Chapter 17 #2
His admission takes the wind out of my sails slightly. “Did she?” I question flatly. My eyes rise from the cake to the other omega.
She tilts her head innocently. “It’s trendy these days. With younger people, at least. You may not have seen it?”
“Kids these days, right?” Cole smiles at me.
“I didn’t know what you’d like so I just got vanilla. It’s my favorite.” Amy leans forward, swiping a finger into the icing. She sticks the digit into her mouth, wraps her lips around it with a loud satisfactory sound.
The implication that I’m old wasn’t what annoyed me. This is just immature and unsanitary. Who knows where her finger has been? I wait for Ian to scold her, but it never comes.
Instead, Liam wipes a remnant of frosting at the corner of her lips away with his thumb. He raises it to his mouth, making her scent turn sweeter as she blushes. The way his eyes linger on her lips makes my stomach twist again, but no one except me pays it any mind.
“Make a wish.” Cole jolts my attention away from the two and toward the now lit candle.
A wish? I stare at the flickering flame, unsure.
The obvious would be for our pack to go back to having one omega. Could things ever be the same? Would I want them to? It feels like that would just be going from being lonely all the time now to back to being lonely while they’re gone.
For them to love me more? They do love me. It simply doesn’t always manifest in the way I want it to. Should I ask for them to love me differently? Ian is almost forty though. People don’t change that easily.
More unsavory desires flicker through my mind too.
My thoughts wander to the bond humming in my chest, the mating mark burned onto my neck.
I picture myself for a moment running as fast as I can, the wind in my hair, no leash tugging me back.
The image of their mark on me being stripped away disappears as quickly as it emerges, flooding me with guilt.
It’s replaced by the smooth smell of aloe vera, the feel of gentle hands brushing against mine as I pass my phone over. The warmth of a jacket, deft and veiny hands cleaning nonexistent smudges off a pair of glasses.
“Ariana?” I look up slowly at Ian’s voice. The table stares at me, faces ranging from concerned to stiff.
“Sorry.” I return my attention back to the melting candle, watching it drip wax onto the cake. What do I want? I don’t know.
I settle on simply wishing for things to be different. It’s broad and vague enough to comfort me, without the unease of having to consider or address what shape a change I would like would need to take. There’s no singing or fanfare as I blow the candle out, just me sitting back into my chair.
Cole holds out a small orange bag. “For you.”
If there’s one thing my pack loves, it’s gifts. There’s no card inside, just a small black box with gold detailing on it. It screams expensive. My eyes flick up to their faces. The three alphas look satisfied, but Amy’s biting down on her lip, staring intensely at the box.
“Open it,” Liam encourages.
Lifting the lid of the box reveals a bracelet. Silver, adorned with diamonds. It’s beautiful. Extremely so, objectively enough that even my tasteless self can tell. Amy’s scent flares as I hold it up.
“A Helios piece. Their jewelry line is impossible to get, that’s-”
Cole beams at her words. “Immaculate. Do you like it?”
It’s gorgeous. I’m grateful beyond words. Helios jewelry is the epitome of luxury. They’re exclusive with who they sell their uncatalogued to. It takes time, you have to build a reputation with their sales reps and purchase other items. Only then do they let you buy their jewelry.
The amount of time that must have gone into this gift is hard to imagine. It’s harder to imagine with all the effort it would take, they would forget something so vital.
I’m allergic to silver.
They definitely know this, after years of gifting jewelry and living together. They may have forgotten it was because of an allergy, but have they not noticed me only wearing gold? It’s been ten years, and I’ve never strayed from it.
But how can I dislike it when they look so proud of themselves? And they’ve been treating me so well all day, I can’t stomp on their efforts like that. I don’t want to ruin this rare pleasant atmosphere.
After. I’ll tell Cole after, once we’re alone. Out of all my alphas, he’s the one that’ll be understanding, not offended.
“Thank you. It’s beautiful.” The statement is neither a lie nor a completely truthful answer to his question.
“Try it on.” Liam says.
My heart races, looking for a way out of this. The three alphas look at me expectantly, and the cursed bond makes it so part of me can’t help wanting to please them. I’ll try it on quickly, then say it’s too precious to keep on.
The clasp is tricky and Cole helps me, his fingers warm against my wrist. The bracelet sits heavy and cold against my skin. It’s beautiful, but I stare at it apprehensively, just waiting for the rash to break out.
“We should all sleep with Ariana tonight.”
My head snaps up at Ian’s words. He looks at the bracelet, then at the rest of the pack.
“It is fair.” Cole nods along. “And it’s been so long.”
Liam makes a noncommittal word of agreement, although he’s looking at Amy. She’s still staring at the bracelet as if transfixed.
“I’d like that.” I say automatically. It’ll be like old times, and it’s only fair. They all slept with Amy the night of the ball. This isn’t special treatment. I lift my wrist up, about to ask Cole to help me take off the bracelet, when the toffee scent swells.
Turning to face its source, I find Amy clutching onto the table. A whine comes loudly from her throat, making all of us go still. There’s a pause, and then her perfume grows richer, the sweet smell of caramel and toffee erupting from her body and turning the air thick.
The first glisten of slick pouring travels down her thighs from under her short dress as she whines again, clinging onto Liam’s arm desperately. There’s no mistaking the sudden onset of heat.
Horribly, my first reaction is relief. If she’s still having heat cycles, she isn’t pregnant yet. That means she isn’t here to stay permanently yet.
That relief doesn’t last long, spiraling into dread. There couldn’t have been any worse timing. All the days in the world and this is when her cycle hits?
Liam pulls her into his arms, petting her hair and murmuring comfortingly as she bites down on his shirt. She’s making soft, needy noises that have the hairs on the back of my neck rising.
Ian lets out a strangled growl and I can already tell her perfume is sending him under the control of his rut.
My arm moves of its own accord, latching onto Cole’s wrist. He turns to me apologetically, a drop of sweat beading down his forehead.
“Ariana…” he says.
“Please.” I beg, my voice small. “It’s my birthday.”
“After. I promise. We’ll come straight to you after.”
My stomach sinks. After spending days filling her with their knots?
“Don’t go.”
“Ariana.” Ian says, and there’s warning in his tone. “She needs us right now.”
I have to get through to them now, before they’re too consumed by their ruts to turn away from her. I clutch onto Cole pleadingly, letting my own scent run wild with desperation.
He pulls his arm out of my grasp. Not violently, he doesn’t wrench it free. I pull my hand back like it’s been burned anyways.
Amy lets out another whine, and then they’re gone, leaving me alone at the dining table with the tacky decorations, the thick smell of caramel laced heavily with arousal, a bracelet that slowly turns my skin red, and a cake in someone else’s favorite flavor.
Happy birthday to me.
Is this her first heat with them? It’s definitely the first since she moved in, but no one’s cared to share the details of their relationship prior to that with me.
I remember our first time, even now, almost ten years later. Vaguely. Most of it was a haze, hands and bodies pressed against and inside me until I wasn’t sure where I ended and they began. Then, clear as day, the pain of teeth sinking into my neck.
By the time it was over with, I was marked and claimed. Theirs forever. Is that how Amy will come out in a few days?
I barely make it to the kitchen sink before brunch spills out of me, retching loudly. My teary eyes burn alongside my throat as I stand, dry heaving. The feeling of a hand patting my back gently makes me jump.
My hopes only have a chance to soar for a moment before they fall again. No one from my pack has come to check on me. It’s Ian’s assistant, Claire, looking at me pityingly again.
I want to apologize for the disappointment she’s definitely felt rising into my scent, but a second wave of nausea strikes before I can. Kinder than I deserve, she gathers my hair and holds it back for me in a makeshift ponytail.
Once I’ve emptied my guts and desperately taken a drink of water straight from the faucet, I turn to her apologetically. “Sorry,” embarrassingly, my voice comes out as a whine.