20. KATIE
Chapter twenty
KATIE
L oren leads me up a staircase to a landing. A wall of windows greets me on one side, and a short hallway with three closed doors is on the other.
“At the end of this hall is the family room. Downstairs can sometimes be…more formal. But up here is all ours. This is the guest room.” He hesitates as he indicates the door in front of me. “It’s, well, this was faster than we anticipated. It’s not set up to be a nest yet. But we want it to feel like home, so if you need anything– nesting material, or toiletries, or clothes – I know you didn’t, ah, arrive with much, but you can always ask me for…” he’s chattering.
Nervous .
Yeah, me too.
As adorable as Loren’s babbling is, exhaustion weighs down all my limbs. I could sleep for thirteen years.
“I’m fine, thank you.” I push into the room. It’s sparse; a clean white with plain curtains in a soft blue and white ticking. Almost farmhouse chic, if such a thing exists here. The bed is large – at least king-sized if not larger – and is low to the ground. Curious.
The bed is made up with a crisp white comforter, the kind I imagine being layered under an artisanal linen throw in a food-named color like cranberry or plum, and there is a noticeable lack of pillows – just three for the enormous bed. At the foot of the bed are two baskets piled high with all kinds of fluffy blankets and a few decorative pillows.
Inside my chest, a longing kindles. I want to curl up in those fluffy blankets. To stack pillows and blankets into a blanket fort and then burrow beneath, surrounded by softness and warmth.
It’s like an itch I can’t quite scratch.
I turn to Loren. I need him to go. But I don’t want to be pushy. I just need space to breathe and be.
“I really am fine. I’m just going to sleep. Thank you.”
He offers another lop-sided school-boy grin. “You are most welcome, Katie.” He takes my hand gently and runs his lips feather light over my knuckles. My skin erupts in goosebumps and my nipples pucker almost painfully.
I need him out now before my body gets the wrong idea. Again. It’s not play time. Not now, not ever. Probably.
Loren nods then slides out, closing the door and leaving me to my quiet.
Great. Now I have my own room. My own space. What am I supposed to do?
I walk quickly in a circle, checking the space for cameras. Nothing looks out of the ordinary. The windows unlatch and open, but I’m two stories up– too far to jump without risking a broken leg or worse. Well, at least they open. I could rig a climbing rope from blankets if I needed to.
Just like Loren said, there is a phone and what looks like a tablet resting on a bare dresser top. It opens at my touch. This is strangely similar to my smartphone back home. Thank goodness interdimensional alien tech is pretty similar to ours.
I scroll through the handful of contacts already installed: Loren, Max, and Callum of course, but Aurelia is there too. And my sisters. All four of them.
“Thank God.” I dial Layla in a video call.
“Katie-kat!” Layla shrieks on the other end. Several other voices squeal and I know my sisters are together. Good .
“Don’t call me that.” I sigh and flop onto the monster bed. Who needs this much mattress?
“How’s things? Have they been treating you like a queen?”
I snort and roll my eyes.
“Have you taken the D yet?” Mads asks over Layla’s shoulder.
“Maddie! She just got there!” Molly Beth chides.
“They’re not being dicks, are they?” Maddie asks, suddenly serious. “Because I swear to God I will steal a car and come over there and kick their teeth in if…”
“No Mads, I’m fine. I’m just tired. And confused. My brain and body are going haywire. I’m horny, then I’m sad, then I’m fucking pissed off. It’s like middle school all over again. It fucking sucks.”
I rub my forehead. My emotions feel like a big red dodgeball being thrown around a school gym.
“No, the guys are all fine.” More than fine. They are hot and polite and I just do not know what to do with that. It would be easier if they were being dicks, then I could bark at them like some smart mouth recruit. Put them in their place.
But someone trying to shower me with praise and attention and help ?
That is too much.
Which is probably a sign I need a boatload of therapy.
I mean, sliding through an entire dimension to try and start a new life in a world devoid of fertile females thus making your womb one of the biggest prizes in the damn country is also grounds for an entire mega-yacht load of therapy. So, there’s that.
I pinch the bridge of my nose.
“Did they give you a nest? Aurelia has spent the afternoon lecturing us on the importance of setting up a good nest.” Norah’s voice floats in from the back.
Right. Nests.
Omegas make nests to hide away in. Which is weird.
“Yeah, I have two baskets of… stuff.”
What do I do with these baskets of fluffy stuff? No fucking clue. But that’s for me to worry about.
“Do you need help? We could get Aurelia to…” Molly Beth trails off as I shake my head forcefully.
“No, I’ve got this. It’s all instinct, right? And mine are certainly shifting into high gear.”
“Are you sure?” Layla frowns at me, twisting the end of her blond braid. “Katie. This is a lot of transition. Your adrenals will be working overtime, and stress depletes our immune system. If you need some extra support right now, I am sure we could figure it out…”
“No, really, I’m fine .” My voice is pinched tight. “You just look after the littles, okay? I really should be there with you. I need to be there to protect you all. I shouldn’t have let them separate us.”
“Stop. The best thing you can do for us is making a good match – making allies who can protect us. The professor said no one ever goes home, so we need to navigate this new home with all the help we can get. Okay?” Layla says earnestly.
My throat constructs and my anger swings to sorrow. How can they give up on going home so quickly? Don’t they trust that I will find a way? Don’t they believe in me?
Tears threaten to flood, so I shake my head. The last thing I want is for my sisters to worry about me. My hormones need to get it together because all these emotions are inconvenient and unwelcome.
“I’m about to crash. I’ll call you in the morning.”
“Love you,” a chorus of voices calls to me, and both Molly Beth and Norah blow kisses. My heart aches. God, I miss them already and it’s only been a few hours.
“Love you all too.”
Then the screen winks out.
I’m alone in an unfamiliar room in a house with three unfamiliar men in a body ricocheting between unfamiliar emotions.
“Make a plan. Execute the plan,” I say to myself. It helps me think to say things out loud, as though speaking the words declutters the mess of thoughts in my brain.
“First, let's make this nest thing. I’m sure it will soothe this Omega bullshit.”
So I dump both baskets on the bed. They’re a jumble of quilts, and fluffy blankets, and pillows. But some blankets are more triangle shaped. Some of the pillows are long and round, like cuddly yoga balustrades. I try to sort them out and make a bird's nest of soft things, but I am left with weird lumpy piles that don't look cozy or inviting.
“Goddamnit.” I slump to the floor next to the bed.
I’m sweating and irritated. I should have just left it all alone and gone to bed like I’ve done every night of my civilian life.
But I want a nest. It is an itch that won’t go away. And fuck if I know how to satisfy it.
Angry tears blur my vision. I will not cry over a nest. It’s just a pillow arrangement!
I crawl into the lumpy pile and burrow into the center, grabbing two soft blankets and ignoring the rest. It isn't satisfying, but the exhaustion I’d felt earlier hits me with a vengeance.
“This sucks,” I say into the empty room. I press my fingers to the lamp, which turns off at just a touch.
Under the cover of darkness, I let the tears fall until they are sobs shaking my entire frame. I don’t want to cry or to care. But, the hormonal mess that I am, I can’t help but feel like I’ve already failed.