Chapter 5 #2
The suppressant patch on my arm itched, and I resisted the urge to scratch at it.
Five years I’d been wearing these patches.
Five years of keeping my biology muted and manageable so I could focus on my career instead of my instincts.
Five years of proving that I didn’t need a pack, didn’t need alphas, didn’t need anything but my job and my carefully controlled life.
Five years of being exactly the kind of omega Nathan had said I couldn’t be. Independent. Successful. Too much.
And I’d succeeded. Had become the best emergency coordinator in three states. Had built a reputation for being difficult but excellent, which was exactly what I’d aimed for. Had proven that being rejected at the altar wasn’t the end of my life, just the end of pretending to be something I wasn’t.
The pasta water boiled, and I dumped in the noodles with more force than necessary, watching them tumble and settle in the roiling water. Simple. Controlled. Exactly what I needed after a day of fighting my own biology.
Except it wasn’t enough. The pasta and the suppressants and the carefully maintained walls. None of it was enough to stop my omega from waking up and insisting these three alphas mattered in a way no one had mattered before. Not even Nathan.
I ate my pasta standing at the counter, watching the sun set over the mountains through my kitchen window.
Hollow Haven in October was beautiful. Gold and crimson against evergreen, the light turning everything soft and warm.
The kind of beauty that made you believe in possibilities, in fresh starts, in the idea that maybe this time things could be different.
I’d moved here specifically because it was beautiful. Because it was small enough that I could know every emergency protocol and every potential crisis point. Because it was far enough from Idaho that no one here knew about the omega who’d been rejected at her own bonding ceremony.
Fresh start. Clean slate. New life built on competence instead of biology.
And I’d succeeded. Seven years as an emergency coordinator, five of them here in Hollow Haven. Respect from colleagues. Trust from local services. A reputation for being difficult but excellent, which was exactly what I’d aimed for.
I didn’t need anything else.
Didn’t need alphas who might decide I was too much work. Didn’t need a pack that might crumble the moment I refused to be someone I wasn’t. Didn’t need the vulnerability of letting people close enough to hurt me.
The lie sat heavy in my chest, and I washed my dishes with the same mechanical efficiency I’d used to cook them. Plate, fork, pot. Wash, rinse, dry. Simple tasks that didn’t require thinking about cedar smoke or vanilla or leather.
My phone buzzed again. Text from an unknown number.
This is Beau Calder. Got your number from the emergency services contact list. Hope that’s okay. Just wanted to say the coffee machine is still working perfectly. You’re welcome at the station anytime.
I stared at the message for a long moment, my thumb hovering over the reply button.
Professional courtesy. That’s all this was. One colleague reaching out to another, making sure I knew I had access to resources I might need for my job.
Except Beau Calder had looked at me this morning with something that wasn’t professional at all.
Had stood in his kitchen offering me coffee and space like he understood that sometimes people needed a place to just be.
And I’d caught his scent on my jacket and purred like my suppressants meant nothing, like five years of walls meant nothing, like Nathan’s rejection meant nothing.
Which it didn’t. Nathan’s rejection didn’t mean anything about me. It meant something about him, about his inability to accept an omega who didn’t fit his fantasy of what omegas should be.
I knew that logically. Had spent five years in therapy working through the trauma of public rejection. Had built a successful career proving that I didn’t need anyone’s approval to be valuable.
But knowing something logically and feeling it emotionally were two different things.
And right now, staring at Beau’s text message, I felt like that omega in the white dress again. Vulnerable and exposed and terrified of trusting someone who might decide I wasn’t worth the effort.
I typed out a response with careful fingers. Thank you. I’ll keep that in mind.
Safe. Neutral. The kind of message that acknowledged his offer without committing to anything. Without opening any doors that might let him close enough to hurt.
His response came back almost immediately. No pressure. Just wanted you to know the door’s open.
The door’s open.
I set my phone down and pressed my palms against the counter, breathing carefully through the uncomfortable tightness in my chest that felt suspiciously like hope mixed with terror.
Five years I’d kept all the doors closed. Five years of making sure no alpha got close enough to matter, close enough to hurt. Five years of building walls so high that even I had trouble seeing over them sometimes.
And now three alphas were circling, and my biology was fighting my suppressants, and I had no idea how to keep running from something my body insisted I needed.
I looked at my reflection in the darkening window. Short black curls that never quite stayed in place. Dark amber eyes that looked tired even when I wasn’t. The suppressant patch visible on my arm where my sleeve had ridden up, a constant reminder of the biology I was trying to control.
“You’re not enough,” I whispered to my reflection, Nathan’s words echoing across five years like they’d been spoken yesterday. “You’re more alpha than omega. You’re too difficult.”
But a small, stubborn part of me, the part that had rebuilt my entire life after that humiliation, whispered back: Or maybe he wasn’t enough for you. Maybe he was looking for submission and you were offering partnership. Maybe his failure to see your value doesn’t mean you don’t have value.
The thought was dangerous. Revolutionary. The kind of thought that could undo five years of careful walls if I let it take root.
Because if Nathan was wrong, if his rejection said more about his limitations than mine, then maybe I’d been running from the wrong thing.
Maybe I’d been running from connection when I should have been running from alphas who couldn’t handle what I had to offer.
And maybe, just maybe, three alphas in Hollow Haven were different.
I turned away from the window and went to bed early, hoping sleep would quiet the arguments between my brain and my biology.
It didn’t.
I dreamed of cedar smoke and vanilla and leather, of three alphas who looked at me like I was exactly right instead of too much.
Dreamed of standing at an altar in a white dress, but this time when I looked up, there were three pairs of eyes looking back at me with something that felt like acceptance instead of doubt.
I woke up at three in the morning with my suppressants burning against my skin and my omega crying for something I couldn’t let myself want. The patch was secure. The dose was correct. Everything was working exactly as it should be.
So why did it feel like I was losing a battle I’d been fighting for five years?
I got up, showered in water hot enough to hurt, and started my day at four-thirty instead of my usual six. If I couldn’t sleep, I might as well work. Work I understood. Work I could control. Work didn’t ask for things I couldn’t give.
Work didn’t look at me with cedar smoke eyes and ask if I wanted coffee.
Work didn’t make me question whether being alone was really the same thing as being safe.
Work didn’t make me wonder if maybe, just maybe, I deserved something more than the careful, controlled life I’d built in the aftermath of public humiliation.
I pulled on my coordinator uniform, clipped my radio to my belt, and grabbed my tablet and keys. Another day of emergency management. Another day of being competent and professional and exactly the kind of omega Nathan had said I couldn’t be.
Another day of pretending I wasn’t fighting a losing battle against biology and hope and the terrifying possibility that this time might be different.
The suppressant patch on my arm felt like it was burning. I checked it for the third time, and it was fine. Secure. Doing what it was supposed to do.
So the burning was psychosomatic. My omega rebelling against five years of suppression, insisting that three alphas who smelled like home were worth the risk of vulnerability.
I touched the patch once more, a gesture that had become unconscious over five years. A reminder that I was in control. That I chose my biology, my biology didn’t choose me.
“Never again,” I whispered to my empty apartment. The same words I’d whispered five years ago, standing in a white dress with mascara running down my face. “Never again.”
But my omega purred softly at the memory of cedar smoke, and I had the uncomfortable realization that “never again” might be a promise I couldn’t keep.