Chapter 29 #2
Alex’s gaze sharpens. “You don’t have to yet.”
I look between them, confused and tired and very aware of how safe I feel sitting here.
“That’s not how packs work,” I say softly.
Alex’s expression turns unreadable.
“Maybe,” he says. “But it doesn’t mean you have to suffer.”
I don’t know what to say to that.
All I know is that the thought of stepping back into that house feels unbearable—and the thought of staying here feels dangerously tempting.
And that scares me almost as much as Ragon’s anger ever did.
***
Two days later, my own house doesn't smell like a home.
It smells like a cage.
The scent is the first thing I register every time I wake—thick, hot, suffocating. Heat and rut layered together until there's no clean edge left, no neutral corner to breathe in.
It's everywhere.
It's in the carpet. In the curtains. In the couch cushions. It clings to the hallway like humidity, sweet and sharp and wrong.
The neutralizing spray helps to keep me from catching the details, but it doesn't keep my body from recognizing the danger.
My throat feels tight when I sit up in my chair. My lungs burn. My skin prickles, oversensitive.
I press the pillow harder over my ears.
It doesn't help.
It never helps.
Muffled sounds leak through the walls anyway—shifts of weight, voices dropping low, the occasional note of distress that spikes my heart.
I've been sleeping like this, pillow over my ears, blanket wrapped around my shoulders, trying to block out the house's constant reminder that I am not part of what's happening.
Not part of what matters.
Days ago, they vanished into Marie's room. The door shut, and the world shrank down to whatever was happening behind it.
Ragon told me to stay in the house. He promised he'd check on me.
He hasn't.
Not once.
I've seen them in fragments—like ghosts moving through my peripheral vision.
A door cracking open. A shadow passing the end of the hall.
Drake slipping out to grab water, head down, scent so saturated with Marie that my stomach rolled.
Eli appearing for a handful of food, eyes glassy, posture rigid, gone again before I could even speak.
None of them come to check on me.
None of them knock.
I tell myself it's because Marie needs them.
Because she's their scent match.
Because heat is urgent and instinct makes monsters of everyone.
The excuses are thin, but they're all I have.
By late afternoon, the house feels like it's pulsing. My head aches. My mouth is dry. My stomach is hollow in a way that isn't hunger so much as emptiness.
Water, I tell myself.
Just water.
I step into the hallway and immediately flinch at the scent.
It's stronger out here.
Heat has leaked under the door like smoke, creeping into every room. Even if I sprayed every inch of the house, my omega instincts don't need details to react. My body knows what heat smells like. It knows what rut smells like.
My knees go weak for a second.
I grip the wall, breathing shallowly, and force myself forward.
The kitchen is bright when I flick the light on. Too bright. I fill a glass and drink too fast, swallowing hard as the cold hits my throat.
I'm halfway through when footsteps pad behind me.
The scent hits first.
Drake.
Not Drake as I remember him.
This Drake is drenched.
Marie's scent clings to him like oil, heat-sweet and sharp, threaded through everything. It's so thick my stomach flips. I gag before I can stop myself and turn my head away.
Drake stops short.
"Oh," he says, startled. "Vee."
Like I surprised him by existing in my own kitchen.
Like he forgot there are two omegas in this house.
Drake moves past me toward the cabinets, pulling out snacks with one hand.
"How're you doing?" he asks, casual, the question tossed over his shoulder as if it's a formality.
I stare at the glass in my hand.
My fingers are trembling.
"I'm fine."
The lie is automatic.
Drake pauses, then glances at me again. "You sure?"
I shrug.
"Yeah."
Drake exhales. He doesn't press.
He stuffs the snacks into his arms and turns back toward the hallway.
My omega twist painfully in my chest.
She’s fully awake again now—too awake. The last time I was at Finn's, something in me started to unfurl. It hasn't gone back to sleep.
And it wants.
It wants warmth. It wants comfort. It wants attention, reassurance.
I hate it.
The bitter thought creeps in: they're too busy taking care of their precious scent match to care about me. The same scent match that lied to hurt me.
I flinch, guilt flooding in immediately.
Stop. That's not fair.
Marie didn't choose to go into heat.
Drake steps close enough that the scent of Marie overwhelms the kitchen completely. My stomach heaves.
He leans in automatically, muscle memory guiding him, and presses a quick kiss to my temple.
The contact is brief.
The scent is not.
It crashes over me like a wave.
I jerk away violently, disgust and nausea crashing through me. "Don't," I choke.
Drake recoils, eyes wide. "Shit—Vee, I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking."
My hands shake as I brace against the counter, breathing hard through my nose.
"Please," I whisper.
Drake's expression tightens with guilt. "I'm sorry. We'll spend time with you as soon as Marie's heat breaks. All of us. We'll focus on you for a while. We have to work through what happened with the zoo."
As soon as.
The promise is dust in the wind.
He doesn't wait for me to respond. He disappears back down the hall.
I stand there for a long moment.
Then pain hits low in my abdomen.
Sharp and sudden, like a fist closing around my organs.
I gasp, bending forward instinctively, one hand clamping to the counter as the other slides to my stomach. The cramp tightens, twists, and for a second I can't see.
"What—"
Another wave hits immediately.
Heat floods through my lower body. A thick warmth slides down my inner thigh.
Slick.
My stomach drops.
My heart slams into my ribs with sudden terror.
"Oh god. No. No, no—"
I straighten slowly, afraid that moving will make it worse.
Another pulse rolls through me, and more slick trickles down my leg.
My heat.
It's here.
Now.
Of course it is.
The air is saturated with alpha pheromones and omega heat. My body has been breathing it for two days, my instincts rubbed raw by it. Of course my omega physiology would respond.
Of course my suppression couldn't hold any longer.
I stand there shaking, slick warm against my skin, panic making my throat close.
I need to get to my room.
I take one step. Pain hits again. I hiss through my teeth.
I take another step. Another wave. My knees buckle.
I cling to the wall, panting.
The hallway seems impossibly long.
Slick keeps sliding down my legs, soaking the fabric, pooling in humiliating warmth.
I shuffle forward inch by inch. I make it to my door with a sob and shove it open, stumbling inside.
I collapse into the chair with a cry as another cramp tears through me. The blanket is draped over the armrest. I yank it over myself like it can hide what I am.
Another wave hits.
I bite my lip until I taste blood, refusing to scream.
Slick soaks into the chair cushion beneath me, warm and relentless.
I can't stop it.
I glance toward the bed, empty except for a thin sheet. I suddenly long to rebuild my nest for the first time since it was destroyed. I need it. I need safety. I need my alphas.
I can have none of those things.
I sit there shaking.
Time loses shape.
The cramps come in waves—tightening, twisting, releasing just enough for me to breathe, then slamming back. Sweat slicks my skin. My throat aches from panting. My walls clench around nothing, desperate, but are greeted only with emptiness.
My omega instincts roar louder with every wave.
Alpha.
Need alpha.
Need comfort.
I press my face into the blanket and sob silently.
They can't help me.
They're occupied.
It's only been two days. Marie will likely be in heat for days more.
My phone sits on the dresser, dark and silent.
I don't reach for it.
Who would I call? Who would come?
Hours pass.
Eventually the pain sharpens into something I can't ignore.
I can't breathe through it.
I can't rock through it.
I can't pretend I can ride it out alone.
I have to do something.
I stand carefully and stagger toward the bathroom.
The tiles are cold under my feet. I fumble the faucet and twist it all the way to cold. Water blasts into the tub.
I limp to the kitchen between waves, moving like an old woman. I open the freezer with shaking hands and yank out the ice bucket.
My knees buckle as a cramp hits mid-step.
I gasp, leaning against the counter, waiting it out.
Then I grab the bucket and stumble back, dumping the ice into the tub with a loud clatter.
No one comes.
No one calls my name.
I strip down and climb into the tub wearing nothing but the shirt from Arden. The cold water hits hard, stealing my breath.
Then relief floods in.
The burning under my skin dulls. The cramps ease. I sag against the side of the tub, shaking.
The ice floats around me like little shards of salvation.
For a while, I can breathe.
Then the ice melts.
My body heat devours it fast. The relief slips away until I feel the heat surge again.
"No," I whisper. "Please—"
A cramp seizes me so hard I scream.
The sound rips out of me raw, echoing off the bathroom walls. My whole body locks up. I scramble, slipping against the tub floor.
I can't stay in here.
I can't do this alone.
I have to get to an alpha.
I drag myself out of the tub, water splashing onto the floor. My legs shake so badly I can barely stand. Another cramp hits mid-rise and I collapse onto my knees, sobbing.
I can't.
I can't.
I crawl out of the bathroom, leaving a trail of water behind me, arms trembling. The hallway blurs through tears.
Marie's door is down the hall.
Behind it are all four alphas.
I turn toward it anyway.
Eli.
Eli is safe.
Eli was my comfort once.
If anyone would help me—it would be Eli.