32. Grace
I’m still on cloud nine as I wave at Stanton as he drives away. He’s already late for his training session this morning, yet he insisted on taking me home.
He’s going to talk to Lucas about the three of us and our baby being a family... a pack. I can’t wait, and I hope he gets through to him.
When his car turns the corner, I practically skip into the house, desperate to tell my sisters about my perfect time with Stanton. But as soon as I step inside, I freeze in my tracks.
Standing in the middle of the living room is Senator Hilton. His icy blue eyes are the same as Lucas’ and when they meet mine, a chill runs down my spine.
I rub my hand over my stomach. Instantly dropping it like it burned me.
“Senator Hilton,” I stammer his name, confusion in my tone. “Why are you here?”
I glance at Harlow, who shrugs her shoulders, and mouths, “Sorry.”
“Yes, why are you here?” my feisty sister, Bardot asks, her arms crossed over her chest.
He turns to me. “I need to talk to you. Preferably in private.”
“Why?” I muster up some courage against the overpowering presence of the man who Stanton has already warned me about.
“I need to talk to you about my son?”
I swallow. He knows.
How the hell does he know?
Maybe he doesn’t.
Act cool.
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
“We both know that isn’t true,” he says. His voice is warm. Dare I say kind after what Stanton told me about him.
“We’re not leaving her alone with you,” Bardot says, standing beside me. “If you have anything to say, you can say it while we’re here. And just so you know, she takes after Mom. Just because she’s an omega doesn’t make her weak.”
I smile and squeeze my sister’s hand.
“Yeah. She’s a badass.” Harlow stands at the other side of me. “She’s a businesswoman, and she doesn’t need an alpha. She doesn’t fall at the feet of high-powered men just because they say so.”
“I’m here in peace.” His shoulders drop a touch, making him look less intimidating. His nose twitches as he glances between us three sisters.
“You are?”
He nods. “I’m here to say sorry.” He squeezes his eyes shut for a moment. He raises his hands, showing his palms in surrender. “I can hold my hands up and admit I made a mess of everything and I don’t want to lose my son.”
I chew my lip, nervously waiting.
“I don’t want to be the one who stands in the way of him finding his scent match. Not when I know how much he wants you.”
I suck back a breath, knowing Lucas must have told his father.
“And I know Lucas and Stanton want this baby,” he says. My heart pounds against my breastbone, knowing I’m so close to having my alphas… my pack.
I turn as the door creaks behind me and smile as my mother walks into the room.
Mom is still gorgeous. In her early forties with dark hair, styled in a shoulder-length bob and ocean blue colored eyes. The same as her twin girls.
She stops in mid-walk and locks eyes with Lucas’ father. “Who are you?”
“Senator Henry Hilton,” he says, holding out his hand.
“Why are you here?” Her eyes narrow as she stares at the Senator. “What’s going on?”
She swallows as she shakes his hand, but he doesn’t drop it immediately.
“You never told me why you’re here,” Mom says.
“I came to talk to Grace.” My eyes meet his. “To explain myself and that I’m the reason my son hurt her.”
“I still don’t understand why you would do that?” I say. Stanton told me that his father wasn’t a good man.
He glances at my mother again. “I’ve never seen him in so much pain and I need for once in my life to do something for my family and not myself.”
“He deserves everything he gets,” Bardot hisses. “Leaving her after her heat finished. Making it out that he wanted her.”
“Bardot,” I whisper.
“Coffee?” Mom asks. “It looks like my girls have forgotten their manners.”
“Please.” He smiles as he looks at Bardot and Harlow with watery eyes. “I love they stick up for each other. You obviously brought them up well.”
Mom’s eyes close as her hand reaches behind her neck and she rubs over the claiming mark my father gave her. The one that aches every now and again.
“You okay?” he asks.
She nods. “Your son is probably hurting because Grace claimed him during her heat.”
“Mom!”
“He needs to know, Grace. If you can’t give the father of your child another chance, Senator Hilton needs to know that his son is going to hurt for the rest of his life.”
“Because you are?” I ask her.
“This isn’t about me.”
“You were claimed?” Senator asks Mom. “What did you say your name was?”
“Doctor Marilyn Foster.” She nods. “Luckily, not by my scent match, but the pain of being rejected after being claimed is still very real.” She turns back to me. “I don’t know what you were thinking.”
Tears lace my eyes as I shake my head. “I was in my heat. I barely remember it. But I obviously thought he was my alpha.”
“Oh, Grace.” Her voice is low and disappointed.
“Doctor? Have you ever worked in New York?” Senator Hilton asks Mom and I’m glad the attention is taken from me.
She shakes her head, and he sighs.
“I did my training there, though. At the Omega Memorial Hospital on Ninth Avenue.”
“That’s where we were born,” Harlow says.
Mom nods and smiles. “I went into labor while training there.”
He sucks back a breath and nods lightly, like he’s lost in time. Then shakes that thought away and turns back to me.
“If the baby is my grandchild, and you won’t give Lucas a chance to be a father, I’ll set up a trust fund to make sure you and the baby want for nothing.”
“What do you mean… if the baby is your grandchild? I was with your son during my heat.”
“And Stanton. It could be his?”
“I’ve only just started seeing Stanton,” I reply.
“But Lucas told me he asked him to help you through your heat.”
Icy fingers walk down my spine. I curl my fingers into my palms, digging my nails into my palms as I stare at him. “Sorry. Are you saying Stanton was there, too?”
He swallows, a ripple runs down his throat. “I thought you knew?”
I raise my eyebrows. I’m annoyed, but a bigger part of me is trying to hide that I’m on the verge of breaking down.
“Oh, fuck!” Shaking his head, he scrubs his face with his hand. “You really didn’t know?”
I shake my head as tears sting my eyes. “Lucas and Stanton were both Henry?” I murmur. “They were both pretending to be the same person?”
“Henry.” he growls. “What the hell?”
“That’s the name they used.” My voice is quiet. I lift my hand before my fingertips touch Stanton’s claiming mark. For the first time since he bit me, it hurts.
It hurts so fucking much that my chest lurches forward as I sob.
My sister wraps a comforting arm around me. “We’ve got you, Grace,” Harlow says, gently holding my head and resting it on her shoulder.
“They never even told you their names!” Senator Hilton bellows. His alpha bark makes everyone jump. “I am so fucking annoyed with him right now. He’s pining for you, yet he wasn’t even truthful with you?”
Mom made me go to my room while she controlled the situation with Senator Hilton.
I’ve spent the past half an hour curled up in my bed.
Tears stream down my face, blurring my vision and making my cheeks and eyes sting.
I press my palm against my throbbing temple; the pain amplified by the constant stream of lies going over and over in my head.
Senator Hilton stayed for another half an hour. I overheard them talking about the baby and what he planned to do to help.
Mom told him she could look after us and that we didn’t need his charity.
He never liked it. I guess the man thinks he can always get what he wants.
He doesn’t know my mother. She’s an omega, but she’s far from weak. Far from submissive. She’s stronger than anyone I know. She’s had to be.
My phone rings. I check the caller.
Stanton.
Part of me wants to ignore him. The other part of me answers. “When were you going to tell me?”
“Grace. Are you okay? The bond…”
“Don’t fucking talk about the bond. When were you going to tell me you were there?” I wipe away a stray tear. “When Stanton?”
Blood thrashes in my ear. He knows exactly what I’m talking about.
He must have known this would happen.
“Grace, I never wanted to keep it from you,” Stanton’s voice trembles through the phone. “I’ll be there in an hour. Let me explain to you.”
“Don’t you dare come anywhere near me,” I scoff, licking away a tear from my lip. “I hate the two of you.”
“No, you don’t, baby. You’re upset and I understand, but we can work it out.” Stanton sighs heavily on the other end of the line. “Please, believe me when I say that everything I’ve done, I did out of love for you.”
“To get your rocks off, you mean?”
“Don’t!” he barks. “You know you’re more than that.”
A surge of anger powers through me. “Am I? Did you both have a laugh about it afterward? Did you both have a morbid plan to fuck me up with your fake dating situation? It was all a joke to you and Lucas.” I swallow the sob that is desperate to claw from my throat.
“No,” he mutters.
“I’m a joke,” I whisper, finally calming down.
“Grace. I fucking claimed you because I love you. Because you’re my omega. Do you know what it’s like to make a promise to your pack mate yet know I wanted so badly to shout from the rooftops that the baby inside you could be mine?” His sigh is heavy as it comes through my earpiece. “The baby feels like mine.”
I shake my head as I press my hand over my baby.
“No, don’t.” I swallow the lump that’s grown in my throat.
“I wanted to tell you, I promise.” His tone is softer and calmer. “I wanted Lucas to be given the time to work out his issues with his father.”
“And now I need time,” I whisper, the exhaustion of the day weighing down on me. “Time to process all of this.”
“I understand,” Stanton replies softly. “I know I messed up, Grace. The situation was complicated because of Lucas’ father, but please believe me when I say that I love you and the baby, and I desperately want it to be mine.”
“And Lucas?” I blow out a breath and close my eyes, trying to calm my nerves.
“I’m working on him.”
“His father was here.” I don’t know how much to tell him, then I decide he deserves to know.
“He was? Why?” His voice shakes, already afraid of what I’ve been told.
“He was the one who told me everything.”
“His father?”
“Yeah. It appears I’m the last to know, and he didn’t like it one bit.”
“I’ll make it right,” he says.
I cover his claiming mark with my fingers. I really need his soothing mouth on it to take away the ache.
“I feel you Grace. I’m sorry. Let me make it better,” Stanton says as he tries to push comfort through the bond.
I reject it and disconnect the call.