausea hit me. This was my third round with a mystery illness this week. I did not have time for an annoying stomach bug while dealing with a ridiculous last-minute trip.
I brushed past Sid and sprinted toward the bathroom. I only got as far as the end of my aisle before I leaned over and puked on the carpet in front of Brian's office door.
"Oh, shit," Sid said. "Are you all right?"
I wanted to wipe my mouth on my sleeve, but the thought made me gag again. Nope. Needed tissues or paper towels.
"Does it look like I'm all right?" I asked as I stalked back to my desk and my box of tissues. Connor's wet wipes would have been wonderful right now.
Connor. All I really wanted was to go home and be with Connor. He would take care of my upset tummy and tell me everything would be okay.
"I'll get the janitor up here." Sid dashed away, taking my itinerary with him.
Once I'd cleaned up, I dashed a terse email to Mr. Danbury.
"I am not going to Chicago on four hours' notice. If you want to keep an eye on Brian so badly, go yourself."
I considered deleting the last sentence, but another wave of nausea bent me over my trash can, stealing my one last fuck about my job. I couldn't do this anymore. I loved working with numbers, but the office politics were too much for me. I needed to find a small business, or a handful of entrepreneurs who needed an accountant.
As soon as I could sit up again, I sent the email. I had written two lines of my resignation letter by the time Sid returned with the janitor.
When I saw her harried expression, guilt washed over me. "I’m so sorry for the mess. Well, two messes." I toed my trash can into the aisle. She tossed it into the open garbage bag on her cart, plastic bin and all.
"I'm so sorry," I said again. "Can I help you clean it up?"
She was a lanky brown-skinned woman with broad shoulders and a bit of a hunch. The way her corded arms hung at her sides reminded me of werewolves, and I wondered if she was a shifter.
Not that Connor looked anything like that … that was probably a wolf shifter stereotype. I felt like a complete asshole for even thinking it, which made me want to help her even more.
She leaned in and sniffed my hair. Then, she shook her head. "Not in your condition. Have you been drinking ginger water, or keeping some saltines in your desk drawer?"
I blinked up at her. "If I'm that sick, maybe I should have stayed home."
"You're not sick, pup. You're pregnant."
Pup? So maybe she was a wolf shifter … It wasn't a stereotype if it was true.
"Pregnant?" My brain finally caught up to the second word of interest.
"Yup." She pointed to her collar. "You're unmarked, though. If your mate's a good one, he'll mark you to keep the sickness and cravings at bay."
That was all the information I needed to type out the rest of my resignation email. "I'm pregnant. I quit."
I left all my office belongings except my little rubber plant and framed family photo. I wouldn't miss the strange conglomeration of team-building propaganda and motivational sayings I'd accumulated over the years.
In the parking lot, I started to second guess my decision. "Okay, so, not every pregnant omega quits their job," I muttered.
I could hear it now. Pops would tell me how disappointed he was that I couldn't have stuck it out for my pregnancy so my paternity leave would have been paid. On the other hand, my dad would gush and tell me that's exactly what he had done when he'd found out he was pregnant with my oldest brother. And then Pops would say, "See? You knew better than to do what your dad did."
The mental turmoil caused yet another bout of nausea. I got sick in the bushes beside my car. Finally, I made it behind the wheel, once more cleaned up with tissues from the box in my passenger seat.
I should have gone home, but I needed to see Connor right away. I had to know I'd made the right decision.
He and Pops were in a meeting on the top floor. I felt guilty for avoiding my brothers, but my stomach was starting to feel queasy again. I grabbed a lemon-lime soda from the vending machine outside the conference room while I waited. The cool beverage seemed to calm everything down.
Fifteen minutes later, the door opened and my beautiful alpha walked out. Sunlight lit him up from behind, burning the image of a halo and wings into my vision for a split second before he stepped forward and became Connor again.
Pops followed him out and clapped him on the back. "Nice work, Connor."
"Thank you, James."
It was weird to hear Connor call Pops anything but Pops, but it was good to see them on equal footing. Pops liked Connor, that much was easy to see, but it was more than that. He seemed genuinely pleased by whatever Connor had presented in their meeting, beyond familial indulgence because Connor was my boyfriend.
I'd always worried Pops would treat me like his omega son if we worked together. What I appreciated at home, I would hate in the office. With his parenting style, I assumed Pops was a micromanaging boss, but Connor gushed about how hands-off he'd been. It didn't make sense until I saw how different Pops, James, was here at work.
Pops was the first to see me, or smell me. "Benjamin? What are you doing here?"
"I need to talk to Connor."
"Hey, Ben." Connor's smile was pure sunlight as he stepped toward me.
I placed my soda can on the table beside me and hopped from my seat. I rushed him, eager to wrap my arms around his chest and squeeze him as tightly as I could.
He smoothed my hair and cupped the back of my head. "Let's get you cleaned up in the bathroom over here, and we'll talk, okay?"
"Is it really that bad?" I asked.
"You smell like you've thrown up at least three times today. Is your tummy still upset?"
I didn't even care when he spoke to me like I was a child. I cuddled against him, though I was careful not to wipe my face on his shirt.
In the bathroom, he wetted a paper towel and dabbed at my mouth and cheeks while I scrubbed my hands in the sink. I loved the way he took care of me. It was the same way Pops had looked after me as a child, but I'd hated it then.
"Feel better?" Connor asked.
"Depends. Do I smell better?"
"You smell …" He inhaled deeply and looked alarmed.
"I thought so." He had the same sense of smell the shifter janitor had. He knew. Worse, he didn't want me to be pregnant. This was all too soon.
"Oh my goddess, Ben!" Connor picked me up and knocked the breath from my lungs. Then, he twirled me around until I thought I would be sick again, all the while chanting, "You're pregnant!"
"Put me down!" I tapped at his beefy arms until he relaxed his hold, and I slid back to the floor.
"We're going to have a baby!"
I nodded. "We are."
"Did you tell your boss?"
"I quit."
Connor blinked at me like he didn't know what the word meant.
"He wanted me to fly to Chicago tonight for that worthless conference Brian is attending. I refused to go, and then I got sick at work. This fabulous janitor lady told me I was pregnant, so I … quit."
Pops barged into the bathroom and pulled me from Connor's arms. "That's how the best omegas in our families do it!" His hug wasn't quite as hard as Connor's, but I still gasped for air when he let me go.
"Would you all stop that? I need to breathe for two!" I bent over my knees, and another wave of nausea sent me into the nearest stall.
Afterward, Connor helped me clean up again, and then he escorted me to his office with Pops on our heels. I'd never been to Connor's office before. Even though I had much to discuss with him and Pops, I took a moment to gush over it. "This is really nice! I love the wolf painting behind your desk, and the view! What a great view!" It mostly looked out onto scrub brush beyond the parking lot, the freeway in the near distance, and the mountain range beyond, but at least we could see the mountains through the haze today.
"Thank you." Connor tried to hide his blush with a quick head nod, but I noticed. He'd told me he didn't think he deserved this job or the office, but Pops couldn't stop raving about his performance at our family dinners.
Pops pulled us into another hug once he closed the door behind us. "I'm so proud of both of you."
"You're not mad?" I asked.
"Why would I be mad?"
"I quit my job, just like Dad did."
"That job was a placeholder. You've always been destined to work here."
I growled in frustration. "But I don't want to work here."
"You didn't want anything handed to you," Pops said, "and that's fair. We would have started you at the head of the foreign finance department, and that might have been too much at first, but you would have grown into the position."
I blinked at him. This was the first I'd heard of the job he'd planned to give me. I'd interned with Barclay Foods the summer of my senior year of college and already had a job lined up before I graduated. I'd worked my way up from accounting desk clerk to Finance Manager. Now, something like Foreign Finance Manager sounded like a lateral move, but "Foreign Finance would still be a handout."
"It would be a well-deserved position for the son I put through school," Pops countered. "A son who's been doing similar work for the last five years without a promotion."
What he didn't say spoke louder to me. We both knew the reason I hadn't been promoted. Mr. Danbury was still holding out hope that Brian Avery would become the CFO the company needed, all because Brian Avery had married Ginny Danbury, Mr. Danbury's only child.
"I - I'll think about it," I stammered. "Right now, I'm coming to terms with this life growing inside me."
"Take all the time you need." Pops pulled me to his chest for another bone-crushing hug. "Connor's leaving early today."
"Thanks," I said. The thought of getting behind the wheel again, even after my stomach had settled, sounded like a bad idea.
"Take your laptop," Pops said when Connor's screens went dark. "Work from home the rest of the week. You know what you're doing."
Connor cocked his head like his wolf. Even I knew Pops hated when people worked from home.
"What?" he asked when he noticed both of us staring at him. "I wished I could have worked from home through your dad's pregnancies, that's all." He winked at Connor. "You'll thank me later."
I so did not want to know what that was about … except the strange tingling in my balls said I probably already knew.