4. Thirty-three
Thirty-three
Taryn
Brea was gonna kill me. Or she’d give me that told you so smirk, which honestly amounted to the same thing.
We’d moved into our new apartment over a week ago, and half our belongings still lived in mismatched luggage and taped-up boxes.
Specifically, my half.
I’d searched through six boxes, three tote bags, a suitcase, two messenger bags, a handful of holey grocery bags, and the various piles living in various corners. It was official: my toothbrush charger was lost.
“Did you find it?” Brea called from the bathroom, a knowing lilt to her tone.
I crouched on the balls of my feet, rolling my lips between my teeth. Brea had always been better at the organization side of things. Everything in its place, a place for every thing, yadda yadda ya. Her unpacked boxes sat by the door, flattened and ready for recycling pickup.
Buttoning up her dark blue blouse, she stuck her head out the bathroom door. “That’s what you get for packing like a woman on the run. Throwing it all haphazardly into boxes with vague labels.”
“How is ‘bathroom’ a vague label?” I asked, standing.
“Well, for one thing…” She crossed to the box in question and pulled out in quick succession a spatula, a single ratty washcloth, a half-empty box of sticky hooks for the walls, two hair elastics with bits of my brown strands tangled onto them, and a bright green highlighter.
“If you’re using all these in the bathroom, I think you’re doing it wrong. ”
I blew a stray strand of hair out of my face and reached into the same box.
“Hey, there’s also a hair dryer and five semi-used bottles of shower gel.
That definitely weighs this box as more bathroom stuff than not.
” Granted, they were rattling around with a handful of batteries and half a dozen clothespins.
We'll just ignore those.
“Yet still no toothbrush charger?” Brea sighed as she loaded the items back into the (completely appropriately labeled) box. “Little omega’s gonna have to brush the old-fashioned way.”
The words rolled off her tongue with a velvety playfulness that beckoned me in.
Almost three years since we met, and two since bonding.
We should’ve been past the ooey gooey honeymoon stage, but that domineering tone still lit me like a fuse.
And like a fuse, I’d simmer with every smirk and command and touch before— kaboom! — she exploded me.
I needed her. I needed her laughing, sleeping, naked and moaning. I needed the desire that heated my skin on the daily. It was a flame that never fully extinguished, only tamped down to embers every so often to see to other things. Stupid things, like jobs and moving and being part of society.
Blegh .
It only ever took the barest hint of an invitation to stoke those embers into a roaring blaze. The sly gleam in her green eyes as she zipped up her pencil skirt was more than enough.
With big doe eyes and the littlest pout, I stepped slowly toward her. “Unless a certain loving…caring… sexy alpha let me use her charger.” I traced my fingertips up her arm before whispering at her ear, “Just until I can charge mine.”
“And what kind of lesson would I be teaching you then? What incentive would you have to pack like a civilized human being?”
“Please, Alpha,” I breathed against her ear before nuzzling at her neck. I even gave a weak, apologetic purr. “I’ll do better, I promise.”
I inhaled deeply, taking stock of her scent. Pomegranate, tangy and rich like a handful of seeds and juice running down your arm in summertime. Soft, gentle vanilla. That delectable combination of sweet and tart came to a tantalizing edge that had goose bumps erupting over my whole body.
That was the greatest gift of our bond bites, the extra layer of clarity we had to each other’s souls.
We spoke each other’s body language, had done so even before deciding on forever together.
Once we’d taken that vow, exchanged bites and blood, her scent basically became a neon billboard into her every emotion.
And in that moment, she was lit up like Times Square. And I hadn’t even needed to pull out the You know I need my sweet vibrations .
My alpha was a sucker for my wiles.
Brea hummed, and I couldn’t contain my grin. I was winning.
Or I would’ve been had the alarm on her phone not blared at that precise moment.
“Shoot,” she muttered as she shut it off, a hint of anxiety creeping into her scent.
I rubbed my hands along her shoulders and arms. “You’re gonna do great today,” I said for the fifteenth time since waking up. I didn’t care. I’d say it fifteen billion times if that’s what it took to set her mind and body at ease.
Brea’s degree was what had brought us to Farendale.
She was only a semester away from her master’s in psychology and social work, with a concentration in designation counseling.
Hers was a specialized niche of study, so the last two years had seen several moves as she completed prereqs and then pursued her degree through Remington State U.
This semester was different, though. It wasn’t just textbooks and exams. This was a four-month working residency, a hybrid model of lectures and counseling in action.
And her orientation started in three hours.
She gave me a weak smile. “You know it’s not too late to pick one of those stable, settled alphas. With careers and charisma.”
I scoffed, wrapping her in my arms and giving her a gentle purr. “Maybe, but they probably wouldn’t find my filing system as charming as you do.”
Brea laughed, her arms raising to wrap back around me.
“Fair enough.” She tilted her head, tipping mine with a touch of her index finger to my chin, and kissed me gently.
The edge of nervousness dissipated as I glided my fingers through her thick red waves, deepening the kiss until she gave a low growl in the back of her throat.
“I have to go,” she whispered against my lips.
“You have three hours,” I replied.
“It’s over an hour away.”
“Which gives us at least fifteen good minutes before you’ll only be ridiculously early instead of obscenely early.”
As I said the words, as I willed her to back me toward the bed just feet away, I knew it was a no-go. Brea was always early, even when she wasn’t going out of her mind with nerves.
What if I get lost?
What if the bus runs out of gas?
What if there are protests that shut down the highway?
What if a bridge collapses and we have to reroute?
All very real, unironic questions posed whenever I’d suggested before that she could relax her scheduling tendencies just a touch.
She swallowed, and her scent soured more. Couldn’t have that. Even if she did look too good to be real in her blue satin blouse, black skirt, and black heels, loose red waves smooth and flowing over her shoulders.
I gave her bottom lip one final drag between my teeth before backing away. “Ugh. Fine. You owe me.”
Brea grinned, leaning in to my neck and drawing in a deep breath like she was taking a hit of hookah. “Come collecting tonight, then, Teacup.”
“With interest,” I said with a smirk.
She pulled away, and I followed her toward the door. She grabbed her purse from the counter, as well as her black leather folio with her notebooks and necessary papers.
Just as she turned the knob to leave, I grabbed her free hand.
I waited until she turned to look back at me.
My smile was genuine, filled with every bit of belief I had in her, and that was no small bit either.
“No one is better equipped to do this job than you,” I said.
I brought her hand up, kissing the back, before letting it drop. “You got this.”
Her gaze was loving, her smile grateful. She gave only a single nod before turning and striding through the door with all the confidence an alpha like her deserved to feel.
Two hours and two boxes later yielded no better results than my morning search. Then my own phone alarm chirped, and the mining expedition came to a pause as I dressed for work.
Just as I zipped up my favorite pair of jeans, a sturdy knock sounded at the door.
I stilled, staring at the offending slab of wood. We’d had to be somewhat careful over the years. The world was largely safe, but attracting unwanted attention wasn’t out of the norm for an omega, especially when paired with a female alpha.
We didn’t know anyone in Farendale, and our entry door was interior to the apartment building, so random solicitors seemed unlikely.
But it was broad daylight, for fuck’s sake.
And I knew the neighbors were home and would hear me if I screamed.
Giving myself a good shake, I kicked my (okay, fine, ambiguously labeled) box out of the way and made for the door.
I didn’t know who I expected to be standing there, but it sure as hell wasn’t another alpha—a male alpha with dark hair falling nearly to his shoulders and just enough steel in those gray eyes to make a girl sigh.
Straightening up to my full height—a whopping five-foot-four—I put on my best pleasantries voice. “Can I help you?”
Thick dark brows gave a slight twitch as he took me in, eyes scoping up and down in a flash before he cleared his throat. “Brea Maddox?”
“Indisposed,” I answered, leaning on the doorframe and crossing my arms. “Who asks?”
The man bristled and his nostrils flared just barely, as though he were trying to fight it. “Caine Arceneaux. Your landlord.”
Well. Whoops. A slight flush rose to my cheeks, but I didn’t change my posture. We’d had our fair share of landlords. Usually older guys, usually betas, varying levels of hygiene, varying levels of skeeze. They’d never been six and a half feet of muscled alpha.
Affecting an air of nonchalance, I shrugged with one shoulder. “I’m Taryn, Brea’s partner.”
Caine’s nostrils flared wider this time, and his eyes snapped to my neck then, likely taking in the faint scar of a bonding bite.
I fought the urge to cover it with my hand.
Normally I was proud to display my bonding mark.
I wanted everyone to know I’d found my alpha, had been claimed by her, that she’d chosen me and I’d chosen her.
But Caine’s glower turned my stomach as he gestured to the papers in his hand and said, “There’s no mention of an omega on the application. ”
Typical alpha male bullshit. I scoffed, rolling my eyes and preparing to shut the door between us, landlord or not. “And at whatever point we’re legally obligated to disclose our designation or bond status on a lease application, we’ll do so.”
He had the sense to look to his feet.
Fucking good.
The world had come a long way in the last few decades.
Somewhere between my grandmother’s presenting and my mother’s, a cry for omega equality rose up from the people.
Repeal the Protect Omegas in Society Act (that forbade omegas to enter public spaces without a male escort)!
Abolish the Department of Omega Affairs (whose purpose was to prosecute omegas who broke oppressive laws, then sentence them to forced bonds)!
Outlaw matchmakers and Omega Balls (human trafficking with a PR team)!
Craziest part? They’d actually succeeded on all fronts.
Plus, they’d managed to enshrine stricter punishments for forced bonding, and funded research for safer and more reliable supplements to manage alpha and omega biology.
Heat control and rut suppressants, scent blockers, even instinct dampeners, which aimed to protect omegas from alpha barks.
All in an effort to break down the strict lines between designations.
Our hormones and instincts no longer held us captive.
Of course, there were still some who preferred the old way, when alphas were in charge and the rest of us had no say in the matter—or any matter.
What did Caine believe?
He chewed the inside of his cheek. “Was just surprised.”
I nodded once. “So, Mr. Arceneaux, what can I help you with?”
He didn’t meet my eye as he raised the packet of papers in his hands. “The signature on the deposit check is smudged,” he said in a gravelly voice. “Need a new one.”
We stood there another moment before he added, “May I come in?” Without a word, I opened the door all the way and gestured for him to join me in the kitchen just inside.
The open floor plan had been one of the reasons we’d fallen in love with Amethyst Commons.
A bright open kitchen that bled into the living area with almost an entire wall of windows that flooded the room with morning light.
Exposed brick walls and hardwood floors added warmth to counteract the stainless steel appliances and counters and exposed ductwork.
“Excuse the mess. Moving mayhem.” I pushed some of the odds and ends on the counter to the side so he could set the papers down. “Do you have the original check?”
Caine flipped through the stack of papers in his hand, pulling out Brea’s check and handing it over.
I gave it a quick glance, noting that her signature had indeed been smudged.
I folded it and stuck it in my pocket as I moved toward the drawer in the kitchen where I knew Brea had stashed our checkbook.
Let him think whatever antiquated thoughts he wanted. We were safe here. And, if he pulled any bullshit now that he knew we were two bonded women, or that I was an omega, we’d report his ass to the Department of Designation Services for discrimination.
I wrote out and signed another check, handing it over. “Anything else?”
He gave a sharp shake of his head.
“Awesome,” I said. “Well I have an appointment, so—”
He was already stepping through the door before I even finished kicking him out. He could read a room, at fucking least.