I hurried after him. The adrenaline boost of my escape was fading, and even as stiff as I was from sitting down most of the day, I was tired and wouldn’t have minded a bit more sitting. I was hungry too, and it was only now that I realized how awkward it would be to ask for food the minute we got here.
This was definitely not a well designed plan.
Fan bounced around in front of the door, leaving tiny dirty paw prints on the steel. “Fan, stop it,” I hissed.
Jason laughed. “I just realized, both our hands are full. We need someone really grown up to open the door.” He nudged Fan with a toe. “Can you do that? The alphas are going to need help getting it open too.” He jerked his head in the direction of the two men, following us up the path with their arms full of my stuff. Enough for a two week long visit with my ‘cousin’.
Really, enough to start my life over again.
I hoped.
Fan, given the opportunity to be a big boy for the alphas, changed back with super speed and played doorman for us. What a wonderful boy he was, when he like this. I wished I could figure out how to bring it out in him more often, but I suspected it was his need for an alpha role model that created the problems for us. “You’re really good with him.”
“I spent some time working in the daycare when I was pregnant, when I wasn’t working in the garden. I learned a lot.” Jason jerked his head toward the alphas coming in the door behind us. “And, I’ve been managing that big kid for six months.”
“Who’s a big kid?” Mac asked. He put my bags down out of the way in the living room and dropped a kiss on Jason’s cheek before heading back out to the van. The Alpha dropped his burden off and followed Mac outside.
I sighed as I looked around their incredibly neat home. Maybe I’d have something like this again.
Some day.
I hoped that there was a way for me to talk them into letting me earn the credit I’d need to pay for it. If not, I’d have to mate for it, but maybe I could find a nice delta wolf to take me before the alphas got all horny and hairy. An older one, that would be looking more for someone to keep his house and make sure his favorite pants were always clean. Although, I thought I might prefer to go live in the human world before I did that. I didn’t think I could handle having my dreams of a loving mating broken again.
That was for the future, though. For now, Jason led me upstairs to a small bedroom at the back of the house, with a crib in the corner and a mattress on the floor. It was overwhelming. They were so rich here in Mercy Hills that even the shifters who weren’t the Alpha had extra furniture.
Jason laid Beatrice down on the mattress and placed his baby in the crib, then took a wide-eyed Teca from me. “We can leave the sleepers up here, if you want to lay him down.” He did something with a strange-looking white and blue box, setting it on the floor next to the mattress. “We’ll be able to hear if they wake up.”
“What is that?” I asked, pointing at the box with my free hand. Noah made a snuffling noise and lifted his head, but went right back to sleep as soon as I started rocking him again.
“It’s a baby monitor. Laine gave it to me—he says it’s traditional for humans to have a party to celebrate a baby, and the parents get gifts. I’ll show you the other half downstairs.”
I didn’t care who this Laine person was, but the blue and white box fascinated me.
Jason paused to give me time to lay Noah down in the crib, then we snuck out of the room and Jason closed the door behind us.
Downstairs, it seemed like someone had talked Fan into getting dressed, and he’d opened his one little bag of clothing, scattering his belongings everywhere. The ones I’d thought looked the least beat up, of the ones that still fit him. He’d started a growth spurt a month ago, and showed no sign of stopping. I didn’t enjoy the thought of strangers seeing how little I had—it had already been brought home to me how different our statuses were, former Alpha’s mate or not. “Fan, baby, put your things back in your bag.” I crouched to start gathering up the mess, and found the Alpha on his knees helping. “Sir, you don’t need to…”
He took a T-shirt from me and folded it. “Call me Abel. No one calls me Alpha or Sir except on formal occasions. And I have two little brothers—I’ve picked up plenty of clothes in my day.” He winked and I smiled, then my cheeks went hot and I turned my head to search for more clothing and recover my equilibrium.
Fan, of course, being not yet four, had followed Jason and Teca into the kitchen searching for the promised cookies. He came back with one in each hand, scattering crumbs everywhere. I was about to say something, but the Alpha took over, laying a shabby gray blanket on the floor in front of a TV—ordinary pack members with a TV!—and herded my boy over to it. Moments later, Jason brought Teca out and set her down next to Fan, cookies in her hands as well. Fan and Teca were immediately engrossed in the antics of some cartoon character I didn’t recognize, and the Alpha was at my elbow again. “They’ll be fine there. Come into the kitchen and we’ll talk.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
In the kitchen, the Alpha showed me to a chair, which was more courtesy than I’d seen in four years, not since I’d been taken from Buffalo Gap. Jason set a mug in front of me, and I smelled coffee. I’d only had it twice in my life, when Patrick had been entertaining. Actually, one of the times was when Abel had visited Jackson-Jellystone. I didn’t remember much of the visit. Mostly, I just remembered being stressed, and the lecture from Patrick over something I’d done wrong at the time, but the coffee had stood out, even though I’d only manage a couple of stolen mouthfuls when Patrick wasn’t looking. It had tasted like—I don’t know what. I passed my mug under my nose and breathed deeply.
“It smells better than it tastes,” the Alpha said, his tone light. He had his own mug, the contents a pale beige just two shades short of white.
“You can have tea if you want,” Mac told him, sitting down with his own coffee.
“No, this is fine. But maybe Bax would prefer tea?”
I put down my mug with a startled thump. “Oh, no, I’m fine. This is lovely.”
“I have milk and honey,” Jason said as he placed a small platter with an opened box of pasteurized milk and a small jar of honey in the center of the table.
“No, this is good. Thank you.” I took a cautious sip and closed my eyes in pleasure. It was as good as memory had painted it.
Jason disappeared briefly into the living room, then came back with another small blue and white box, the mate to the one in the bedroom upstairs. He pressed a button and the speaker crackled, and then I heard the tiny noises of sleeping babies from upstairs.
“Oh,” I said, and reached impulsively to touch it. “That’s amazing.”
“It’s so useful. I can’t imagine not having one.” He beamed at me and slid into the last chair around the little round table.
We sat in silence for a moment. I got the feeling that no one quite knew where or how to start.
Then the Alpha straightened in his chair and cleared his throat. “So, what’s the story?” My papers sat on the table in front of him, face down. Evidently, he wanted the explanation from me, not my paperwork.
I stared down at my mug and played with it, running my finger around the rim, feeling the slight irregularities of the pottery. “You already know that my mate, Patrick, was killed in a car accident. Because he was Alpha, we lived in a pack-owned house instead of owning our own. But when he died, I lost my home. Being omega, I couldn’t rent or buy on my own, even if there’d been housing available.”
Abel shifted in his chair. “He had no will?”
I shook my head. “He was young, for an Alpha.” Though not as young as the Alpha sitting next me at this table. “I’m sure he would have gotten around to it sometime.” There. That covered the respect due to my deceased mate, I hoped. I didn’t want them to know how resentful I was—omegas were supposed to be cheerful and comforting, not angry and frustrated.
“He should have done someth
ing about it as soon as he mated. That’s hardly the sign of a responsible Alpha.” Abel tapped his fingers against the table as if he were making the point to Patrick himself.
My throat was tight with the memory, and I took a sip of coffee to loosen it. It wasn’t proper for me to comment on the Alpha’s words, so I continued with my story. “I hoped they’d put me in temporary housing under someone else’s guardianship while they looked for a new mate for me. I don’t think I would have had much of a problem with a quick mating—it’s how things are done, and I meant to make the best of it. But I didn’t have a chance. Two weeks after he passed, they came and told me they had no home for me to go to with my pups, and while they could find shifters that would mate me, none of them wanted my babies. The pack wanted to foster them out.” I blinked, trying unsuccessfully to stop the tears. Angrily, I rubbed them away with the back of my hand. “I’ll admit, I didn’t take it well. In the end, the new Alpha said I could stay there until Noah was weaned and I’d finished mourning Patrick.” The snort escaped me before I could stop it, and I buried my nose in my mug in search of enough time to shove my anger and resentment back down where it came from.
“That would be hard,” Jason said and put a hand on my shoulder.
I glanced around the table, trying to gauge how my story was being received, whether the alphas believed me or not. So much depended on this, but I was finding it harder than I’d expected to remember all the most important parts of the story. Mac looked upset, a good sign. The Alpha had a gleam in his eye that I couldn’t read.
I took a deep, shuddering breath and nodded. “Then, early this week, they brought a pack-trained doctor to visit, trying to convince him to move to Jackson-Jellystone.” My stomach clenched and for a moment I thought I might be sick. Even the smell of the coffee made my guts churn, so I pushed the mug away from me. “They offered me as part of the deal.” I looked up and met the Alpha’s eyes. “Even that, I would have agreed to. It was a good mating, and fairy tale romance would be nice, but I know better than that. I would have made him the best home I could, born his pups, whatever he wanted.” I choked on a sob and had to bite the inside of my cheek to stay in control long enough to choke out the next sentence. “Except he didn’t want my babies either.”
The Alpha’s sober expression blurred in front of me and this time, I didn’t bother trying to hide the tears. I doubt I could have stopped them anyway. I clasped my hands together in my lap, squeezing until it hurt. “It’s not fair. They’re good babies, and they don’t deserve this. So I told Roland I wanted to come visit my cousin before I mated the doctor, packed everything I could that wouldn’t look suspicious, and came here.” I reached up and touched Jason’s hand, turning toward him. “If I can’t take refuge here, will you tell me how you hid in the human world for so long? Help me keep my babies?” Tears poured down my face, racing past the last scraps of my self-control.
“Oh, fuck,” Jason murmured, and pulled my head down to his shoulder, his arms around me like a best friend. I hid my face against his neck and took the comfort he offered, which was almost as upsetting to my fragile emotional state as telling my story had been. I was going to be a wreck by the end of the night.
Someone put a hand on my back. It could only have been the Alpha. He rubbed up and down my spine, soothing me with his warmth and his obvious strength. It was more than just a physical strength, but something that all the Alphas I’d met had to some degree or another. It was the power that had roused my body for Patrick, even though my heart despised him. But in this Alpha it was something different, something that warmed me without overwhelming me.
That thought jerked me out of Jason’s arms, and my sudden movement startled the Alpha into pulling his hand away. I wiped my eyes carefully and sniffed as delicately as I could manage. “I’m sorry. It’s been a long day.”
“A long few years.” The Alpha turned my travel papers over on the table and looked across at Jason. “I know you’ve told me before about early matings.” He passed the papers across the table and I held my breath, not knowing why. But it felt like a make-or-break moment, as if the next words spoken would determine the course of the rest of my life, and that of my pups.
Jason picked up the papers, wearing an expression I found hard to read. He read them and glanced up at me, then something changed about him. About me, too. All of a sudden, I knew it would be all right. That these people would help me. I saw Mac catch Jason’s gaze, and some unspoken message passed between them. Then Jason turned back to me.
“I’m so sorry, Bax. We’ll do everything we can.”
And I fainted.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
I came back to myself, swimming up through layers of sound and strange, wobbly shapes, to find they’d moved me to the couch in the living room. Jason was gently dabbing at my face with a cool cloth and when I turned my head to the side, I saw the Alpha fanning me with—ironically—my travel papers. Fan and Teca were nowhere to be seen. “Where are my babies?” I croaked.
Jason’s eyes crinkled. “Mac took them outside to see the back yard and do a little scent marking.”
That made me laugh and I tried to sit up. “I’m fine. It’s too cold for them to be outside.”
The Alpha spoke reassuringly. “We dressed them before he took them out. They’re okay. You need a few more minutes horizontal, though. Your face is still white as chalk.”
“It’s been a long day,” I repeated.
“And,” Jason said, with a martial look in his eye. “You’re seriously underfed. Even I know that four babies in four years is too much, and I missed all the serious child-bearing lessons. What was your mate thinking?”
“I have no idea.” I winced and wished I could take the words back.
Jason sniffed. “Your scent is better. What have you eaten today?”
“Uh.” I couldn’t really remember. “Fan and I shared a bag of potato chips on the way here. Some fruit. A muffin, when I stopped for gas. Oatmeal for breakfast.”
“Not enough. I’ll make you a plate, and something for the babies too.”
“Really, there’s no need—” I tried to sit up, but the room whirled around me, like that one time in Buffalo Gap when I and my fellow omegas had stolen a gallon of raw whiskey and gotten drunk on it. Now that I thought about it, maybe Uncle Mitchel had had good reason to want to mate me off—the liquor had been my idea. “I’m fine. Really.”
The Alpha put his hand in the center of my chest and pushed me back down into the cushions. “Enough. You just went three shades whiter. You’re not ready to get up yet.”
I tried to protest but the Alpha’s power stopped my words in my throat. I hated that, but I sat on my anger—I needed these people. My babies needed these people. And as kind as this Alpha seemed, how could I know that he was any more tolerant than Patrick was? For all I knew, he was just looking to one-up Jackson-Jellystone, in the giant game of egos the Alphas all seemed to love playing.
No. This is Mercy Hills. Mercy Hills had no reason to play king of the forest glade with another pack. And he didn’t feel like Patrick, inside my head. If anything, he seemed stretched thin over the entire pack, so thin there was almost nothing of him left for him.
And then I wondered how it was that I knew that.
A clattering of dishes sounded from the kitchen, the sucking sound of the refrigerator opening and closing speaking of food to come, and then more clattering. I closed my eyes, because the Alpha was watching me too closely for my own comfort, and I needed the illusion of some amount of privacy to regain my composure. Sleep sucked at the edges of my awareness and the adrenaline that had kept me going for the past five months deserted me completely. I was moments away from dozing off when the damp cloth touched my forehead again and my eyes flew open.
The Alpha pulled the cloth away. “I thought it might help. You’re looking a little less gray.”
“I’m feeling better.” The hazy thought that the Alpha would have made a fine radio announcer fli
tted through my mind. His voice had that lovely depth you always heard when the DJs started talking, the kind that made you want to listen forever.
He made a noise deep in his throat. “But tired, I’ll bet.”
I nodded. He wasn’t wrong.
Faint giggles came from the direction of the kitchen, the sound of happy pups. Then a door opening and closing, and louder giggles mixed in with the deep rumble of Mac’s voice. I swung my legs off the couch and started to sit up.
The Alpha put out a hand. “I don’t think you’re ready yet.”
I wasn’t, not entirely. My stomach lurched and the room swam in front of me for a moment before my vision cleared. “I don’t want to scare the pups. I won’t try to stand, so you don’t need to worry.” He still looked concerned, so I dared greatly and put a hand on his forearm. “Really. I’m good.” And just then, my pups barreled around the corner into the living room and leaped on top of me. Teca gave me a huge kiss, throwing her arms wildly around my neck, but the unfocused expression in her eyes told me she was two blinks away from sleep herself.
Fan, on the other hand, was wired for sound. “Dabi, Dabi, Mac let us pee on the fence posts. Why don’t they have a real fences? They just have the up and down parts.”
“You mean the posts? I don’t know why. You could always ask. Politely.” I helped Teca out of her little coat and let her curl up on the couch with her head in my lap. She went heavy, boneless, almost immediately, her breathing settling out into the deep respirations of puppy sleep.
Fan nodded and curled into my side, grinning and humming happily while he stroked my chest as if he was still nursing.
I hugged him to me. “You hungry, baby?”
“Can I have more cookies?”
“You can have food. But no more cookies until tomorrow.”
Abel's Omega(Gay Paranomal MM Mpreg Romance) (Mercy Hills Pack Book 2) Page 7
