7. Elliott
Elliott
Ifollowed Gail up the stairs and into a room on the right used for therapy. It was a small space with a desk and two comfortable couches facing each other and a table in between.
Once seated, I said the first thing on my mind. “I can’t take having an alpha following me around.”
“I’m afraid you don’t have a choice,” Gail told me. “Your safety is what’s most important.”
I had slept terribly the night before, and my mood reflected it. Groaning, I whined, “Well, does it have to be a different one every day? Can’t I just keep a regular?”
“Do you have one of them in mind?” Gail asked.
“No. But it would nice to be able to get comfortable with one person. As it is, I can’t even remember all of their names. It makes me nervous to wonder who it will be every day. Like, today I’ve got a guy who gives me the creeps.” I looked toward the window.
Gail leaned forward so she could do the same.
“Oh. That’s Kirk. He’s kind of stoic.”
“If that means scary, you’re right,” I said.
Gail chuckled. “It’s usually used to mean emotionless. Well, I don’t see any reason why a permanent person can’t be arranged for you. I actually think it would be a good step in your recovery to focus on one alpha. I’ll talk to Laura about it.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Not Kirk, though. And not Joel. He’s nice, but even though he didn’t mean to, he scared me yesterday, and I can’t get it out of my mind.”
“Okay,” Gail said, making a note on her phone. “Anyone else you don’t want?”
I shook my head and then remembered. “Oh, not Brandon. He’s one of the new ones. He reminds me of…”
I clamped my lips shut, leaving the sentence unfinished.
“Edge?” Gail asked gently. We had been over what had happened to me many times. It wasn’t surprising that she’d guessed.
I nodded and looked at the floor.
“Would one of the women make you more comfortable?” she asked.
I shook my head. Two of the kidnappers had been women. “One of the female kidnappers was…particularly mean to me.”
“I see. Thank you for telling me that. Are you sure there isn’t an ops alpha that makes you feel more comfortable than the rest? Maybe the one who sat outside the work shed when you were in heat? He proved himself to be strong and trustworthy, didn’t he?”
Did I want Jet to be assigned to me? Alphas were all the same at their core—slaves to their ruts.
But Jet had held back when I’d gone into heat.
He’d kept his promise and stayed outside, and he’d been kind to me when I’d had a panic attack while working in the garden.
He always respected me when I told him something made me uncomfortable.
Also, yesterday when I brought him and Joel the lemonade I’d made, he drank it all, even though I’d discovered later I’d only put in half the sugar I was supposed to.
For some reason, that meant something to me.
“Okay. Jet will be fine.”
“I’ll take care of that right now while I’m thinking about it.” Gail tapped out a text before setting her phone down on the table and picking up her clipboard and pen. Smoothing her plum-colored dress over her knees, she positioned her pen over the paper and asked, “How are the nightmares?”
“Scary” I answered.
“How often do you have them?”
“Maybe twice a week.”
“Are they the same as they’ve always been?”
I nodded. My nightmares were always about me getting away from the kidnappers and then them chasing me.
I’d try doors and they wouldn’t open and I’d hide in spaces not big enough to conceal me.
The dreams always ended with Edge finding me.
Oddly, lately Ben had been there, too, standing off to the side, watching.
I didn’t mention that to Gail, though. I knew it was counterproductive, but I didn’t want to talk any more than I had to during the session.
“Can you get back to sleep again afterward?”
I shook my head. “Only if Keane wakes up and talks to me for a while. But I’m glad when he doesn’t because I don’t want him to lose sleep because of me.”
“I understand. Keane’s a thoughtful friend to you.”
I nodded.
“Is everyone getting along well in the house?”
“Yes.”
Gail looked at what I assumed were the notes she’d taken about me over time.
“Let’s go back to this unexpected heat you had. That has happened in the past a few times, right?”
I nodded. I thought we might skim by the topic, but it looked like we were going to talk about it. Recently, I’d been thinking about something and decided that this was a good time to go for it.
“Gail,” I said.
“Hmm?” she murmured, looking up from where she was jotting something down in her notes.
“You’ve told me many times that I should set boundaries when I’m uncomfortable. Well, I’m uncomfortable talking about my heats. I’m not going to do it anymore unless it’s absolutely necessary for my well-being.”
“All right, well, do you think there are some things about the heat you recently had that you don’t mind talking about? Maybe what happened leading up to it?” Gail asked.
I thought about it. “Here’s what I’m willing to tell you: it was unexpected.
It scared me because I wasn’t at home and didn’t have people whom I trusted around me.
Also, an alpha was present who might not be able to resist my heat.
At the same time, I was scared to be alone.
That’s why I asked Jet to stay outside the building.
As usual, the heat was painful and extremely embarrassing to me and I feel ashamed of the things Jet probably heard during that time. ”
Gail put down her clipboard and smiled softly.
“I’m proud of you, Elliott, for setting boundaries, even with me, your therapist. I don’t have to know any more than that about the incident. I wish I could help you be a little less ashamed about your heats, though. They are natural occurrences.”
Probably due to lack of sleep, that annoyed me more than it normally would. “I don’t think you get it,” I told her.
“Okay. Explain it to me.”
“It’s like this. Think about the way you felt during your moments of deepest arousal. Even better, think about the times you were alone and feeling it.”
I wasn’t exactly comfortable saying this to a woman two decades older than I was, and my therapist to boot, but I forged on because I had a point to make.
“Now, imagine those feelings accelerating until you can no longer control them. You no longer care who sees or hears you in that state. You’re completely out of control.
So much so, you would do anything to relieve your need, including beg a complete stranger for their help.
And when your need is sated, that satiation lasts mere moments before you need more.
If fifty people showed up to take you, you would let them.
Nothing matters except relief from the need. ”
Gail’s face flushed with embarrassment, but, to her credit, her eyes didn’t waver from mine.
“Then,” I continued, “after hours…days, when it’s finally over, you have to face the memories of what you did. What you said. How you begged and who you begged. Who heard your wanton behavior. Who saw. Who would tell whom. And you knew it would happen again and again and had no way to stop it.”
Gail started to say something, and I held up my hand. “Wait!” I said. “One more thing. Knowing all of this, you also know that there are people out there who want to exploit you for it. Can you imagine? Even a little bit?”
When I saw tears in Gail’s eyes, I hoped they were tears of compassion and not of pity. I didn’t want anyone’s pity.
Grabbing some tissues from a box on her desk, she wiped her eyes. Then she pulled out a few more and handed them to me.
It was only then that I realized that tears were running down my face, too.
We composed ourselves in silence, and then Gail cleared her throat.
“Thank you, Elliott.”
Surprised, I asked, “What for?” I was prepared for her to be uncomfortable and move on from the subject, or maybe even be angry that I’d said what I had. I definitely hadn’t expected to be thanked.
“For allowing me to stand in your place even though it undoubtedly cost you to do so and for giving me a glimpse of what you go through.” She took a shaky breath and let it out.
“I understand better. Of course you can’t embrace your heats as something natural when they put you through such turmoil over and over again.
I’m sorry. And I’m sorry that you go through the experience more often than your friends do. ”
“Do you think that’s because I’m a different kind of omega? An omega x?”
“Probably, yes. You’re aware that I recently did my dissertation on biological character classification.
” When I nodded, she continued, “I explained to you and your friends back then that my experience with omegas almost exclusively came from the time I’ve spent with the seven of you.
So, you probably won’t be surprised to learn that I mentioned the omega x theory in my dissertation, after getting Laura’s permission, of course.
What I haven’t told many people is that my professor was so pleased with it, he had it published in a well-known medical magazine last month. ”
“Congratulations,” I said, meaning it. “That’s really great. I know you worked hard on that.”
She smiled. “Thank you. I did. But there’s something else—recently, I was contacted by email by someone who said he was an unregistered omega and therefore off the government’s radar and in hiding.
He and his twin brother had been scouring medical journals for a long time to try to learn more about omegas and were very excited to read what I had written, particularly about the idea of an omega x sub-strain.
He said that they had always felt different from the descriptions of omegas that they’d read and had really related to the omega x I mentioned.
I immediately asked if they have a star-shaped freckle on one shoulder, and they said they both did! ”
I leaned forward. “In the same place and everything?”
She nodded.
“Wow! What else did they say?”