Chapter 14
Admittedly, it felt a little cruel to walk away from Eva while she was crying in a parking lot. But I needed to go grab my car, and I wasn’t exactly keen sure as fuck wasn't going to park it here of all places.
I’d already been walking towards her. It took me a little while to figure out where she was going, but once I watched her park and go in, I decided to find a spot to park my car, a watched spot.
Surely she knew this wasn't a nice neighborhood… right? Well, I mean, obviously, she did now.
I went to the valet parking I'd chosen, handed the attendant the slip, and waited with a tap of my foot for him to collect my car.
My omega was waiting for me. My omega needed me.
Needed us.
She could've asked anyone for help, but it was our pack that she reached for when she needed it.
And that meant something.
Or, at the very least, it meant that Charlie's beach vacation was going better than he hoped in that they'd actually managed to get on the plane.
I wouldn't call the alpha a workaholic the way I would with me, or even Marcus, but he certainly wasn't afraid of late nights when they were called for.
Something he'd reduced once he'd bonded with his pack, but couldn't escape entirely.
Not with Scent CX doing so well.
I traded my keys for a crisp twenty-dollar bill from my wallet, sliding into the driver's side of the car and peeling out of the lot to go the few short blocks to where I'd tracked Eva.
She'd dropped a pin to help me find her, but I didn't need it.
A little flicker of irritation went through me at her irresponsibility. Didn't she know there was a monitored lot, not even five blocks away? Why wouldn't she look for something like that?
Though from the general patina of her vehicle, I wasn't sure it was worth much more than parts. And not in a snobby, I have enough money to buy a new car for every day of the week kind of way. In a was this the car you bought yourself in high school? kind of way.
Or maybe a little of both, I guess I couldn’t be sure.
I could almost find it in myself to be impressed that she was so loyal to her hunk of scrap metal, but any kind of warm feelings towards the car dried immediately as I pulled up beside her in the gravel lot and caught sight of her red, puffy face.
"T-thanks f-f-f-or c-c-c-oming—" she said with a heavy sniff as I got out of the car, rounding the back to come and inspect the smash job on her windows up close.
"Of course," I said, my chest tight with the overly sweet, rotten stench of her stressed scent. But the smell was manageable, if only barely; it was the crying that made me want to run. "Why don't you get in the car, and I'll take you home?"
Awkwardly, I patted her shoulder, offering a tight smile that felt more like a grimace. Eva turned to me, her blue eyes glassy and wet as she threw her arms around my neck, her face pressing into my chest and dampening the front of my black t-shirt.
I tried, very, very, very hard, not to think about how many germs were in the saliva and snot she was sinking into the fabric.
A task I failed as I half lifted her to turn and open the passenger side of my car, nudging the omega into the seat, "C’mon—let's uh—"
I froze.
Just under the nearly alcoholic scent of Eva's distress, there was something else. Something familiar.
I couldn't entirely place it, where I'd smelled it before… and with Eva's uneven breathing and sniffling muddying my thoughts with their overwhelming… muchness… I couldn't think straight enough to figure it out.
She settled into the seat, clutching a folio of paperwork against her chest that her knees came up to meet.
Bile rose in the back of my throat at the thought of her filthy shoes on the upholstery of the seat.
I hadn't considered when I'd offered to be the one to pick the omega up that she wouldn't be familiar with my rules… but I was the closest, by far, and it wasn't like I was going to leave the job to someone else.
Still, when I leaned into the car to buckle Eva's seatbelt, since she didn't seem inclined to do it herself, I couldn't help the pang in my gut as I worried about when the last time she washed her hands was.
Our eyes met, and for a moment, the howling inside of me quieted—until she lifted her arm to blow her nose into her sleeve.
I reared back, closing the door between us and turning away quickly to hide the revulsion on my face.
Crying, I decided then, was my least favorite thing on the planet.
Between the noise and the mess… wholly unacceptable.
Now that there was some space between us, I took a couple of deep breaths, as much to steady myself as an attempt to try and gather a bit more of that familiar scent into my lungs, but it was gone now. Drowned by Eva's perfume.
Shit.
I leaned into her car, careful to avoid the glass as I opened the glove box to pull out her pink slip. Not that it would do her much good, since I doubted the car was worth stealing.
If it had been, wouldn't they have stolen it?
As I withdrew from the cab of the car, something caught my eye. Something that flagged the back of my mind as being unusual. wrong.
All of the change in her cupholder, and even a couple of small bills, were still there.
I snapped a few photos, just in case someone else came by before one of the others could arrive, sending a message to Marcus to see if he was able to come by and keep an eye on the situation until I was able to return for another look
If this had been your typical smash-and-grab, easily accessible cash should've been the first thing to take. Especially since I knew Eva had her laptop in the bag on the floor of my car.
I ignored the flickering thought of the germs that'd soaked into the weave of the fabric when she removed it, grateful that I was taking her to her place instead of mine.
Rounding the car, I slid into the driver's side, relieved to find that the omega's sobs had subdued a little, even if her miserable scent continued to permeate the space.
I drove out of the lot, glancing at her sidelong. "Are you cold?"
"No," she sniffed, cuddling her knees.
Should I… touch her? Is that comforting? I wondered, frowning a little as I took the first turn to take us towards her place.
I reached into the glovebox, pulling a travel-sized packet of tissues from the compartment and handing it to her. “Here. Please use these.”
“Um, thanks…” she mumbled, opening the packing and pulling a tissue free to blow her nose again. "Don't you need my address?"
I laughed, shaking my head. I knew where I was going, though I supposed to her that it was a surprise. It didn't matter, not really. I was her alpha. Surely it made sense that I knew where she lived.
Her temporary alpha, though the distinction felt all wrong.
Remembering the little plastic holder I'd removed from her car, I fished it out of the pocket of my jacket to offer it to her. "For your insurance. Did you have anything of value in there?"
"N-no," she said, the dangerous wobble of her tone warning that she was on the brink of crying again. "I-IIi—don't know what I'm going to do! The stupid thing barely drove as it was, and I can't afford a new one!" She sobbed, her face going into her knees as her shoulders shook.
With her cloying scent nearly making my eyes water, the addition of the sound—loud sobs and broken words that were difficult for me to piece together even after speaking English natively since I was twelve, it was overstimulating to the point of maddening, making it hard to focus on the road.
I slammed on the brakes as I nearly rammed into the back of a commuter car ahead of us, the stoplight above glowing red.
My heart leapt to my throat, arm flying out as we came to an uncomfortably jerky stop.
"If you stop crying," I said through clenched teeth, so tightly that my jaw ached. "I'll buy you a new car. But you need to stop. right now, before you kill us."
If only temporarily, Eva stopped crying, and the knot in my chest loosened, allowing me the first real lungful of air that I'd managed since I'd started driving.
"You can't just buy me a new car because I'm crying," she said, her tone conveying her complete confusion and disapproval. "That's crazy."
"I'll give you whatever you want—you need that studio space too, right?" I asked, talking fast as I sensed another wave of emotion coming.
I wasn't equipped for this sort of thing, something I was going to need to work on before the baby.
The baby.
I looked at Eva sidelong. "What color is your hair naturally?"
She blinked, and I realized that I must've interrupted her midsentence.
"What?"
"Your hair, it obviously doesn't grow out of your head pink?"
"Well, no…" she hedged. "I'm like, a mousy brown naturally?"
The corners of my mouth ticked up in approval, imagining her like that. "Cute."
I briefly wondered if she had any photos from her childhood. I would need to check the next time I “let myself” into her apartment.
"What does that have to do with anything?"
"I was simply… curious," I said, thinking that that was likely not the moment to press the surrogacy issue.
Though if she was this upset over a relatively manageable issue, finances had to be a fairly serious factor in her decision-making process.
Perhaps it was exactly the time to discuss it.
"Your job… it doesn't pay well?"
"It pays fine," she mumbled. "Life is just expensive."
I hummed, not agreeing or disagreeing. Inflation in recent years had been above the acceptable average.
And the service that Eva provided, while enrapturing, was still considered non-essential.
Well, to some, I suppose. Loneliness was a powerful motivator.
Almost as powerful as the urge to procreate.
Though even I wouldn't cross into that thought path while the omega had snot on her sweater.
A man had limits.
"And I'd saved enough to be able to rent a little space to set up my studio, but now…" she sniffed, voice going tight, and the alarm bell that she was going to start wailing again went off inside my mind. "I won't be able to afford it and a new car.”
Half panicked, my nervous system shot, the longer this went on, I blurted out the first thing that I could think of. "If you had my pack's baby, I'd set you up for life."