Chapter 20
TWENTY
I stare at the watered-down dregs of bourbon in my glass. After the stress of shopping yesterday, Atlas and Athena went to take a nap. They didn’t even bother setting up the nest that we spent hours shopping for.
But that was more on Atlas than Athena. She was, once again, awake but not aware of what was going on around her. I know we need to call her brother and let him know what is going on, but that feels like a betrayal.
And we would be admitting we have no idea what we’re doing. Which is true, but doesn’t feel good to say out loud.
A knock on the front door jars me out of my musings, and I push to my feet.
It’s time to get this over with. Rip off the Omega-sized bandaid.
My brother stands on the other side of the door, his crooked smile stretched across his face.
He pulls me into a tight hug, his pleasant but nondescript scent washing over me.
Now that I know what it’s like to smell a scent match, it’s a little jarring how superficial everyone else smells.
Everyone else only smells good or bad. Since we’re family, I find his scent comforting, but that’s it.
Will doesn’t have his pack yet. Not that he’s looking. He stopped after he was taken from us. One day, after I vet them from here to hell, he’ll have someone who can protect him in ways I can’t.
The way I couldn’t.
“It’s good to see you,” he says, pulling away. His hazel eyes turn down at the corners, and his light brown hair brushes his shoulders. He’s seven years younger than me, but could be my twin if it wasn’t for the lines on my face that somehow cropped up the moment I turned forty.
“You too,” I say, stepping back and letting him come into the house. “Can I get you a drink?”
“So formal. Why yes, sir, a beverage, please?” He snorts and throws himself onto my couch like he has a thousand times before, oblivious to the tension that thrums through me. “What’s going on?”
Everything is going to change with this one conversation.
After today, there will be no hiding who I am to Will. No hiding who Atlas is to me.
I wish I could say that I’m not nervous. That I know my brother loves me as unconditionally as I do him, but that would be a lie.
It’s not that I think his love is conditional.
It’s that his best friend will be my Omega first, before he’s his best friend. The hierarchy is changing.
I make him a glass of bourbon while pouring myself another, before sitting on the coffee table in front of him. He tenses and sits up straight as he accepts the glass.
“Seriously, Wyatt, what’s going on? Did someone die?”
I shake my head, unable to open my mouth.
I don’t know how to do this.
How do I tell my brother that I’ve got two Omegas, and one is his best friend, and also I’ve fucked him before, so I know that this match is going to work out?
“No one died,” I say, glad that the guys agreed to hole up in their rooms while I have this conversation. “But something did happen.”
“Is it Atlas?” he says sharply. He knows we rescued him, but that’s all he’s been told. “Why haven’t I seen him? He’s not answering my calls.”
“He doesn’t have his phone. It’s not like kidnappers are keen to give their victims contact with the outside world. He’s… fine.”
The word feels like a lie, even when I know it isn’t.
“Okay then, so why the whole…” He gestures up and down my body. “Weird, tense, bristly Alpha thing you got going on?”
“Atlas is an Omega.”
Well, that’s one way to do it. Just vomit the words on the floor between us.
Will wrinkles his nose and shakes his head. “What are you talking about?”
I pull my cap off and rub my hand over my buzzed hair. “When we rescued Atlas, we found him with a woman. Athena. They had been held together, experimented on. Both of them went in as Betas, but came out as Omegas.”
“Is this why you haven’t let me see him? Because if he’s an Omega, he needs me. He needs me to help him through this.”
I take a massive gulp from my glass to avoid having to speak, but of course, it doesn’t last long. “Atlas and Athena bonded. We’ve never seen anything like it, but somehow they claimed each other.”
My brother leans back, sinking into my couch a little. “That’s not possible.”
“Neither is turning two Betas into Omegas, and yet here we are.”
“I want to see him. Where is he?”
My stomach bottoms out. Here we go.
“He’s in our nest. But that’s not all, Will. I uh…” Sweat breaks out on the back of my neck. “Atlas and Athena are our scent matches. Me and the rest of the pack.”
The silence stretches between us, heavy and loaded, until Will throws himself to his feet. “No. Nope. I don’t believe that. You can’t be. He’s my best friend.”
“It’s convoluted and there is a lot more to the situation, but that’s the truth. The two of them are my scent matches. They smell like sweet tea and lemon, Will. I can’t control who I match with any more than you’ll be able to when it’s your turn.”
My brother paces, his drink abandoned, looking anywhere but at me. “I need to see him, Wyatt. I don’t believe this. They need to come with me and stay at the Omega rehab center.”
A growl rips out of me as I stand and bow up to my brother. “You’re not taking my Omegas anywhere. You’re my brother, and I love you, but I’m not letting you take my Omegas away. You’re going to have to accept that things are going to be different now.”
“You’re straight!” he exclaims, throwing his hands up. “How are you going to take care of him if you’re not able to give him a knot? He deserves better than that.”
“There are other ways to care for an Omega that don’t involve a knot,” I snap. “Besides, I wasn’t straight the last time we fucked, and I don’t think that’s gotten any more true now that I’ve scent matched him.”
There were probably more tactful ways to share that news.
Will collapses onto the couch, face contorted in betrayal as a whine squeaks out of him. “You fucked my best friend?”
“It’s not like we set out to do it.” I try to keep my voice calm and level, not wanting to upset him any more than I already have.
“It just happened. But you don’t have to worry about him not getting the care he needs.
There are four of us. And Athena’s brother is a doctor and said it’s less about taking a knot and more about being exposed to Alpha pheromones. ”
“He’s really bonded with an Omega?” he asks quietly. “Is he happy, at least?”
I snort a sarcastic laugh. “I wouldn’t say happy, Will.
He’s had his entire life upended, and you know how Charles is with Omegas.
He’s hovering and trying to force them both to be regular Omegas when they’re not.
I hate to say it, but they’re broken, man.
They can’t stand to be apart from one another. ”
He snarls. “Do not refer to your Omegas as broken. What kind of asshole are you?”
“I’m not trying to be an asshole!” I hold my hands up in surrender.
“But neither of them is accepting their new reality well. Athena is dissociating, and Atlas is pushing us away and refusing to acknowledge the changes he’s going through.
That’s why I called you. I need your help.
No one has been through what they have, but you’ve at least experienced a part of it. ”
He flinches, arms wrapping around his body at the reminder of his time in captivity. He still hasn’t told us everything that he went through, but after seeing the conditions Athena and Atlas were in, and rescuing several Omegas from the flesh trade, I have a good idea.
Will was a shell of himself until he went into heat. It took that for his Omega to start the healing process.
Will it be the same for my Omegas?
“I don’t know if I can,” he says quietly. “Helping the other Omegas is one thing. But this is my best friend. And you’re my brother. How am I supposed to help him get better so he can bond with my brother?”
“At least you know I’ll take care of him. You know I won’t hurt him.”
I would be lying if I said I hadn’t let the night I spent with Atlas run through my head hundreds of times since then.
Something about it had felt so right, so natural, that it didn’t even register to me that I had never been with a man before.
Our society is pretty fluid sexually, with no one blinking an eye at who you’re with.
I was always open to any Omega, regardless of gender, before Will was taken.
It surprised me that being with Atlas felt so natural that it didn’t even bother me that he wasn’t an Omega.
“Do I know that, though?” my brother whispers. “I know you as my brother. You could be someone different as an Alpha. And Atlas wouldn’t know any better, would he? He’d accept whatever scraps you give him because you’re his scent match.”
I bristle at the idea that I would give my Omegas anything other than the world. Things may be weird right now, but I’m going to be a good Alpha for them. They won’t want for anything.
“That’s why I want you to teach him everything he needs to know.
To answer his questions. I’m not trying to keep him in the dark.
But he needs to stay here with us. The Hawks have the people who did this to him, but not their leader.
We need to protect him, and we can’t do that if he’s at the Omega rehab. ”
Will nods and sits back down, resting his chin in his hands. “Okay, yeah. That makes sense. What about her, though? Is she going to listen to me?”
A knock on the door interrupts before I can answer. “Good thing I thought of that already.”