Chapter 11 #2
“I love you, June. More than anything.”
“I know, Mom. I love you too.” I sigh heavily.
I hang up and sit here in the silence, staring at the road ahead.
Everything is falling apart. My body. My home. My business. The careful life I’ve built is crumbling around me, and I don’t know how to stop it. Shit!
I don’t recall how long I’ve been sitting here, parked on the side of the road, but I start driving again until I find myself parking in front of The Rusty Spur, knowing that Hazel is here most mornings.
So I get out and drag myself in there, spotting her at a table in the middle of the room with an open laptop, her blonde-and-pink hair pulled into a high ponytail.
She glances up at me. “You look like death warmed over,” she announces as I slide into the seat across from her. “You okay, hon?” She gets up and gives me a big hug before I can stop her. Then she pulls back, and her brow furrows as she sits down again. “Why does your scent smell different?”
“I need to tell you something.” The words come out in a rush. “Please don’t be upset with me. I should have told you years ago, but I convinced myself it didn’t matter, and this whole week has been chaos, and I think the universe is finally done letting me pretend—”
“Breathe.” Hazel reaches across the table and grabs my hand. “Whatever it is, just tell me.”
I take a shaky breath. “I’m an Omega.”
She blinks.
“Or I was. Or I am. I don’t know anymore.
” The words tumble out faster now, seven years of secrets spilling onto the sticky bar table.
“When I was younger, doctors diagnosed me as dormant. Said I’d probably never have heats, never form proper bonds.
My parents convinced me it would be easier to just…
take suppressants to conceal my Omega side and pretend to be a Beta.
Avoid all the complications of a designation that didn’t work properly anyway. ”
“June…”
“I know. I know I should have told you. But I wanted to believe it myself, you know? Wanted to just be normal and uncomplicated and not have to deal with any of it.” I swallow hard.
“And then those three Alphas rolled into town, and suddenly my suppressants are making me sick and my body is doing things it’s never done before, and I think they might have woken something up inside me that was supposed to stay asleep. ”
Hazel is quiet for a long moment. Then she stands up again, comes around to my side of the table, and pulls me into a fiercer hug. “Oh, hon.” Her voice is thick. “I’m so sorry. That must have been so lonely.”
I didn’t realize how much I needed to hear those words until tears were spilling down my cheeks.
“I didn’t know who I was supposed to be,” I whisper. “My parents made it sound so easy—just take the pills and live a normal life. But it wasn’t easy. It was pretending every single day. Hiding. Lying to everyone, including myself.”
She strokes my hair. “I know.”
We stay like that for a moment before she pulls back, keeping hold of my hands.
“Okay. Tell me about the guys and how they’re impacting you. Tell me everything.”
So we take our seats and I let it all out. The way their scents overwhelm me. The pain that flares when I’m near them and fades when they touch me. Last night with Carter and how his presence was the only thing that made the agony bearable.
“I think they’re my scent matches,” I admit. “All three of them.”
Hazel nods slowly. “That would explain a lot.”
“But what am I supposed to do about it when they leave? I have a life here, or I did, before everything started falling apart. And even if I told them the truth, what then? I’m a dormant Omega. I might never go into heat properly. And maybe I’ll never be able to give them what they need.”
“You don’t know that.”
“The doctors—”
“Doctors are wrong all the time.” She squeezes my hands. “Listen, I’m an Omega. I know what this pull feels like. When I found my fated mate at eighteen, it was like the entire world narrowed down to just him. Nothing else mattered. Nothing else existed.”
I nod, knowing she’s experienced a tragic past.
Her expression flickers—pain, then acceptance. “I told you before he passed away. Car accident. I was nineteen.”
“So sorry.”
“It was a long time ago.” She takes a breath.
“It took me years to feel normal again. To want anything. That’s why I don’t do serious relationships anymore—can’t risk that kind of loss again.
But I know how intense that attraction is.
How impossible it is to fight. And if you’re feeling that, then this is the real thing. ”
“So what do I do?”
“Talk to them.” She says it like it’s simple. “Tell them the truth. Let them decide what they want. Besides, from what I’ve seen, those boys are already gone for you. Scent match or not, dormant or not, they look at you like you hung the moon.”
“Around them I lose my ability to think. I just stand there drooling like an idiot. How am I supposed to have a serious conversation when my brain shuts off every time they get close?”
Hazel laughs. “Yeah, that part’s hard. The first few weeks with my mate, I could barely string two words together. But it gets easier. The intensity levels out eventually.”
“Eventually.”
“A few months. Maybe a year.”
“Fantastic.”
She’s on her feet. “Gonna order us something to eat and drink.”
It doesn’t take long for the simple bar food to arrive, and while we eat, she tells me more about her experiences as an Omega—the good parts and the hard parts, the things no one warns you about. It helps, somehow. Knowing I’m not alone in this.
“Okay,” she says eventually, pushing her empty plate aside. “Enough heavy stuff. I need to show you something that will make you laugh.”
She reopens her laptop and connects it to the bar’s main TV screen—she’s friends with the owner, apparently—and starts scrolling through photos.
“These are from the carnival shoot. The official ones.” She flips through images of the guys posing with fans, looking professional and devastatingly handsome. “But then I got bored and started playing around.”
She clicks to the next image, and I burst out laughing.
It’s me, Kai, and Carter standing in front of the Eiffel Tower. We’re posed like tourists, Kai throwing up a peace sign, Carter with his arm around my shoulders, me grinning at the camera. Behind us, clearly photoshopped in, is Seth on horseback, looking stoic and slightly confused.
“Oh my God.”
“Wait, it gets better.”
The next one shows us at the Egyptian pyramids. Seth is still on his horse, now wearing a pharaoh’s headdress that Hazel has crudely drawn in. The photo after that is the Great Wall of China. Then the Grand Canyon. Then what appears to be the surface of the moon.
“Hazel.” I’m crying with laughter. “These are hilarious.”
She clicks through more. “Look, here you are at the Taj Mahal. And here’s one where I put Seth on a surfboard in Hawaii.”
I hear the door open behind us. “What in the hell am I looking at?” a familiar male voice calls out across the empty bar.
I spin around. Seth is standing in the entrance, hat in hand, staring at the TV screen where his photoshopped face is currently surfing a twenty-foot wave.
He strolls closer, studying the image with an expression somewhere between disbelief and amusement.
“Is that me?”
“No, that’s your doppelganger who happens to be really good at surfing,” Hazel deadpans.
“I heard you both cackling from out on the sidewalk.” He slides into the seat next to me, his thigh pressing against mine, and nods at the screen. “Show me more.”
Hazel grins and starts clicking through. Seth watches each image with growing amusement, occasionally snorting or shaking his head.
“I’m impressed I made it to Egypt,” he says when the pyramid one comes up. “On my horse, no less. That’s dedication.”
“You’re a man of many talents,” I say.
“Apparently.” He turns to glance at me, and I realize too late how close we are. His blue eyes are warm, irresistible. My face heats. Seth’s gaze hasn’t left mine.
“You smell different today,” he says quietly, low enough that Hazel might not hear.
I look away. “Do I?” I say, playing dumb.
“Stronger. Sweeter.” He pauses. “Like yourself.”
I don’t know how to respond to that. Don’t know how to handle the intensity in his eyes or the way my body is leaning toward him without permission.
“Why are you in town?” I ask, changing the subject. “Shouldn’t you be training?”
“Had to meet with my lawyer. The sheriff’s trying to move my court date to the same day as my main ride next week. We’re getting it pushed back.”
I should pull away, put some distance between us before my body does something embarrassing. But his closeness feels so grounding and steadying that I can’t bring myself to move.
Seth’s eyes shift to the bar, then back to me like he’s making a decision. “I’m going to grab a drink,” he says, low. “You want anything?”
“I’m fine,” I manage, which is a lie. I’m not fine. I’m sitting here trying to act normal while his scent keeps teasing me.
He pushes to his feet, and I study him as he goes, because I can’t help it. At the bar, the owner leans in, and they start talking like they’ve got history. Seth laughs once, shakes his head, says something I can’t hear, and it turns into one of those conversations that drags on.
I’m still watching when the TV mounted on the wall with Hazel’s photos start flickering.
Then snaps to black-and-white, grainy, security-style footage.
Seth reappears at our table fast, sliding in beside me, eyes already locked on the screen. He leans forward, forearms on the table, and his voice goes quieter than the music.
“That’s from the night I was here,” he says. “The night I remember up to the first drink… and then nothing.”
The air shifts around us. We all go still, attention pulled up to the silent footage.
On the screen, Seth approaches the bar, looking sober and steady. The place is packed, bodies everywhere, people pushing to get closer to the circuit star who just walked in.
And there, hanging on his arm like she belongs there, is a woman.
Dark hair. Pale eyes. Dressed in something tight and low-cut. She’s pressed against Seth’s side, touching his shoulder, his arm, leaning into him with aggressive familiarity. There are a couple of other women behind him.
Something hot and sharp twists in my chest.
You’re jealous of a woman in security footage from days ago. Get it together, June.
“She wouldn’t leave me alone,” Seth mutters, watching his past self try to create distance. “I remember that much.”
On the screen, Seth orders his drink. The bartender sets what looks like a Coke in front of him. He turns to respond to someone calling his name from behind—
And the woman’s hand moves toward his glass.
“There.” The bar owner pauses the footage. “Did you see that?”
We all lean closer. It’s not definitive—she could be reaching for her own drink, could be stretching, could be doing a dozen innocent things. But the timing and angle are suspicious.
“She could have spiked your drink,” I say.
“That chick looks super familiar,” Hazel admits. “I swear I’ve seen her.”
She’s hunching over her laptop, scrolling through photos, then turns it toward us.
“I knew I’d seen her. She was at the carnival too.
I remember her face.” We’re staring at the same dark hair, the ice-blue eyes, lurking in the background of one of the fan photos.
“You guys might have a stalker,” she adds.
“She needs to move the hell on,” Seth says.
“Who is she?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “I barely remember her.”
Then he’s already moving, pushing back from the table and heading for the bar with that purposeful stride, like the footage lit a fire under him. He leans in to speak to the owner.
“Can you send that footage to my lawyer?” he asks loud enough for us to hear him this time.
The owner nods without hesitation. “Of course. I can do it now.”
Seth pulls his phone out, already typing, already in work mode.
Hazel nudges my side with her elbow, and I look at her, brows raised. She’s grinning like a troublemaker. Then she makes an exaggerated kissy face and flicks her fingers toward Seth’s back like she’s launching me at him.
I clamp my mouth shut to keep from laughing out loud, but a giggle still slips out.
Hazel’s eyes sparkle. She mouths, Talk to him, touch him.
I glare at her, but it’s weak, and she knows it.
A minute later, Seth returns to the table, sliding back into his seat like he never left, only his focus is sharper now, the edges of him drawn tight.
“Just gotta step out and talk to my lawyer,” he says. “Then I’m going to swing by the station and get this in front of them.”
Hazel nods, all business. Then his attention shifts to me, and for half a second, he hesitates like this part isn’t as easy as dealing with footage and police.
“June,” he says, quieter, “can I ask a favor?”
“Depends,” I tease, trying to keep it light.
He clears his throat. “I came here with my lawyer, and he’s gone. Any chance I could catch a ride back to the ranch with you?”
Hazel makes a noise that is absolutely not a cough and absolutely a laugh.
“Of course,” I answer immediately. “We were just finishing up anyway.”
The corners of Seth’s mouth lift, and he’s so handsome that I lose my thoughts. “Take your time. I’ll wait for you.”
Then he rises, phone in hand, and heads for the door to make the call.
The second his back is turned, Hazel leans in, eyes bright. “Oh, yeah,” she whispers, grinning. “You’ll wait for that piece of candy.”
I choke on a laugh. “Hazel.”
She laughs too, quiet and wicked, and I can’t help laughing with her as Seth disappears outside.