Page 53 of The Omega Archives: Part One

“You don’t look too good, beautiful.” He cocked his head. “You still have that headache you mentioned earlier?”

Shutting my eyes, I could hear the buzzing ache of my head pulsing behind my skull. “A bit.”

“Well, that’s that. Maybe you caught a bug going around, working yourself to the bone like this.”

He might’ve had a point.

“Let’s go pick up food.” He pulled me into his arms, putting a hand to my head. Surely, he felt that it was warm. He hummed in disapproval. “Let’s get you home and comfortable.”

Chapter

Thirteen

CAL

Ella really must not have been feeling good. She didn’t fight me once as I walked her up to her apartment.

Usually, if I made it to the end of her workday with her, she'd stop me shyly outside or just outside the front door of the old house situated on the corner a block from the university.

She looked flushed, cheeks red and hot. Not to mention, she was dead on her feet as she leaned on me.

Unconsciously, she took deep breaths of my shirt. Which, I admit, made me want to grin at the entire situation. She must've not been lying when she said that she liked my scent back at the roller rink last week.

Betas didn't have the strongest sense of scent in most cases compared to alphas or especially omegas. So, the fact that she could scent me felt like we were meant to be.

My heart hammered in my chest at the realization.

I never really believed in the idea of scent matches or anything, but even the idea felt pretty magical in the back of my head– fiction or not.

We picked up the tacos I knew she would at least eat some of after she wolfed down five of them earlier this week. She hadn’t been eating as much as she should've been while working on her project at work.

Poor girl probably didn't have enough strength to fight off whatever bug caught her.

I kept us moving, making sure to check in with her all the way out to the car. I only paused in front of the slightly rundown apartment building she stood in front of. “This is really where you live?”

It wasn't a question. I wished it was.

“Uh-huh.” She dug around in her oversized canvas bag for a house key.

The door creaked loudly on its hinges as she made her way inside, not looking back to make sure that I was following.

The place itself wasn’t bad exactly, but it wasn’t good either. It beat the hell out of a lot of places I lived growing up, but I expected more from where Ella lived. I expected it to be nicer or at least structurally sound. The entire place smelled damp and I could hear the other people who lived here clear as day as we made our way up the stairs.

She pulled out a second key to let herself into her space. Or a shared space? To be honest, I was a little grateful that compared to the outside, the inside looked much better with a few photos on the fridge of people I didn’t recognize and clean surfaces throughout.

“You don’t live alone?” I asked.

“My friend. Rita,” she said. “Remember.”

“Must’ve forgotten,” I said. “She’s not around tonight.”

“Working. Or maybe tonight is her night class?” Ella almost asked herself the question. “Getting my days all mixed up.”

I stepped inside, closing the door behind us as she dropped her bag on the floor next to a few pairs of shoes, perfectly in a line. From there, she seemed on a mission, heading straight towards the one door furthest away from the door.

Her room was tinier than most closets, but organized. Oddly organized.

“You don’t have a lot of stuff, huh?” I said.

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