Chapter 12 - Nathan
If I had thought my obsession with Bridget was a problem before the gala, it was nothing compared to the aftermath.
Even Victor had noticed, which said a lot because he usually failed to notice dishes piled in the sink.
“Are you sleeping at all?” he asked me one morning, ten days after the incident, while I yawned over a cup of coffee in the living room. “No offense, but you look terrible.”
“I’m fine. Just stressed with work.”
He didn’t seem convinced. “Why don’t we go out for drinks tonight? Krystal can bring that friend she was talking about?”
“No. I need to focus right now.” I downed the rest of my coffee. Despite my exhaustion, despite the sleepless nights, I was still forcing myself to workout. Any deviation from my normal routine felt like courting disaster. I had to keep myself under control.
“I know it’s none of my business, but you need to have a life outside of work,” Victor said.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” I replied dismissively.
February was proving to be as cold and miserable as January had been. The early morning crowds on the train that swept downtown huddled in their coats. I pretended to be on my phone like everyone else, but other things occupied my mind.
Bridget was perfectly professional around me. It seemed we’d both decided to pretend that embrace had never happened.
But it had. Her scent had been stronger than ever.
I didn’t know what an Omega perfume was supposed to be like, but her scent was already more than enough to drive me insane.
Not for the first time in the last few weeks, I wished I understood more about her designation — and my own.
Was my reaction to her normal? It didn’t feel normal.
But I suspected this was why unbonded Omegas weren’t usually working with unbonded Alphas.
Bridget would never, ever be in danger from me, but the thought of her alone in that room with Andrew was enough to make me get off a stop early so I could stalk through the cold, rather than sit one more second with my own fevered imagination.
But even the cold couldn’t make me forget what really haunted me: the sound she’d made as she pressed against me.
She’d whimpered, a soft, helpless sound that inflamed the part of my mind I tried to keep firmly locked away.
I’d growled, like an animal, while the Alpha inside urged me to claim Bridget as my own.
That whimper. Would she sound like that if I touched her in the ways my mind conjured up in the hazy hours of almost-sleep I endured every night? Would she like it if I took control the way my Alpha wanted me to?
You can’t think about that, I scolded. Think about work.
That was actually an excellent distraction, considering how chaotic things had been. We were receiving the new Omega MSC samples that day. They were arriving fresh, too, rather than from the biobank we’d worked with before.
“A new supplier?” I’d asked when Lisbeth provided the details. Securing the samples would have normally been under my purview, but she’d insisted she had better connections.
“Lucky, right? A new biobank opened here in the city. But we can’t afford another fuck up.” She handed me the paperwork for the delivery. “How this lab runs is a reflection of your leadership. Don’t make me regret giving you the responsibility.”
Now more than ever, the threat was obvious. No more costly mistakes if I wanted to keep this job.
The delivery arrived on time. Bridget and Anvi worked on plating the cultures, a faster process since they didn’t have to worry about cryoprotectants.
I studied the delivery paperwork. Axion Biostorage. I’d never heard of it, which made sense if it was a new lab, but working with an untested supplier made me nervous.
Once Bridget and Anvi finished plating the cultures, we took a break for lunch. Anvi designated herself as the one to go pick up our orders from the deli down the street. I guessed she was still trying to make up for missing her weekend shift.
Bridget always left for lunch. No matter how terrible the weather was, she would go out on her own. Even when Lisbeth offered to cover a meal for us, she declined.
That day, she hesitated before leaving, then came to stand in my office doorway. Her eyes darted to Lisbeth’s empty office as she leaned against the right-hand side of the door frame. I sat at my desk, pretending to work.
“This is really awkward, but I have to tell you something.” She twisted her fingers together like she did whenever she was nervous.
My stomach dropped in anticipation. Were we going to discuss it?
The prospect was both terrifying and thrilling in equal measure.
I sat back and gave her my full attention, as if I hadn’t already been unconsciously tracking her movements.
“You were right about Andrew. Mr. St. James, I mean,” she said, her cheeks blazing red. I scowled. “He is — was — interested. Um, in me. I guess.”
My inner Alpha reared in rage. What had he done? I schooled my expression as best as I could. I wanted to jump up and find him, rip his arms off, or his smug head. “Did he make you uncomfortable?”
“No. But you should probably handle talking to him on your own. I don’t want to jeopardize the study.” She met my eyes defiantly. “See? I can be professional.”
Was that the only reason? If circumstances were different, would she want to pursue a relationship with him? Would they get back in touch once the study ended?
None of that was my business.
“Thank you for letting me know. I’ll handle it,” I said.
“Don’t be rude, though. They were really nice about it.”
I’m sure they were. I simply nodded.
Two weeks later, we had enough cells from the new cultures to test for immune responses. All three of us worked together to run the assays needed on each of the six samples against the ten subjects.
“Huh,” Anvi said, looking at her laptop. “This is weird, right?”
I looked over her shoulder at the screen. It was the report on one of the assays. The crossmatch was positive, meaning the subject’s cells were showing an immune response to the Omega ones.
“We need to run this one again. There may have been contamination,” I said. It wouldn’t help anything if I panicked.
“What’s wrong?” Bridget asked.
“Positive crossmatch on sample A3 with subject six,” I said, meeting her eyes. Hers widened.
“Let’s run it again,” she agreed.
In the end, we ran that sample against blood samples from all the subjects, and every time the tests showed immune responses.
“Are we sure these are even Omega cells?” Anvi asked, biting her nails. Bridget saw her doing it and pulled her hand gently away from her mouth.
“Yes. I just checked and they have the correct markers,” Bridget responded. There were a few key differences in Omega cells, including differences in their mitochondria, and they were impossible to miss.
“It’s just this one sample, though. So, that’s okay, right?”
“No,” I said. “We built the study on the assumption that all Omega cells have mutable HLAs. If they’re no longer responding as we expect, that throws everything into question.”
“What do we do, then?” Anvi asked.
“Where the hell is Lisbeth? We’re doing all this, and she’s never fucking here!
” It was the first time I’d heard Bridget curse.
It was oddly exhilarating to hear her say what we were all thinking.
“Sorry. I’m just… this is a huge problem.
And sorry for saying sorry,” she said, throwing a dagger of a look my way.
Even amid the panic budding in my chest, my heart tripped over itself a little.
I called Lisbeth, but she didn’t answer. As I was typing out a frantic email with the results attached, she arrived.
“I’ll talk to her,” I said as she waved through the glass of the prep lab before disappearing down the hallway.
“No, we’ll talk to her,” Bridget corrected, looking fierce. “Not that I don’t trust you, but I want to be a part of the conversation. If that’s okay.”
Misplaced pride flared in my chest. “Of course. Anvi, would you like to join, too?”
“Hell no,” Anvi said. “This is all above my pay grade, which is zero, by the way. I’ll gladly do some cleaning.”
“Sorry I didn’t answer. I was almost here anyway,” Lisbeth said when Bridget and I entered her office. She frowned when she saw our expressions. “Please don’t tell me you ruined the new samples.”
We explained the situation. I expected Lisbeth to rage at us again, but she was surprisingly calm. She shrugged and opened her laptop. “It’s only one sample. Just don’t use that one. It’s a nonissue.”
Bridget scoffed quietly next to me. I didn’t trust myself to look at her.
Lisbeth narrowed her eyes. “If you have something to say, speak up.”
Bridget quailed for a moment under her scrutiny, but then straightened her shoulders. “Respectfully, it’s a huge issue. If the foundational assumption of the study is incorrect, we can’t keep going. We need to pull back and reassess things.”
“I see. For some misguided reason, you think you know how to run this study better than me?” Lisbeth’s voice was low and dangerous.
“No, of course not,” Bridget said. “I just—”
“I’m glad we agree I am best-suited to make the decisions regarding the operation of this lab. Now, I believe you have work to do?”
Bridget’s posture crumpled as she left the room. I tried to follow her, but Lisbeth stopped me.
“Shut the door,” she ordered. “I don’t think I need to explain to you that she is on very thin ice already.
Her little stunt at the gala didn’t go unnoticed.
I agreed for her to be part of this because it looks good to have an Omega on the team.
Avoiding internal biases, ‘girl power,’ and all that nonsense.
But if she continues to undermine me and the progress of this study, I will take action. ”
“She’s talented and an asset to the lab.” Internally I was raging, but somehow my voice stayed calm.
“She’s competent, but we both know she’s just wasting time until she gets snapped up by a pack and starts popping out kids. I was content to let her do so, but not if she’s going to be insubordinate.”
Some of my anger must have shown on my face because Lisbeth sighed and gave me an indulgent smile.
“Are you hoping she chooses you as her meal ticket?” she asked.
I gritted my teeth. “Absolutely not.”
“Good. Because if I find out you’re fucking the Omega, I’ll fire you both. Go.” She waved her hand dismissively.
Bridget was waiting for me in the hallway to the prep lab. She opened her mouth to speak, and I jerked my head towards the door to the main clinic. We stepped into the brightly lit corridor.
“This is wrong,” she said emphatically. She crossed her arms tightly over her chest as she glared up at me. “I don’t care what she says; it’s wrong.”
“I know. I agree with you. But if we fight back, she will get rid of us. She just told me as much.”
“Then we go above her head!” Bridget hissed. “We take it to the IRB.”
I considered that. Many of the IRB members were the same ones who had sniggered behind Bridget’s back at the gala. They wouldn’t listen to her. “Lisbeth is right, though. One sample isn’t enough to pull the plug on the whole study. We’ll report it in the logs, and maybe someone will raise a flag.”
She looked away, furious. “This feels… icky. I don’t like it.”
“I don’t either. But I don’t think we have a choice. Unless you want to quit?” The thought of not seeing Bridget every day was too horrible to contemplate.
“No!” she said, outraged. “Mostly because I don’t have any other options for employment right now.”
“Then we wait. If anything else happens, we’ll reevaluate. Agreed?”
Bridget sighed, then held out her hand for me to shake. “Agreed.”
We shook, like business partners, and I did my best not to react to the feeling of her surprisingly strong hand in mine.