Chapter 19 #2
Mateo steps forward so I can see him again, neck slightly tilted in submission to show me he’s not a threat. “It’s your nest because you’re ours, mi conejita. The scent match is a beautiful bonus, but we want you for you.”
“That’s impossible, we just met.”
Augie clears his throat and joins Mateo. His features flushed and eyes bashful. He pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose, the action reminding me of the other times he did that over the last week.
“We may have just met, Iris, but I think this pack feels like they’ve known you for a long time.”
My brows furrow. “What do you mean?”
He rubs the back of his neck. “I planned to tell you how much of a fan I was of your work before everything happened. To be honest, I’ve had an embarrassingly large crush on you for a long time. My pack can confirm.”
“Large is even an understatement, mi amor. Sometimes I feel jealous.”
They share a lover’s smile, and Mateo presses a kiss to his mate’s knuckles before they both turn their gaze on me. The warmth between them shifts, wrapping around me too. Butterflies stir in my stomach, and my Omega preens under their attention.
“You’re being serious?” I ask.
Augie’s confirming nod only intensifies the flutter of wings in my belly.
“I know it’s not the same as knowing the real you, Iris, but you’re everything I’ve dreamed and more.
I think my instincts knew who you were, even through a screen.
I’ve felt a pull to you from the moment I saw you. Don’t you feel it?”
His question echoes the one he asked me on set, before I agreed to come here and let this pack to see me through my heat.
He presses a hand to his chest and I mirror his action.
Just like before, there’s a pull there. One I felt the second our eyes connected on set, and my Omega trusts him implicitly.
She wants me to run and jump into his arms right now.
Let his calming energy and earthy basil scent soothe us.
I nod before I can think better of it, which makes his smile widen.
“There’s something else.” He looks over to Jett before he continues. “We figured something out while you were asleep. Tell her.”
Jett steps up to complete the semi-circle again, but this time there’s hardly any space between me and the pack. My eyes connect with his ocean blue ones, and that tug Augie made me aware of only grows stronger.
“Were you at the Producer’s Guild Halloween party in Beverly Hills two years ago?”
I raise a brow in question, but I nod.
Several emotions cross Jett’s face, but his shoulders relax before his lip tips up in a smile. “We were, too.”
“I don’t remember seeing you there.”
“Because we were there all but thirty minutes before I went into a rut and we had to leave.”
“That was you?”
Jett rubs the back of his neck. “It was. I don’t remember scenting you, but my Alpha must have known you were there. He wanted to find you and we couldn’t.”
Ours. They’re ours.
I want to tell my Omega otherwise, but I know she’s right. I’ve known their ours, but—
“I hear what you’re saying, but I told you what I did. And you all were just talking about replacing me.” I stare directly at Jett. “You said we didn’t have chemistry,” I repeat.
“We weren’t talking about you, star,” Jett insists, distress laced in his tone that upsets my Omega.
“Then who?”
“We were talking about a film we’re changing the production schedule of, one that came after Knotting Hill,” Wilder says. “The Omega actor playing the opposite of Jett was already cast.”
My face falls and jealousy rears its ugly head out of nowhere. My Omega growls, the sound low and menacing, one I’ve never made before—at least while coherent.
I force it down and press my lips together in shocked embarrassment. I expect the males in front of me to react negatively to it, but instead the four of them grin at me like that was the best thing they’ve ever heard.
“That’s why we were discussing her part,” Mateo says. “Because none of us feel comfortable with Jett starring opposite an unbonded Omega.”
“Especially so soon after we’ve found ours,” Wilder says.
My gaze meets his and for a time, I don’t know what to say.
“You really all feel that way?”
“Without question,” Augie says.
“But I ruined everything!”
“You ruined nothing,” Wilder declares, tone final. “I’d argue the opposite.”
“He’s right, Iris. You made everything better,” Jett says.
I huff out a disbelieving laugh. “You’re just trying to make me feel better.”
“Omega,” Wilder barks.
My eyes snap to his simmering ones, his gaze zeroed in on me.
“I want you to listen to me.” He holds out his hand and when I don’t stop him, he cups the side of my neck, thumb holding the curve of my cheek.
“I’ll only say this once, and I mean every word.
You’re not only our mate, but you’re smart, talented, and perfect.
Our pack nearly ruined everything because our idiot asses didn’t push to hire you when we should have.
Had we gone with our guts instead of our investors you would have been ours sooner. ”
“But—”
“May I finish?” He doesn’t say it in annoyance, but with a wily grin tugging at the corners of his bowed lips.
“Yes, Alpha.”
His eyes darken and his hand on me flexes.
“You shouldn’t have lied about the suppressants, and my Alpha is upset you were on them for so long and we weren’t there to help you before now, but on our pre-production call, you told me this job meant a lot to you and why, so I understand why you did what you did, especially if your prescription was denied. ”
I’d forgotten I spilled my guts to him about the role in Knotting Hill being my dream, and what it could do for me. But I do remember hanging up and wondering why I’d felt so comfortable with him, and even thinking his voice reminded me of a soothing cup of peppermint tea.
I inhale, leaning into his hand and scent marking it. Wilder’s minty pheromones intensify as he rubs his thumb on my cheek, the adoration and awe in his eyes evident.
“I’m sorry,” I exhale.
“You have nothing to be sorry for. The crew won’t say anything, they’re good people and are under NDAs like all of us are.”
I breathe a sigh of relief. “But the movie?” I look at the rest of the pack but they’re all smiling.
Wilder directs my gaze back to his. “The pack is funding the rest of Knotting Hill, and production is set to continue in two weeks if that works for your schedule.”
Excitement blooms in my chest. “Really?”
“Yes, really. The movie wouldn’t be the movie without you, star,” Jett says.
“Wait. Why two weeks?”
Wilder drops his hand and steps back so I can take in every pack member before he declares, “We were hoping to claim our Omega.”
There are moments in life where you know you’re going to remember them forever. When you feel the earth move beneath your feet, and the DNA and elements that make up your body transform, and your memory burns the experience so deep into your being, no passage of time will scrub it away.
My first day on the Knot Hollows set, getting the call from my agent with the offer to play Juliette, and meeting Pack Quinn—my scent matches—were three of those moments.
And now…
Three Alphas and a Beta who only met me a week ago, who took care of me at my most vulnerable, who very much want me and need me like I need them—even if I’ve been trying to deny it—want to claim me as their Omega.
What is life right now?
Ours. Bite. Please!
Perfume bursts out of me in a cloud of strawberry haze.
Slick dampens my underwear and leaks down my thighs.
Wilder’s nostrils flare, taking in my scent before releasing a groan.
I’m aware of Jett, Mateo, and Augie doing the same, purrs springing to life in the Alphas’ chests along with their pheromones, Augie’s basil almost as strong.
“Yes.” My single word hangs in the air, the pack’s eyes all on me unblinking as if they can’t comprehend that I said yes.
I close the distance Wilder created, my gaze locked to his. “Bite me, Alpha. Make me your Omega.” I look into the rest of the pack’s eyes. “All of yours.”
When I meet Wilder’s hazel gaze again, his purr dominates over the other’s, the veins of his tattooed neck flexing. He runs his tongue along his canines and looks down at me with heat, the intensity of him flooding my greedy pussy with more slick.
I allow my instincts to take over, to show him that despite my earlier fears, I’m theirs for the taking.
My Omega has been telling me from the start that we belong together, and I’m not going to fight it anymore.
I trusted them enough to fully surrender to my heat, to let them take care of me when we didn’t even know each other. I even trusted Wilder in a rut—and now…
I’m going to trust myself. It’s high time that I do. I got this far in life relying on myself, and now I can do it alongside an amazing Pack. We can figure out everything else later. But I want them—no, need them—now.
“I want this.” I show my throat to Wilder. “If you’ll still have me.”
The Prime is silent as he reaches for me, his fingers stroking down the side of my neck, over the bruise he left during his rut. The “fake claiming” mark to satisfy my Omega. I shiver at the sensation, another wave of arousal heating my core and saturating the kitchen with my scent.
“There will never be a point in time where we don’t want you, Iris Walker.”
The rest of the pack chimes their agreement and my eyes water, this time not with tears of distress, but happiness.
“Now”—he kisses me once—“we’ll take you up to your nest”—another kiss, rougher—"and I’ll sink my teeth into this perfect throat”—a third kiss, hungrier—“and then your pack will claim you—fuck you hard, fill you so full—that you’ll never forget who you belong to.”
I clutch his arms, my nails biting into his biceps, and repeat the word we all need to hear. “Yes.”