Chapter 24
Twenty-Four
Strat
A pparently, moving the animals to Lance’s place was an “all hands on deck” kind of deal. Even I’d been roped in, and honestly, I was happy to be included, even if I knew nothing about animals. My parents hadn’t been pet people. Hell, they hadn’t even been kid people.
But I was happy to follow orders and haul boxes. Otillie-James’s vet friends had also come along, bringing a large horse trailer to load goats and crates into. I imagined this was how Noah had felt when it started to rain.
I stood holding the leash of a truly obese dog, though you wouldn’t know that from the athleticness of his tail. He was very sweet, even if walking looked painful for him. I scratched behind his ears while we waited for our turn to be loaded onto Otillie’s Ark.
We hadn’t talked about what had happened during her heat. We hadn’t spoken about where we all went from here. We were just continuing as if it had never happened and she wasn’t an Omega, and we were back to the getting-to-know-you portion of our friendship, pretending like I didn’t know how she tasted when she came all over my tongue.
One of Otillie-James’s friends wandered toward me. From what I could tell, they were a large Pack, and the woman walking toward me was their Beta, Anakie. She and Rex were both vets, while their other Alpha was a mechanic, and their Omega was their heart.
Anakie dipped her head as she approached me, bending down to pet the obese Lab. “Omega. How are you doing over here?”
I shrugged. “He’s a very good boy,” I said softly, making the dog look up at me adoringly. He really was cute. I wondered if Otillie would keep him.
“That he is. He just needs a little extra care. He’s got a really big heart, and some people would abuse that.”
I looked at the Beta. She was pretty, in an earthy way. Light brown hair, freckles from being in the sun, rough hands and laugh lines—she was a beauty in her own unique way. But she didn’t make me feel anything like what Otillie made me feel. Well before she’d been an Omega, even.
I met her eyes. “She’s tougher than she looks. She doesn’t need us to fight her battles for her. But I promise that I’ll protect her, heart and body, for as long as she’ll let me. Those Alphas over there? They adore her. I’m also fairly sure Lance would jump in front of a bullet for her, and they’re still at some weird emotional impasse.” I shook my head. “We haven’t got it all figured out yet, but Otillie-James is our focus.”
If I’d thought that would be the end of it, I was sorely mistaken. These people obviously loved Otillie, so when the other Omega popped up beside me, I wasn’t even surprised. Anakie’s Omega was the opposite of her; Sophie was soft, curvy with dark hair and a wide smile that stretched across her face. She looked nice, but her Omega didn’t call to me the way Otillie-James’s did. My connection to my Omega defied logic.
Sophie tilted her head at me. “You’re okay that she’s another Omega? That you’d be sharing Alphas? Because I love Tills, but the idea of her joining my Pack makes my Omega hiss like a wildcat.”
I shrugged. It was hard to explain to anyone outside of myself. “Not only does my Omega not care about her designation, he wants her. I don’t want her Alphas—” I cut myself off. “Okay, no, I do want her Alphas. There’s a connection there. But if I had to choose, I’d choose her.”
Sophie looked at me appraisingly, then grinned. “In that case, welcome to the family, Strat!” She hugged me tight and bounced off toward her Packmates. Rex, her giant Alpha, was carrying one of the crates, but leaned down, picked up his Omega one-armed, and kissed her. Honestly, it was impressive as hell.
Anakie snorted. “I better go save Gert before she ends up sitting in that cage for ages, because they’re making out like teenagers again.” The Beta headed over there, but I watched as Rex broke off the kiss with his Omega to kiss her too. Man, they were the picture of perfect Pack bliss.
“Are you checking out other Alphas there, Omega?” someone whispered in my ear, and the scent of browned vanilla and sweet tobacco flooding my nose told me it was Truett.
A smirk curled my lips. “You have to admit, he’s kind of hot, in that giant tank kind of way.”
Truett grunted, pulling me back toward his chest. “Is that so? Is that what you like, Strat? Do you want a giant to pick you up and throw you around?”
Well, I wouldn’t say no to that, but I wasn’t interested in Rex. Not in the way I was interested in the man behind me. “Mmm, no. I prefer my Alphas with smart mouths and stacked bodies.”
He nuzzled the back of my neck, making me want to pant. “Hmm, that sounds like someone I know.” He nipped my shoulder, and I barely bit back a moan.
“Sonny?” I teased.
“Cheeky,” he growled. “We still have to talk. I know that, but I can’t stop fucking thinking about you. You’ll let us court you, won’t you, Omega?”
My heart stilled in my chest. “Do you all agree? Is this something everyone wants?” I hadn’t felt so uncertain in my life. So nervous.
“We all agree. I think OJ might even like you more than she likes us.” He spun me around, so I was looking up into his face. He was only a few inches taller, but it was enough to make me tilt my head back. “Do you know, before she designated, OJ was trying to convince me that you were the perfect Omega for us? At that point, she meant for just me and Sonny, but I told her that if there was going to be an us, she was included in that. She didn’t know it yet, but there was only ever going to be a future for our Pack with OJ in it.
“The fact she’s an Omega is a curveball, but it doesn’t change what we want.” He kissed my cheek, just to the left of my lips. “We want you too, and we’re happy to work hard to show you that.”
They already had me. But it wouldn’t hurt for them to make grand gestures, to show Otillie-James what she deserved. “Okay, but you have to court us both. Me and her.”
Truett grinned, that smile with those dimples making my stomach do swoops. Unfair bastard.
“This is how I know you’re perfect, Strat. You’re a stubborn fucker, just like in the courtroom, but you are still looking out for our girl’s best interest. We’ll woo you both. Just you wait.” He kissed my lips quickly, then bounded off to help herd Kevin the pig into the truck.
Our girl. I loved the sound of that.
Seven hours later, animals had been placed in stalls, kitten cages had been set up, birds had been placed in temporary aviaries, and the Remorne Pack had all gone home. We’d had a bit of a cookout in Lance’s backyard, and I still couldn’t believe this place. Or that he’d been living under a bridge when he could’ve been here.
But I didn’t pretend to understand people’s trauma, or what led them to the decisions they made. I might have made a different choice in their position, or maybe I wouldn’t have. It was hard to know without living someone else’s life experiences.
The Beta in question was haunting the house like a ghost, trapped somewhere between the past and present. I didn’t know much about Lance, only what Otillie-James had told me. I didn’t know where he fit into the Pack they were building. However, I thought he’d be staying around, which meant if I wanted to be part of her life, it would be pertinent for me to get to know him.
He was standing out in the backyard, throwing a rope toy for the dogs, including Akio, who was kindly letting Doodles the zombie dog get to it first. Doodles, however, had trouble holding onto the toy with his messed-up mouth, so Akio would pick it up and carry it back to Lance.
Honkers the Labrador was lying on his side, doing his best impression of a speed hump, exhausted after a big day of moving house. I reached down to scratch his ears, his tail thumping twice the only indication that he was alive.
Akio gave me the side-eye, but sidled up to me so I could scratch his ears too. “He seems to be enjoying the company,” I said lightly as Doodles jumped all over the bigger dog.
Lance nodded. “He was lonely.” He threw the rope again, both dogs running after it. Even Honkers attempted to sit up to chase the rope, but immediately decided it was too hard and flopped back down. Doodles leapt over him on three legs, like he was an Olympic long jumper.
“He doesn’t seem so lonely now. He seems content, even. I know the group has accepted him, and he seems to have accepted them in return.” I grinned as Doodles and Akio played tug of war with the rope, though Akio only had to lightly shake it, and the scrappy little dog went flying. “I wish it was that easy for us. Without the conjecture, the overthinking, the what-ifs and buts. Just pure acceptance. Then no one would have to be lonely anymore.”
Lance looked at me from the corner of his eye. His face was a mess of scars, but somehow, they just made him interesting. One pulled up the corner of his mouth, tugging at in a way that must’ve been almost painful, even now. “I don’t think you’ll be lonely for much longer,” he murmured, and I wanted to shake this big, stupid brute.
Okay. So subtle allegories aren’t going to work.
I stepped in front of him, looking him in the eyes, startling him for a moment. Maybe making sudden movements toward a former Marine with PTSD wasn’t my smartest idea, but I was all in now. “Neither of us has to be lonely anymore, Lance. She has enough to give us both. They have a place for us all. She looks at you like you’re the last piece of candy in the bowl; she wants to eat you up in one bite.” I shrugged and stepped back. “No one needs a martyr when they can have a hero, Lance.”
Leaving it at that, I went back inside his house and found a collapsed Otillie lying on the couch, watching some reality TV show about an animal rescue—probably getting ideas. Ideas I’d help her achieve, if it made her happy. Sliding onto the spot beside her, I crawled between her thighs and rested my head on her lower stomach. Immediately, she scraped her fingers through my hair, making me purr.
Laughing, she smiled down at me, and I wondered if you could fall in love with someone in a week. I hadn’t seen it; my parents hated each other. My grandparents had too, before they died. My friends’ parents were either divorced or both working full-time careers, barely seeing each other.
From what I’d seen, love was a fantasy. And this love at first sight stuff? A fairytale.
But when she looked down at me, her eyes sparkling, that feeling in my chest felt a lot like love.
She stroked my cheeks. “Thank you for today.”
I turned my face to kiss her fingers. “Anytime, sweetheart. Tomorrow, next year, forty years from now.”
Her laughter told me she didn’t think I was serious, but that was okay. I’d have time to prove to her I was dead serious. We lay there in silence for a bit, her fingers stroking through my hair, and my hand wrapped around her thigh.
I started to wonder if I could turn this moment into me eating her out on the couch.
She stiffened. At first, I thought I’d fucked up and said the inside words on the outside, but when I looked up at her face, she wasn’t looking at me at all. She was staring at the TV.
“Pass me the remote.”
I grabbed it from down beside the couch and passed it to her. She scrolled back the video, then paused the screen. I couldn’t see what had her rattled at all. The host of the show sat with one of the owners beside a barn. The man’s smiling face was warm, and whatever anecdote he was saying was making the owner laugh.
“Does that guy seem familiar?” Otillie asked, frowning.
I stared at the screen again. I mean, of course he looked familiar. The guy was basically a celebrity in South Carolina, with the reality TV program, and a vlog before that. His whole Pack were celebrities now, from their Omega, Allegra, to their other Alpha, John, who was a retired college professor.
I tried to see what I was missing, but came up with nothing. “Anthony Smalls? I mean, yeah?”
She shook her head, sitting up. “No, behind him, carrying that bucket.”
I looked behind the interview, at all the workers bustling around, trying to make such a large rescue run smoothly. When I spotted it, I sucked in a breath.
The guy from the lineup. The one she hadn’t been able to place, with the red hair.
What were the chances that a worker from an animal rescue would also be at a cockfight?