Chapter 24 Vespera
twenty-four
Vespera
Three weeks. We've been at the lake house for three weeks, and it feels like we're living in a different world. A world where the past doesn't exist, where we can pretend we're just a normal pack figuring out how to be together.
But summer's ending. I can feel it in the cooling air, see it in the way the light changes earlier each evening. School starts in two weeks, and we're going to have to face reality eventually.
I'm sitting by the pool, feet dangling in the water, watching the late afternoon sun paint everything gold. I'm wearing one of Dorian's shirts—stolen from his closet this morning—and nothing else. The freedom of it still feels surreal. No fear. No watching over my shoulder. Just peace.
The sliding door opens behind me and I know without looking that it's Dorian. I've learned his footsteps, his scent, the way the air changes when he's near.
"Thought I'd find you here," he says, settling beside me. His feet join mine in the water, and he's close enough that our shoulders brush.
"It's nice," I say simply. "Quiet."
"Too quiet?" There's something in his voice—concern, maybe. Fear that I'm getting bored, that I'll want to leave.
"No." I lean into him slightly. "Just thinking about how different this is from campus. From reality."
He's quiet for a moment, his hand finding mine under the water. Our fingers lace together automatically now, like our bodies have learned a new language.
"We have to go back eventually," I continue. "Face everyone. Deal with what we did. What you did to me. What I let happen."
"You didn't let anything happen." His voice is sharp. "We forced—"
"I know." I squeeze his hand. "But that's not how people will see it. They'll see me, claimed by the pack that tormented me. They'll think I was weak. That I gave in."
"Fuck what they think."
"Easy for you to say. You're Dorian Ashworth.
Golden boy Alpha. You can claim whoever you want and everyone just accepts it as your right.
" I pull my feet from the water, tucking them under me.
"I'm the scholarship Omega who was supposed to be driven out.
Instead I'm wearing your claiming mark and living in your lake house. People are going to talk."
"Let them talk." He turns to face me fully. "I don't care what anyone says. You're mine. We're yours. That's all that matters."
"Is it though?" I meet his eyes. "What about your parents? Your inheritance? The Ashworth legacy?"
Something flickers across his face. Pain. Old wounds.
"My brother," he says quietly. "I told you he was disowned."
"You mentioned it. For choosing an Omega your parents didn't approve of."
"For choosing love over duty." Dorian's gaze drifts to the lake, but I can tell he's seeing something else. Someone else. "His name is Julian. He was supposed to be the perfect heir—graduated top of his class, Alpha genetics, the whole package. Then he met Marcus."
"Marcus?"
"An Omega. Not wealthy. Not connected. Just... someone Julian loved." His throat works. "My parents gave him an ultimatum. Drop Marcus and claim an appropriate Omega from an approved family, or lose everything. The money. The name. Access to the family."
"And he chose Marcus."
"He chose Marcus." Dorian's hand tightens on mine. "I was sixteen. I watched my parents erase him like he never existed. Portraits removed from the walls. His name forbidden. They didn't just disown him—they tried to unmake him."
The pain in his voice is raw, real. This isn't the calculating Alpha who tormented me. This is just Dorian, still hurt by his family's cruelty.
"Do you talk to him?" I ask gently.
"Not for years. They made it clear—contact with Julian meant choosing his path.
Losing everything." He finally looks at me.
"I was too much of a coward. Too afraid of ending up like him.
So I became exactly what they wanted. The perfect heir.
The golden boy. And I convinced myself that their way was right, that Omegas like you were beneath me, that I could never. .."
"Never what?"
"Never be weak enough to fall in love." The words are barely a whisper. "Because that's what they called it. Weakness. Julian's great weakness that destroyed the family's plans."
I shift closer, cupping his face with my free hand. "It's not weakness."
"I know that now." His eyes are suspiciously bright. "But for years, I believed them. I bullied scholarship students to prove I was nothing like Julian. To prove I'd never be stupid enough to choose someone inappropriate. Someone like..." He trails off.
"Someone like me," I finish.
"Someone perfect like you." He leans into my touch. "And the whole time, I was just digging the hole deeper. Making myself into exactly the kind of person who didn't deserve you."
"You're trying to be better now."
"Am I?" His laugh is bitter. "Or am I just repeating Julian's mistake? Falling for someone my family will never accept, someone who'll cost me everything?"
The question hangs between us, heavy with implications.
"Is that what I am?" I ask quietly. "A mistake?"
"No." The word is fierce, immediate. "You're the first right thing I've done in years.
But that doesn't change the reality we're facing.
When we go back to school, when my parents find out about the claiming.
.." He shakes his head. "They'll do to me what they did to Julian.
I'll lose the inheritance, the family name, probably any chance at the career I planned. "
"And you're okay with that?"
"I'm terrified of it," he admits. "Not because I care about the money. Because I watched what it did to Julian. How hard it was for him and Marcus. They struggled. They're still struggling. And I don't want that for us. I don't want you to suffer because I chose you."
I'm quiet for a moment, processing. This is the real fear underneath all his arrogance and control. Not losing his status. Losing me because he can't provide, can't protect, can't be what I need without his family's resources.
"What if," I say carefully, "you contacted Julian? Before we go back. Before your parents find out."
He looks at me sharply. "Why?"
"Because maybe he can tell you how he survived it. How he made it work." I brush my thumb across his cheekbone. "And because you need to reconcile with him. You abandoned him when he needed family. That's not who you want to be anymore, right?"
"I don't even know if he'd talk to me."
"Only one way to find out." I lean forward, pressing my forehead to his. "You keep saying you want to be better. Prove it. Make amends with the people you hurt, starting with your brother."
He's quiet for a long moment, and I can practically hear him thinking, calculating, weighing options.
"What if he hates me?" The question is small, vulnerable.
"Then you apologize and accept it. But what if he doesn't? What if he's been waiting for you to reach out?"
Dorian pulls back to look at me, really look at me. "When did you get so wise?"
"When I started believing I deserved better than what you were giving me." I smile. "Now I'm holding you to the same standard. Be better. Do better. Starting with family."
"You're terrifying," he says, but he's smiling too. "You know that?"
"Good. You should be a little afraid of me."
He kisses me then, soft and sweet and nothing like the desperate claiming kisses from weeks ago. This is something else. Something that feels like promise.
When he pulls back, there's determination in his eyes. "I'll call him. Tonight."
"Good."
"And when my parents inevitably lose their minds about the claiming?"
"Then we deal with it. Together." I squeeze his hand. "You're not Julian. You have a pack. You have me. And unlike your brother, you're not going into this alone."
"No," he agrees. "I'm not alone anymore."
We sit there as the sun sets, hands intertwined, facing the reality that's coming. School starts in two weeks. His parents will find out about the claiming. My return to campus will be complicated and messy and probably painful.
But right now, in this moment, we have peace. We have each other. And maybe that's enough to face whatever comes next.
"Vespera?"
"Yeah?"
"Thank you. For pushing me to be better. For not accepting the Alpha I was." He looks at me with something that might be awe. "You could have settled. Could have just accepted the claiming and lived with whoever I was willing to be. Instead you demanded more."
"Because you're capable of more," I tell him. "All three of you are. You just needed someone to hold you accountable."
"Well, you're terrifying at it."
"I know." I stand, pulling him up with me. "Come on. Let's go inside. I want all three of you tonight."
"Demanding," he observes, but his eyes are heated.
"You made me this way." I start walking toward the house, his shirt barely covering my ass. "Now deal with the consequences."
I hear his sharp intake of breath behind me, feel his gaze tracking my every move. Then he's following, and I'm smiling because this is what we are now. Not perfect. Not without complications. But real.
And when we face reality in two weeks, at least we'll face it as a real pack.
Not a perfect one. But ours.