Chapter 12
CHAPTER TWELVE
Quincy
It was so fucking unfair.
As Jack and I sat close, eating our lunches and trying to talk about normal things, trying to pretend we were a normal omega and alpha in the early stages of their relationship, all I could think was that nothing in my life, or Jack’s life either, was even remotely in the neighborhood of fair.
I was severed and Jack was a prisoner of his class and expectations. Everything was against us.
But I couldn’t have been more in love with him than if some deranged cupid has stabbed me in the heart repeatedly with a fucking arrow.
“We’ll find a way to make this work,” Jack said once we’d vacated our table to another, probably way less star-crossed, couple and headed outside. “I don’t know how, but I’m not going to give up on you, give up on us.”
My lunch sat like a lead weight in my gut, but I turned to Jack and tried my best to smile up at him all the same.
“I’m not going to give up either,” I said, leaning closer to him and putting my hand on his chest, despite the lunchtime rush of people walking around us. “We’re utterly fucking impossible, but I refuse to let them win.”
Jack grinned and placed his hands over mine. His body was warm and his heart beat steadily, making me believe that we actually had a snowball’s chance in Hades of making this work. I guessed I could believe in fairy tales, too.
“We probably shouldn’t be seen walking back to the hotel together,” Jack said after we stood there making googly eyes at each other for too long. “If my father is still there and if he sees us, who knows what else he might do?”
I was smart enough to know that question covered a whole world of really scary shit.
“What are you going to do?” I asked, pulling my hands away.
He caught them and threaded our fingers together. “I don’t know,” he said with a heavy sigh. “Honestly, I’ll probably do whatever I can to avoid him for as long as possible. I want to stand up and fight for us, but I don’t need to throw everything in his face right away.”
I nodded, though I was anything but certain that would be a long-term strategy.
“What about your cards and bank accounts?” I asked, another wave of panic rising in me.
Jack shrugged. “This might sound crazy, but I think I’m just not going to mention anything about them and see what happens.”
“But you need money to live,” I said. “Don’t you have, like, bills to pay and groceries to buy?”
Jack’s face pinched. “We’ll see what happens,” was all he said, though.
“I’m worried about you,” I told him.
Surprisingly, Jack laughed. “You’re worried about me? And here I was the one terrified that this will somehow make your life harder.”
It wasn’t funny, but it was hard not to smile when my big and brave alpha was beaming at me like I’d hung the moon.
I wasn’t anywhere near good enough for him.
“My life is already a wreck,” I said, all the hope draining out of me as the stump of my old bond burned and itched. “Your dad can’t make it much worse.”
Jack looked like I’d stabbed him in the heart. “I’m so sorry for that,” he said quietly.
And then, right there in the middle of the sidewalk, where everyone could see, he pulled me against him, tilted my head back, and slanted his mouth over mine in an amazing kiss.
For the space of a few seconds, every drop of my fear and anxiety melted away. My heart seemed to swell and beat in my ears. The remnants of my old bond throbbed and swelled, almost like the pain that came with new teeth trying to rupture where a baby tooth had fallen out.
It wasn’t comfortable, but I grabbed onto that sensation and threw myself into it along with the kiss.
It was a fool’s fancy to think that some sort of new bond could grow when an old one had been severed.
But I was ready to believe in fairy tales with a handsome hero like Jack kissing me into oblivion.
Eventually, Jack rocked back, taking a vocal breath. “Wow,” he gasped. “I guess I got a little carried away there.”
I laughed loudly, then slapped a hand over my mouth until I felt like I could let it go without turning hysterical. “I can’t imagine what we must look like together,” I said. “The pink and purple-haired omega with a lip ring and tattoos and the straitlaced alpha in a designer suit.”
“You can’t really see any of your tattoos the way you’re dressed right now,” Jack said, his smile warm. “But I know where they all are and what they all look like.”
My heart flipped. Fuck, I shouldn’t have loved him so much as quicky as I did. It would lead to nothing but disaster.
“You’d better go,” I said in a gravelly voice. “I need to get back to work.”
“Yeah, you should,” Jack said.
I pushed up to my toes to kiss him one more time, we hugged, and then we parted.
It was like trying to walk uphill in acid rain with an elastic cord attaching us for me to walk away from Jack and back to the hotel. I couldn’t look back at him as we separated, even though I wanted to. I wouldn’t have been able to keep walking if I knew he was standing there watching me go.
I did glance back over at the park as I waited for the light to turn green right in front of the hotel, but Jack wasn’t anywhere in sight.
It was a relief in some ways, but when I instinctively tried to feel my way along what my deepest soul knew should have been a bond between us to at least gauge which direction he was in, I slammed up hard against that invisible glass wall within me.
That was probably why I was near tears when I took the elevator up to the hotel’s offices.
Maybe it really was time to up the dosage of my meds or seek additional help or something.
Falling in love with Jack was beautiful in some ways, but it was going to shred my soul and every last ounce of my control.
“Hey, Quincy, can I see you in here for a minute?” Amelia’s voice caught me as I walked past her office.
I cringed, then took a few backward steps until I stood in her doorway. I wasn’t dumb enough not to know what she wanted to talk to me about.
“Hi,” I said, walking into her office, then taking a seat in one of the chairs in front of her desk even before she could indicate for me to.
Amelia sighed and mirrored my tired, deflated, wary expression. “Yeah,” she said.
“Yep,” I answered.
For a few seconds, we just stared at each other. Then she said, “Senator Salisbury wanted me to fire you.”
I jerked to sit straight. It shouldn’t have surprised me, not after everything with Jack’s money, but it did a little.
“Like, fire me fire me? Not just remove me from working with Chester—erm, Mr. Monk?” I asked, eyes wide.
I could tell Amelia made a note of the fact that I’d called Chester by his first name, but she had other things to address first.
“You know how these society alphas with money and position can be,” she said with a tight wave of her hand that was probably supposed to be casual, but totally wasn’t.
“I definitely know how they can be,” I said with a slow nod. I was in the middle of getting a sharp lesson about that.
“I said no, of course,” Amelia went on.
My eyes went wide. “You did? You actually told a senator that you wouldn’t fire me?”
“Absolutely,” Amelia said, folding her arms on her desk and grinning victoriously.
“This is my hotel and my team. I refuse to let some puffed up alpha with delusions of grandeur, a man who is only here for one event and who might lose the election for governor in the fall, dictate to me whether I should fire one of the best team members I have.”
“Amelia,” I started apologetically, “I’m hardly one of the best team members you have. My mental challenges—”
“Cause you to think outside the box and give you an extraordinary degree of compassion and understanding,” Amelia finished for me.
“You picked up on things that none of the rest of us did for the Barrington Psychological Society’s annual conference this past winter. You’re insightful and dedicated—”
“But not particularly reliable,” I stopped her, remembering how many times I’d ended up in the bathroom in tears while setting up the psychology conference.
Amelia made a scoffing noise. “Are you going to let me defend you or are you going to do Senator Salisbury’s work of cutting you down for him?”
Her question was blunt enough to stop my spiral in its tracks. “Thank you for not firing me,” I said, fighting to drum up the courage I needed to fight back. For my sake and for Jack’s.
“If he tries to mess with you again, and I have the uncomfortable feeling he will, because men like that get tetchy when people don’t just lie down and give them what they want, then I will defend you again,” she said.
I managed a wobbly smile for her. “Thanks.”
“I’m going to have to move you to the registration team for the Tech Expo,” she went on, sitting back in her chair, like the important part of the impromptu meeting was done. “I know it’s a huge downgrade for you.”
“I’m definitely not going to complain,” I said.
“We’ll get through the next week together,” Amelia said, leaning back in her chair. “And then I think I’m going to ask that our entire team be treated to supper in the dining room as a reward.”
I smiled and pushed myself to stand. Amelia was particularly fond of the chef that The Grand had hired two years ago to run all of its kitchens. A staff supper in the main restaurant was her idea of the biggest reward possible.
“Thanks again,” I said as I headed for the door. “You have no idea how much it means for you to stand up for me like this.”
“Any time,” she said. And then, just as I stepped into the hall, she had to go and add, “Just don’t do anything else that will put my job on the line, too.”
I could have stepped out of her office and into a gaping hole that plunged all the way down to the street fourteen floors below. I was absolutely doing something else that would cause a total disaster if Salisbury found out.