Page 99 of Captive Omega

Do I go upstairs to get it?

The guy took you to a clinic at midnight and replaced a chair because he must have suspected it would upset you to see it. How about easing back on this reliance on your knife?

I walk toward him, taking a seat in the armchair across from him. “What happened to the other chair?” I ask, curious about his response. Will he expect me to be grateful for having removed it?

“It was time to replace it,” he says, still focused on his puzzle. “I never liked the way these chairs didn’t match.”

Yeah, right.

I snort at his barefaced lie and focus on the puzzle. It’s the same one he was putting together before, only he’s had to start again.

He’s created several small piles on each corner of the table and he’s halfway through putting together the corners and sides.

“You must be pissed at having to start again.”

“Finishing it isn’t the point,” he explains, looking at me for the first time.

“And if you learn at the end that one of the pieces ended up in the fire and you never get to finish it properly?”

“I would have had several months of restful sleep. Which is the point.”

“Do you have an answer for everything?” I feign irritation but I like his answer.

“Yes.”

I snort, shaking my head at his confidence as he returns to his task.

As he works on the puzzle, the fire seeps into my bones, warming me from the inside out. It’s not as hot as it was before and I soon realize why.

He’s moved the table and the armchairs a little farther away from the fireplace and there are fewer logs in the fire. It has the same glowy, ambience as before, but it’s not so intense.

For himself? Or did he do it thinking I would come down again?

I need to apologize for bleeding on his couch and ruining his puzzle. Garrison seems not to be expecting an apology at all, but he deserves one. But I don’t know how to apologize to alphas. I only know how to hate them.

“How do you have the patience not to fling that thing into the fire?” I eventually ask. Ten minutes of watching him with it, and my fingers itch to do just that.

The muscles in his cheeks pull. A sign he might be smiling. “I sometimes wonder that myself. You can take the reds if you want?”

I nearly smile, liking his dry sense of humor. “If I did that, your puzzle would be in the fire five minutes later. I’ll leave it to you.”

“It’s relaxing. Helps to focus on something external.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

We fall back into silence.

I watch him pick up a piece, hold it over the table, and sometimes return it to the pile of blue pieces, or add it to the slowly forming puzzle.

I don’t recall feeling tired or even closing my eyes.

Something light and soft settles over me, startling me.

“You’re safe.” Garrison’s voice shouldn’t reassure me.

Yet it does. But not nearly enough as the delicious scent of the thing covering me. I drag the material closer to my nose, inhaling as I relax.

Chapter 29

---