29. Nora
29
Nora
I wake with a delicious ache between my legs.
My pack surrounds me, all of them napping in the nest with me after our early morning activities.
As the day goes on, I begin to feel a little uncomfortable with how much I enjoyed what happened. I was too active of a participant. It was too centered around me.
It's my job to serve my pack, and I don't think I did that this morning. Once again, it felt very much about me. But we decided that I was going to be officially done with suppressants after I finish this pack now that I have an idea of what to expect during a heat.
I should have plenty of opportunities to take care of my pack during my heat. It shouldn't all be about me.
I'm beginning to pull stuff from the refrigerator to start piecing together an early dinner when I feel a presence at my back.
Turning, I'm surprised to be face-to-face with Chase. We're so close the scent of lemon bars swirls around me.
"We didn't get our day together," he says quietly, a foreign and almost bashful look on his face.
I close the fridge behind me and place the vegetables I grabbed on the counter. "I apologize for that, Alpha," I say softly.
"Don't apologize," he replies. His voice is softer than it's ever been with me. "What are you planning on cooking?"
"Chicken pot pie." I gesture to the ingredients I've laid out in a line. "I was just about to get started."
"Can I help?" The words fall out of his mouth rapidly and there is a vulnerability that looks out of character on his face while he waits for me to answer.
My smile must be blinding as I respond, "I would love that."
He tosses me my apron from the hook Levi installed on the wall, and I wrap it around my waist. I'm dressed plainly today, in leggings and a white shirt, but Chase doesn't seem to mind.
We work quietly, rarely speaking except to ask the other for something or to say what our next steps are. Eventually, I've got the vegetables softening in a Dutch oven. Chase has diced the chicken, and we're standing shoulder to shoulder at the stove, each stirring our components to keep them from sticking.
"My mom taught me to cook," Chase says, unprompted. "She was that mom that made my birthday cakes every year. I loved spending time with her in the kitchen."
I smile as I picture a young Chase standing shoulder-to-shoulder with a woman who looks like him in the kitchen, measuring ingredients. "My mom taught me too." I look up and find myself gazing directly into his clear blue eyes. "And when I surpassed her skill, she would get me a lot of cookbooks. I was always allowed the opportunity to practice because she wanted to make sure I could cook anything for any Alpha's tastes."
Chase leans down, burying his nose in my neck, scenting me. "Do you want to know what you smell like?" he asks in a tone barely above a whisper.
"I would, if you're comfortable telling me. I know you didn't want to scent match with me, so if you don't want to share, it's okay."
"It's not that I didn't want to match with you, princess," he says, going back to the stove and turning off his burner. "Well. Okay, I didn't want to match with you. But it wasn't about you, Nora. It was about you, the Perfect Omega." He places a finger under my chin and turns me to face him. "I thought you were lying, Nora. I thought you were trying to manipulate the whole pack into believing this Perfect Omega thing, and you were going to try to take advantage of my brothers."
"I would never." The point of contact from that one finger is overwhelming, a heat radiating from it. "I care about all of you."
"I see that now. You have adapted to us immediately, and I can see sometimes that it's hard for you, but you're trying your best to find your place in this pack."
"I very much want to be a part of the pack," I say quietly, my eyes drifting closed at his continued touch. "I was always told that an Omega was to be there when her Alpha needed her, and otherwise I was to clean, do laundry, cook… basically anything to keep a home in order. If my Alpha didn't need me, I was to only perform a few specifically approved Omega activities." I take a shuddering inhale and force my eyes open. "Why didn't I see it? Why didn't I see how that wasn't the way it was supposed to be?"
Chase turns the heat off for my Dutch oven, guiding me over to the counter. He grabs cold butter from the fridge, and we get to work chopping it and kneading it into flour to create a pie crust. "If you spend your whole life being told the sky is green, would you believe anything else?" I wrinkle my nose in confusion. He laughs, shaking his head. "I'm not great at metaphors. Actually, I don't think anyone in the pack is. Basically, what I'm saying is you were told that the way you were educated was how everyone was and how life was supposed to be. And I'm sure some packs would have been happy about that and not changed a thing. It took you meeting a pack that went against the expected to help you realize you could, too."
"You certainly are not what I expected," I admit, ducking my head.
"I know. You aren't what I expected either." He places his finger under my chin again, and I feel the smudge of flour and butter it leaves on my flesh. He pulls my eyes up to his, forcing me to give him every bit of my attention. "Strawberry shortcakes."
"What?" I say, breathless from the combination of his undivided attention and touch.
"My mother's favorite dessert was strawberry shortcakes. We would make them together the entire time strawberries were in season." He dips his head to my neck, wrapping his arm around my hips and pulling me so tightly there is scarcely space for air between our bodies. "You smell like strawberry shortcakes, Nora. You smell like afternoons with my mother, like the sweetest thing I've ever tasted. Like every comfortable, happy memory from my childhood." His free hand caresses my cheek, those tattooed fingers so gentle as he presses his forehead to my own. "You don't just smell good, and you don't just smell like home. You smell like love."
His words freeze me in place, his hands a burning brand on me. We're both breathing deeply, eyes locked, just existing in this moment together. This moment where Chase and I are the only two people that exist.
I think he's going to kiss me, and my body craves it, but he takes a step back, leaving me bereft. "Wait here, please. Just for a minute," he says, leaving the kitchen.
My heart aches, and I wonder if he's going to return at all or if he's gotten cold feet about me again. But before I can spiral too deeply into those feelings, he's back, carrying a black box. "Hey, that's the box that was outside my room. I wondered where it ended up."
"I took it," Chase says. "I got my feelings hurt that you hadn't opened it." I can feel a thought, a realization, in the back of my mind, begging to be unearthed. Chase must see the absolute confusion on my face because he puts me out of my misery. "All of the gifts were from me, Nora."
"You?" I whisper. I never in a million years would have thought it could have been Chase. Not even once did that thought cross my mind.
He sets the black box down in front of me. "This is the one I left after strip poker, before your heat spike. I… well, could you just open it?"
I open the lid and find a soft blanket that has a floral and moth print design, almost like … "Your tattoos?"
"Yeah," he says sheepishly, "that's exactly what I thought when I saw it. I was wondering if you'd want it for your nest?"
"I would love it," I say honestly.
"There's one more thing," he tells me, pushing the box closer. I pull out a soft leather binder, and inside it are pages and pages of recipes. "They're my mother's recipes. I use a lot of them at the restaurant, too. I had a copy made for you."
"Chase," I sigh, turning towards him and clutching the book to my chest. "This is too much."
"It's not the only copy. I want you to have your own." He steps to me and gently pulls the book from my hands. "My mother would have loved you. And she would've been ashamed of how I've treated you, princess." Chase grabs both my hands in his own, holding them up to his chest. His words trip clumsily out of his mouth, unpracticed and rushed. "I am not good at this kind of thing. I don't know how to grovel for your forgiveness. I don't know if I'd ever be able to earn it."
It's strange seeing a man like Chase tongue-tied.
Of all my Alphas, Chase is the one that seems unflappable. I've never seen anything bother him. He's tough, and all of his tattoos, from his neck to his knuckles, make him look dangerous. So to be in front of him now, where he says he feels he needs to grovel for me, feels special. It feels rare.
"Alpha," I say, stepping forward to firmly shove our bodies together. "You do not need to grovel. I will always forgive you." He twists backward a bit as though my words hurt him.
"I don't want unconditional forgiveness, princess. I want to earn it. I want you to know just how sorry I am for the way I've treated you until now." He looks down at the counter with a critical look. All of the components are prepared, but none of the pies are assembled. "Let's put this away and go out for dinner. I want to show you my restaurant."
I bounce excitedly on my feet. "I would love that! Should we get the rest of the pack? What do you want me to wear?"
"No, this will be just the two of us. I want you to wear something that feels like you, princess. I want to see who you are."
I give him a kiss on the cheek and dart upstairs, digging through my closet. He wants to see who I am.
Who am I?
I am the Perfect Omega. Or, I was. Maybe I always will be to an extent.
But I am also Nora, who does hip-hop cardio while she cleans the house.
I'm Nora, who plays paintball and doesn't mind the bite of paint, that splatter of paint, the chaos of colors.
I am someone who can bartend in a dive bar, ride on the back of a motorcycle, and initiate a game of strip poker.
I am a flawed woman who lets her guilt eat her alive but trusts her Alpha to help her. I can learn from others' experiences when they share them with me.
I am Nora, who let herself be commanded and conducted around a room for the enjoyment of her pack and felt lucky to be able to do it, knowing that my brain will crave it again.
I am Nora.
I am not the Perfect Omega.
But I'm starting to believe I may be theirs.