by J. L. Wilder
She thought she was so smart.
Grant stood up, putting distance between the two of them. “Omegas are good at that, too,” he said. “In fact, they’re usually better than this. But don’t worry, you’ve got time to learn.”
Shock crossed her face. She hadn’t expected him to be able to resist her. He could see that.
“You’d better go on back to your tent,” he said. “We don’t need to discuss this any further, as long as it never happens again.”
She jumped to her feet. He was sure, for a moment, that she was going to burst into tears and go running back to her tent. He even wondered if perhaps she might be so embarrassed by her behavior that she would stay in there for the rest of the trip.
But just as Grant was about to get up and apologize to her, her face changed. She was alight with rage now. “You can’t talk to me that way,” she hissed. “You think you’re so big just because you’re an alpha and I’m an omega, but the truth is that you’re nothing. You’re nothing to me, Professor Larson. I don’t care what you say. I don’t care what you think.”
“Calm down,” he ordered. He was somewhat taken aback, and without really considering it, he found himself injecting his command with some of the weight of his position as alpha. She needed to calm down. The whole group needed it. This kind of drama would do no one any good.
“Fuck you,” she snarled. “Fuck you and your whole institution. I’m done with it.”
She turned her back on him and sprinted off into the woods.
Grant swore violently. He couldn’t very well let her go. She was an omega, and there were wild wolves out there. She might not have thought much of his trying to dominate her, but that was nothing compared to what she would experience if the wild wolves found her and tried to incorporate her into their pack.
Or they might just attack her. That was a concern too.
And yet, he couldn’t just leave camp. He had a dozen other girls there, all of them depending on him for leadership. They couldn’t just be left on their own.
He was torn for several minutes. What could he do? How could he choose?
But they’re safe as long as they stay in camp, he told himself. The wild wolves won’t come to the campsite. They’ll be all right here. No harm will come to them.
At least, he hoped that was true.
“Everyone, gather!” he called.
The girls grouped up around him quickly. At least no one else was feeling rebellious. Thank God for small mercies.
“I have to go into the woods for a bit,” Grant said, deciding not to tell them what Cait had done. He didn’t want to give the more rebellious among them any ideas. “You’ll all have to promise me that you’re going to stay here in camp.”
“How long will you be gone?” one of the girls asked, a nervous expression on her face.
“Not too long. No more than an hour.” I hope that’s all it is, at least.
“We’ll stay here,” another girl said.
“Promise. Everyone say it.”
“I promise,” they chorused.
“You can start making your dinner,” Grant said. “There are sausages in the cooler there. I’d hoped to take you hunting tonight, but we’ll do it for tomorrow’s breakfast. Not to worry. Someone tend the fire. I’ll be back shortly.”
With a last glance over his shoulder to ensure that they were obeying, he jogged into the woods.
He longed to shift. Tracking Cait would be easy in wolf form. There was no way a hysterical omega would be able to elude his finely honed senses. But if he shifted, he would have to leave his clothes behind, and that definitely wasn’t something he wanted to do. Catching up with her naked would put him at a disadvantage that he didn’t want to deal with.
Fortunately, she was easy to track.
She had been so enraged when she’d taken flight that she hadn’t bothered to disguise her trail. Or maybe she simply didn’t know how. It was something he would have to teach her eventually, something he would have to teach all of them. He was struck anew by how helpless omegas were on their own.
Omegas weren’t powerless. That was what Cait believed, and she was wrong. Omegas were some of the most powerful people in the world.
But they weren’t powerful on their own.
They needed their pack. They needed an alpha.
Without that, they could never be complete.
He followed Cait’s footprints. He followed broken twigs and disturbed rocks. And before long, he had come close enough that he was able to follow the sounds she was making as she crashed through the underbrush.
Cait. You have so much to learn. You could be so much more than what you are right now, but you refuse the lessons that could help you. Why do you sabotage yourself like this? Why do so many omegas insist on doing this to themselves?
He wished he had the answer.
Just then, he heard a cry of pain and a loud crash. Abandoning the distance he had been maintaining and his attempts to remain subtle as he followed her, he raced forward.
She was on the ground, cradling her ankle between her hands, and he saw at once that it was beginning to swell. “Shit, Cait.”
She glared up at him. “Get back.”
“You can’t walk on that. Come on, let me help you.”
“I don’t want your help! You think I can’t do anything without your help.”
“That isn’t true. Cait, come on. We need to get back to camp.”
She opened her mouth to retort, but before she could get the words out, lightning flashed above them.
Fuck.
The lightning was followed almost immediately by a crash of thunder, and then, without warning, the sky split open, soaking them in a sudden downpour.
“Are you goddamn kidding me?” Grant hollered at the sky. First, an out of control omega on an excursion, and now this? He turned to Cait, moving to help her up. “Come on,” he said. “We need to get to shelter and wait this out.”
She scooted backward out of his reach. “You better not touch me, asshole.”
“What, you’re going to sit out here in the rain?” he asked. “Don’t be crazy.”
“Go back to camp if you don’t like it.”
“Can’t do it. Sorry.” He bent over and scooped her up in his arms.
Cait howled in protest, kicking and beating at his chest with her fists, but Grant was much stronger than she was. He ignored her struggles and set off at a jog. “There was an old hunting cabin over here,” he said. “I saw it when we were on our run earlier. We can go there and wait this out. Fall storm like this shouldn’t last long. Maybe an hour.”
He found the cabin easily and carried Cait inside. There was a sagging sofa, and he laid her down on it and went to the fireplace. Someone had stacked some wood there, but there were no matches and no lighter.
He was just going to have to try to make a fire.
Cait stared as he arranged wood in the fireplace. “Do you know what you’re doing?” she asked him.
“I’ve done it before,” he said. “I’m not exactly a professional.” He took a likely looking stick, stripped it of its bark, and began to twist it rapidly in the notch of a log.
“That’s not going to work,” Cait scoffed.
Grant ignored her and continued twisting the stick.
After a moment, a curl of smoke rose up. Grant held a piece of bark to it, and it caught. He added more bark to the pile until he had a flame that was big enough to catch a few sticks, and then, finally, one of the logs.
He stepped back and admired his handiwork. Cait was staring at him in frank amazement.
“How did you learn to do that?” she asked him.
“Shifter University,” he said. “Now, let me look at that ankle.”
She was too awed by his fire-making to protest as he knelt beside her and began to manipulate her ankle carefully back and forth.
“I don’t think this is broken,” he said. “It’s probably just sprained. Ideally, you’d want to ice it a
nd wrap it, but there’s nothing we can do about that here. It’s too bad we’re not back at camp.”
“There’s no ice back at camp,” she said.
“No,” he agreed. “But there are a bunch of omegas.”
“What difference does that make?” she asked.
“I told you,” he said. “Omegas are natural healers. Omegas have instincts that serve well in situations like this. I don’t have those instincts.”
She was quiet for a minute. “Do I have them?” she asked.
He glanced at her. “Are you going to curse at me and run away if I say you do?”
She gestured to her ankle. “I’m not running anywhere. No promises about the cursing thing.”
He smiled. “You have the instincts,” he said. “But you reject them. You push them away. I’m not sure why you do that, but something about you doesn’t want to be your best self. And as long as you keep doing that, you’ll never have the natural talents that come with being an omega.”
“And if I let you teach me?” she asked.
“Are you saying you’re willing to learn from me?” he asked her.
“I’m saying I’m considering it,” she said.
“What changed your mind?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I suppose I just...want to learn. I do want to be the best version of myself, you know. I’m sure you probably just think I’m rebelling for no reason, but I do want to improve myself. That’s why I wanted to go to Shifter U in the first place. I still want that. But nobody’s going to let me have that.”
“It’s not the right place for you, Cait,” he told her.
“Whatever,” she growled. “The point is, I should make the most of what I am allowed to have. Otherwise, I’m just languishing, and I’m not going to amount to anything at all.”
He came over and sat on the floor beside the couch. “All right,” he said. “If that’s how you feel, then let’s get started.”
“What, right now?”
“We’re stuck here, aren’t we?” he said. “Why waste the time?”
She sighed. “Why, indeed?”
Grant smiled. It would be a long battle to get her on the right path, but at least she was working with him now.
Chapter Eight
CAIT
“So,” Professor Larson said, “the role of the omega in the pack.”
Cait pulled her legs close to her chest. This was a lecture she had heard a thousand times before from her father. I know the role of the omega, she wanted to say. You don’t have to tell me.
But she had promised to listen.
She couldn’t have said exactly why she felt like listening to Professor Larson all of a sudden. She had despised him when they’d left the university to come on this little camping trip, and the way he’d rejected her attempts to seduce him hadn’t endeared him to her.
But he had been so masterful when he had found her in the woods after she had hurt her ankle. She’d fought against his attempts to take control of the situation, but he hadn’t listened. He had picked her up and brought her to the cabin almost as if he had planned it.
And yes, she had hated the fact that he had taken control without even listening to her. Without seeming to value her input at all.
But she could hardly deny that she was in a better situation now than she had been before.
He was right. I hate to admit it, but he was. And if he was right about that, he might have something to teach me after all.
“Okay,” she said. “The role of the omega.”
“Is what?” he asked.
“You’re asking me?” She frowned. “You’re the professor here.”
“I want to know what you think the answer is,” he said.
“The role of the omega is to do what she’s told,” Cait said. “She serves the alpha. She’s the lowest member of the pack, and her entire existence is about making the alpha happy. Everyone knows that.”
He nodded. “I thought you would say that.”
“I might be new to Omega University, but I’m not new to this life,” she told him. “I’ve lived under alphas all my life. I know exactly what they think I’m good for.”
“And what’s that?” he asked her.
“Mating,” she said. “Making babies.”
He nodded slowly. “It’s true that omegas are the most fertile members of the pack,” he said. “They produce the most and the healthiest offspring, and they’re prized as mates for that reason. But you talk about it as if it’s a burden.”
“You have no idea what it’s like,” she said. “You’re an alpha.”
“I’m an alpha,” he agreed. “But as an alpha, I understand pack dynamics better than most shifters you’ll meet.”
“What do you mean?”
“The majority of us are betas,” he said. “Betas are ordinary. They follow the alpha’s orders, but when they have no alpha, or when their alpha hasn’t given an order, they’re happy enough left to their own devices.
“But I’m like you. I know what it’s like to be born for a specific role. I know what it’s like to have my nature compel me to live a certain life, whether I think it’s what I want or not.”
“Why wouldn’t you want to be an alpha?” Cait scoffed. Every alpha she had ever known had loved flexing his authority. Why would anyone resent having that station in life?
“Because it’s an enormous responsibility,” Professor Larson said. “It’s the alpha’s job to make sure the pack is happy and well cared for. In particular, it’s his job to make sure his omega is healthy and content. You say omegas are meant for breeding, and in part, that’s true. But the role of the omega in the pack is more complicated than that. She’s the pack’s healer and caretaker. She’s the heart of the pack, while the alpha is the head. And if an omega is unhappy or ill cared for, the pack as a whole will be weaker as a result.”
Cait frowned. This didn’t tally with her experience at all.
“My father was the alpha of our pack,” she said. “He wanted me to marry.”
Professor Larson nodded. “That’s typical,” he said. “An omega should marry young, to make the most of her prime childbearing years.”
“He chose a mate for me,” Cait said. “Is that normal too?”
“It’s uncommon,” Professor Larson said. “But it’s not unheard of. And knowing you, Cait, I can only imagine that you had to be compelled to marry. I don’t imagine you would have done it unprompted.”
“No,” Cait admitted. “I wouldn’t.”
“Then, it makes sense for your father to try to get the ball rolling.”
“But the man he chose for me,” Cait burst out, her frustration boiling over. “He was all wrong. He was terrible. And my father only chose him for me because he was an alpha.”
She expected that Professor Larson would dismiss this, would say that of course, her father had wanted to see her with an alpha, that an omega should be with an alpha. That it was only right.
Instead, he frowned. “What was wrong with this alpha?” he asked.
Cait hesitated. How could she explain Bart to someone who had never known him?
“He was...” she struggled for words. “He was bossy.”
“Young alphas often are,” Professor Larson said.
“No,” Cait said. “It wasn’t like that. It wasn’t...normal. At least, I don’t think it could have been normal. I don’t know what others are like. But he was cruel with his power. We grew up together, part of the same pack, and he was always the bully.”
“It’s common for alphas to exhibit some bullying traits in childhood,” Professor Larson said.
He wasn’t understanding her. She felt frustrated. “The other boys in the pack rallied around him,” she said. “By the time we were teenagers, several of them had submitted to him. It drove him crazy that I wouldn’t do the same. I used to run away from him and tell him he wasn’t my alpha, and I didn’t have to listen to him. He would slap me to try to make me obey, but I never gave
in.”
Professor Larson turned and stared at her.
“He hit you?” he asked, his voice strangled.
She was confused. Why had his demeanor changed so abruptly? “I told you he was a bully,” she said. “You said that was normal.”
“I imagined him ordering the other children of the pack around,” he said. “Controlling the games that were played. Not letting others have a voice. That sort of bullying.”
“Well, yes,” Cait said. “But that’s how he kept his control.”
“By hitting the others?”
“That was mostly just me,” Cait said. “He gave them...I don’t know. A common enemy. The other members of the pack knew that if they joined him in hating me and pushing me around, that his attention wouldn’t shift to them.”
“My God,” Professor Larson breathed. “And your father wanted you to be mated to this person?”
“We were supposed to marry,” Cait said. “I was only able to put it off by asking to come to Omega University. I lied and told my father I wanted to learn how to be a better omega, how to be a better shifter and a better mate.”
“That’s why you went to Shifter U instead of coming here,” Professor Larson said quietly. “You were trying to escape.”
“But Bart decided to go to Shifter U,” Cait said. “I guess he needed something to fill the years before I would be able to marry him. And he caught me there, and now I’m here.”
Professor Larson was quiet for several minutes.
Then he looked up at her.
“I owe you an apology,” he said, his voice thick with emotion.
She looked into his eyes and felt her heart beat a little faster.
“What?” she asked.
“I assumed you were just rebelling to cause trouble,” he said. “I assumed you wanted to disturb my class. I had no idea, Cait.”
He reached out and rested a hand on hers.
Her heart pounded. His touch was electrifying. His eyes seemed to search her very soul. “You couldn’t have,” she managed. “You couldn’t have known.”
“Alphas like that...” he exhaled slowly. “I’ve known a few of them in my time. They’re the worst thing imaginable for the health of a pack. They’re the worst thing for shifter life as a whole. It’s because of alphas like that that some omegas don’t want to settle down. It’s because of alphas like that that some packs splinter and some betas can’t trust enough to let their own alphas take the lead. It’s a crime against our nature for them to act that way.”
