2. Simon
Chapter two
Three Years Later
It's been a slow process, but I'm almost out of the pack house.
I can't stand to be here anymore. I thought I could get over losing Jordan. I thought I could get past the fact that we fucked up so royally that we lost the best thing that ever happened to us.
But I can't.
She's gone.
It's been three years since the moment I watched her heart break in real-time, and I've still got a Jordan-sized crater in my chest.
"Where are you going?" Rafe says, leaning in my doorway and staring at my duffle bag.
I do my best to ignore him, but it's hard when he's shirtless and still sweaty from his daily run. I was hoping to be gone before he got back.
"You're just going to leave then, huh?" he says quietly, stepping into my tiny bedroom with the shitty furniture I bought when I was nineteen. He closes the door behind him and leans against it, blocking my only means of egress.
I don't think this old apartment is up to fire code.
"It hasn't been working for a while." I open the bottom drawer of my dresser and begin to pull out clothes. "You know it hasn't."
"I thought we were good," he insists, taking a deep breath. "I'm sorry if I made things weird. It doesn't have to mean anything, Simon." He takes a few steps towards me, pitching his voice down. "It can just be for fun. I can handle that."
"That's not what I'm talking about, and you know it." I snag his wrist before he can place his hand on my shoulder. "I care about you, Rafe."
He wrenches away from me. "So you've said. What's the problem, then?" He perches on the edges of my bed, looking up at me with wide, dark eyes. "Other packs do it. It's not uncommon for the pack bond to become something more."
"Goddamnit, Rafe," I say, unable to stop myself from touching his cheek. "I'm not having this conversation again. What happened between us is not the issue right now."
"Then what is?"
I yank my hand back. "What do you mean what is? Jordan! The issue is Jordan."
"Jordan, who hasn't returned your calls in three years, Jordan?" He scoffs and lays back on his bed. "We fucked that up royally, Si. That ship has sailed into a hurricane."
"We don't work without her." I sink down next to him on the worn plaid bedspread. "It was always the four of us. It was meant to be the four of us from the beginning. She should be here."
"She's not an Omega, Simon," he says softly. "And if we bring her into our pack and then find a scent match, and they don't want a Beta in the pack, we would be left to choose between them."
"And I would choose Jordan every. Fucking. Time!" My voice is hysterical, but I don't care anymore. It's been so long since we've talked about her that every feeling I have held back for the past three years bubbles to the surface. "You two convinced me to reject her for the concept of another person. We hadn't met someone else. We made an assumption based on what we thought was best for her. Did we ask her if she was willing to risk the hurt? No!"
"Because she would have said yes!" he shouts. "She would have said yes, and it would've broken all of our hearts if she had to leave the pack. She wouldn't have been the only one shredded."
"Don't pretend like we did this for her."
Rafe's hand darts out and gently grabs my neck, pulling my face so close to his that my eyes almost cross when I try to look at him. "We all agreed, Simon. Do not try to play the victim like we forced this on you. You agreed."
I gulp around his grip, my body loosening with the pressure. "What choice did I have? Cyrus wouldn't have listened to me. He was set in his decision."
"Our decision. All three of us sat down and decided it was best for Jordan. We needed to give her room to explore her life, meet other people, and come to terms with being a Beta." He slowly scoots closer to me, and his bare chest presses against my side. His breaths are almost as fast as mine.
Two years ago, drunk and sad, Rafe and I fell into each other's arms for the first time. When we woke up, the awkwardness made me want to buy a plane ticket across the world, but that hasn't stopped us from seeking comfort in each other several times since then.
I felt then, and still do, loyal to Jordan. But Rafe wasn't wrong when he said Jordan would not care if we were together. Not just because of the breaking her heart thing but because Jordan has the biggest heart of anyone and would never begrudge someone more love and affection.
Also, she'd want to watch. No doubt about it. I borrowed her phone once and saw her taste in porn.
It was all polyamorous packs.
Rafe flexes his fingers around my throat and then pulls back, sighing. "You're really leaving?"
I miss the heat of his touch and do my best to shake it off. It only takes me a minute or two to finish packing my bag. "Yeah, I am. I can't listen to Cyrus planning for us to go to Omega socials and trying to find someone to fill the hole that Jordan left in our pack."
Throwing my bag over my shoulder, I nudge past Rafe, who has risen to his feet, and head out of our shitty third-floor walk-up apartment. Rafe follows me down the stairs and stands on the curb as I climb onto my busted, half-restored motorcycle.
"Will you ever be back?" His voice is more vulnerable than I expected, sowing a seed of doubt in my gut that I bury deep within me as I throw on my helmet.
"Tell Cyrus I said bye."
"Damn, did you never get food at your old place?" Nitro asks with a chuckle, sliding another hamburger on my plate. The smoke from the grill fills up the club complex, and the chatter of people is loud enough to drown out my thoughts.
I smile at the big, burly Beta and shrug. "Always hungry," I say through a full mouth.
His hand smacks me on the back of the head, and I wince. "Don't talk with your mouth full!"
"Sorry, boss." I tuck into the new burger he gave me, enjoying the slight char on the top. A heavy feeling covers me, and I look up to see Nitro staring at me. He's got silver streaks in his dark beard and hair and classic-style tattoos of pinup girls and eagles that I can barely make out because of the age of the ink.
"Not that I'm not happy that you're joining the family, kid," he grunts, throwing himself onto the bench across from me, "but leaving a pack is a big deal."
"Had to be done." The hoppy beer goes down rough, and I fight back a wince at the bitterness. "Irreconcilable differences, ain't that what they call it?"
"In a divorce, yeah, but last I checked, you're not a Beta."
"How'd you check, Nitro? You're not a doctor."
He throws a napkin at my face and chuckles, shaking his head. "Shut it, kid, and tell me why you're really here."
Something about Nitro is easy to talk to. Being in the Hawks, a pretty rough motorcycle club, you'd think he'd be scary and unapproachable. But he's not. He's always been kind to me and quickly told me I had a place in the family if I wanted it while helping me fix up my bike.
I can't hold back the word vomit. I tell him every detail, minus my …unique relationship with Rafe. But I explain how close we were with Jordan, the numerous ways we fucked things up, and how I just couldn't stand to be a pack anymore without her.
"But she won't talk to me." My voice cracks a little, and I cover it with a cough. "I don't call or text her anymore. After three years of being ignored, I couldn't take the outright rejection."
"You complaining about the rejection is bullshit, Simon. You rejected her first."
"I know that. I know." I grab the bowl of potato salad in front of me and scoop a large portion onto my plate, taking a big bite. Not wanting to get smacked again, I swallow the bite completely before talking again. "I just wish it never happened. I don't even know if she's okay."
He pulls a pack of cigarettes out of the pocket on the front of his shirt and taps the pack on the heel of his hand. "You haven't looked her up or anything?"
"I haven't. I've been scared to. What if I find out she's got a pack or a husband or something?"
He holds a cigarette out to me, and I shake my head. The older Beta shrugs and hangs it between his lips as he lights it. "I can get one of the guys to get some information on her. Keep tabs on her. Until you're ready to approach her and make things right."
A lightness swirls through my chest, and I lean forward on my elbows. "Yeah? The club has someone who can do that?"
"C'mon, kid, now you're insulting us. Of course, we can. Let me introduce you to Clicks, he's real good with computers." He snags me by the arm, yanks me off the bench, and guides me through the courtyard.
For the first time in three years, I'm feeling a little bit better.