Page 132 of Captive Omega

As I pick the paper up, something thumps to the table, scaring the shit out of me.

It’s a book, and it has numerous colorful tabs in it.

Not just any book. A pregnancy one. One that details what a woman can expect during her pregnancy. Not the expected reading material for an alpha.

I pick it up and flick through the pages.

When I stumble across the yellow Post-it tab highlighting lower back soreness, a symptom of pregnancy, I have a sudden flashback to Vaughn’s insistence I use a back pillow.

I’d wondered why, and it looks like I just got my answer.

Porn, he said, I mentally snort.

I’m still flipping through the pages when the sound of conversation moves this way.

Returning the book to the middle of the newspaper, I scurry over to the kitchen island. I’m back on a bar stool, digging into my breakfast when they file in, eyes bleary and tired, looking like not one of them got any sleep.

They smile as they take their usual seats, and I try not to notice Garrison pick up the newspaper and open it.

He isn’t reading the newspaper.

The real question is why. Why are the men in this house reading a pregnancy book, and why don’t they want me to know it?

“Everything okay?” Vaughn sounds suspicious.

I stick my fork into my eggs. “Good.”

“You look like you were thinking hard,” Vaughn says.

“Yeah,” I murmur. “Just thinking about porn.”

“Porn?” Vaughn echoes.

“Uh-huh.” If Vaughn wants to play the porn card with me, I’ll play it right back.

“Do you maybe want to talk about it?” Vaughn asks with a hopeful note in his voice.

Pretending disinterest, I pick up my glass of juice. “Not really.”

“Are you sure?” Garrison asks. He doesn’t sound as hopeful as Vaughn, but there’s a definite hint of interest in his tone.

“We wouldn’t mind if you did,” Blaine adds.

“I’m sure.” I glance over at the dining table.

No one is eating breakfast.

Garrison is holding his newspaper open as he stares at me with simmering intensity. Blaine’s glasses have slid down the bridge of his nose, but he’s making no attempt to push them back up. Vaughn is in danger of knocking his coffee into Blaine’s lap if he doesn’t start paying attention to where he’s leaning.

I put down my glass and resume eating, leaving them to whatever they’re imagining that has them forgetting all about their breakfast. And I have to say, it’s more satisfying than it should be to know how thoroughly I’ve distracted them.

I stand awkwardly on the mat in front of Blaine. He’s in his usual outfit, and I’m in a pair of black sweatpants and a baggy white tee, hoping all the bagginess will help me not be so aware of Vaughn’s body when he grabs me again.

Vaughn had been the one to arrange this after breakfast self-defense lesson. I hadn’t hesitated to say yes. Blaine had been a little slower to agree.

“He said he was coming after changing, right?”

Blaine glances at the black clock hanging over the doors. “He did.”

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