Chapter 40
After Dinner
Elowen
The dining room looks completely different at this time of the evening.
The overhead light catches the crystal of the water glasses and throws small prisms across the walls. The good plates are out, the ones I found stacked in the back of the cabinet still in their original packaging, and Odette filled the center of the table with a big pot of her bolognese.
I take the last bite of my pasta and set my fork down.
The bolognese is extraordinary.
Rich and slow-cooked and deeply savory, the kind of recipe that takes most of a day to cook and tastes like it.
There's fresh parmigiano on top that Odette grated herself at the table, and the focaccia was still warm when we started eating, covered in rosemary and sea salt and an obscene amount of olive oil.
I ate more in one sitting than I probably have in my entire life, and I don't feel even slightly bad about it.
I lean into Perrin's side, my shoulder finding the warm space between his arm and his chest. He shifts to hold me, his arm coming up around my shoulders, his attention still on the conversation moving around the table as I press my palm flat against my very full stomach.
On my other side, Raff reaches across me for the last bit of focaccia on my plate, and I let him have it because I seriously cannot eat another bite.
Across the table, Odette sits between Adam and Cliff, a wineglass in one hand and her silver hair catching the warm light of the room.
Her gray eyes move from Raff to Cliff. “You boys wash up, and I’ll break out the olive oil cake once you’re done.”
Raff sits up so fast his chair scrapes the floor. "Olive oil cake?"
"That's right." Odette cuts a look to the empty pot sitting in the center of the table, making her point without words.
Raff is already on his feet, the pot in both hands before anyone else has moved. Perrin smiles widely as he watches the alpha go.
Cliff stands, smiling as he begins collecting plates from around the table with his free hand. He pauses beside Odette and leans down, pressing a kiss to her cheek. "Thank you," he says quietly. "We really needed a good meal."
"It's important for omegas to be well fed after their system settles," she says as she leans into Adam’s side, making the omega smile.
"Sal ate nothing but oatmeal for two days after his heats.
" She shakes her head, the memory moving across her face like light through water.
"Then, for a solid week after that, the man ate everything in the house that wasn't nailed down.
" She looks back at Cliff. "So consider yourself warned. "
Cliff laughs as he straightens up. "I’m good with that.”
"Go wash up," she says, waving a hand at him.
"Perrin." Cliff glances at the beta across the table. "Grab the breadboard on your way in."
Perrin turns to me before he stands, and presses his lips to my cheek. It's soft and warm and completely unhurried, like he has all the time in the world. I reluctantly release the beta, and he stands, stacking the last few dishes including my empty plate.
“I’ll help.” I push my own chair back.
"Sit down, sweetheart," Odette says, as she reaches for her wineglass. "The men can clean up fine on their own.”
I smile, then sit, watching as Perrin disappears into the kitchen with the dishes. And then it's the three of us. Me, Adam, and Odette, sitting in the warm light of the dining room with the last of the wine and the warm quiet that settles over a table after a good meal.
“So.” Odette turns in her chair, looking directly at Adam. "How are you doing with everything?"
“Good.” Adam immediately smiles brightly, but it’s a little stiff.
Odette doesn't say anything right away.
She simply leans in, her arm coming around Adam’s shoulders, pulling him toward her side. She's so tall that even sitting down she has to duck her head slightly to bring herself to his level, her chin coming to rest near his temple.
"You don't have to pretend with me, sweetheart," she says. "You know I won’t judge.”
I watch Adam's shoulders drop.
I adore this woman.
She is one of the most quietly intimidating people I have ever been in a room with. She’s six feet of composed, immovable authority, and then she does something like this and it completely undoes me.
"It's weird," Adam finally says, shaking his head like he can't quite find the words for what he's trying to say.
"I feel like my whole identity just—" He pauses.
"It was ripped away. Everything I thought I knew about myself.
" He picks up his glass of water, then sets it back down without drinking from it.
"And male omegas aren't exactly desirable.
" He laughs, short and humorless. "Most people think they're defective. "
He stops and something almost painful flickers across his face.
"We," he says, correcting himself. "We're defective." He lets out a heavy sigh. "I keep forgetting I’m an omega."
Odette's expression doesn't change. She looks at him with those clear, steady eyes, and when she speaks, her voice is completely certain. “I get why you’d think that. People like to have shit opinions about things they know nothing about, and most people don’t know male omegas.
But I want to remind you that my Sal was an omega too," she says simply.
"And I wouldn't have traded him for every alpha on the planet combined. "
She reaches over and tucks a strand of hair behind Adam's ear.
"He was the best man I ever knew,” she says. “The smartest. The funniest." Her mouth curves. "The most stubborn." She drops her hand. "People who think male omegas are defective are simply too small-minded to deserve one."
Adam looks at her for a long moment, pure love shining in his soft brown eyes. "Thank you, Mama O," he finally says as he leans a little closer.
Odette presses her lips to the top of his head, holding them there for a moment. "You are still the same person you have always been, Adam," she says against his hair. "Every single part of you. Nothing has been taken away. You've only been given more."
Adam absorbs that quietly, his eyes dropping to the table for a moment. When he finally lifts his head, he looks directly at me across the table, and his mouth pulls into a small, sweet smile.
"It's really helped to have someone to talk to." His eyes stay on mine, so sweetly grateful that it makes my chest pull tight. "Someone who actually knows what it feels like."
Odette looks at me then. Not the quick, assessing sweep she sometimes gives people, but something much softer.
"We're all pretty damn lucky to have you," she says simply.
I don't know what to do with that.
I duck my head, my eyes dropping to the table. My fingers tighten around Adam's for a second before I make myself loosen them.
"Thank you," I say, which feels completely inadequate, but it’s all I can manage.
“You know,” Adam says. "A part of me wishes I could keep it a secret, and pretend to be a beta the way you did. You know." He shrugs one shoulder. "Pretend nothing changed."
"No, you don't," I say without thinking.
"I mean." Adam shifts slightly in his chair, his brow pulling together.
"Omegas don't exactly have rights, Elle.
They can't work, they can't live alone, they can't make their own decisions without pack approval.
" He shakes his head. "At least as a beta you got to have a life.
A job. An apartment. Some kind of autonomy.
" He looks at me. "That had to have been easier. "
I can’t help but shake my head. "Hiding is so lonely," I say simply. “It was exhausting and isolating and…” I let out a heavy sigh.
“That must have been hard,” Odette says softly. “I can only imagine how much energy it took to keep track of the lies you had to tell.”
I can’t help but snort. “Very.” I run one hand through my hair, pushing it away from my face.
"The lies weren't even the hardest part," I say as I stare at the dark wooden table.
"The hardest part was maintaining them. Every lie I told created a little more distance between me and everyone around me.
I kept quiet and shared as little as possible about myself, because the more people knew me, the more chances there were for something to slip. "
Adam is looking at me with an expression that makes me wish I hadn't been quite so honest. His brow is drawn together and his mouth has gone soft at the corners.
His fingers tighten around mine. Silently telling me to keep going.
So I do.
"I was so busy maintaining the lies that I stopped living entirely,” I say. “I had no joy or laughter or love. It was me, and my quiet apartment and those paper-thin walls." My voice drops. "I’ll never lie about who I am ever again."
"Elle," Adam says softly. “I’m so sorry.”
"Don’t be," I say, squeezing his hand. "I'm happy.
Like actually happy, which still catches me off guard sometimes because I forgot what it felt like.
" A small laugh escapes me. "For the longest time, every sentence I said went through about seventeen checkpoints before it left my mouth.
" I shake my head. "Now I just talk. Like a normal person. It’s so freeing.”
Odette raises her wineglass. "My Sal used to say that the truth takes up so much less space than a lie." She takes a slow sip. "And the bastard was right about most things."
Something crashes in the kitchen, and we all turn toward the sound.
Then Cliff laughs. Loud and genuine and completely unguarded, the sound of it rolling through the wall and into the dining room like something warm spilling over, and it's so unexpected and so purely him that it breaks the moment open in the best possible way.
Adam turns back to me with his mouth already pulling into a grin. "That'll be Raff," he says.
"That is absolutely Raff," Perrin's voice carries through the house, followed immediately by the sound of glass crunching.
"It was already cracked," Raff says, not sounding remotely sorry about it.