Page 6 of My Omega's Gift

“Gotcha. Thanks.” I took my coffee out to the truck and drove around the back. Carrying it with me, I sipped it as I made my way to the forest and stepped among the trees. The air was clear and cold and smelled of pines and small creatures who would remain in hiding while the predator was among them. My wolf would want to hunt, but we had eaten a big lunch from all the food the betas packed in my cooler for the trip. As long as we didn’t see anything, they were probably safe from us. I set my cup down beside a tree and stripped down, shivering briefly before the change took me, landing me on all four feet, muzzle stretching out and fur covering my goose-bumped skin. Tipping our head back, we gave a howl and tore off into the woods, feeling free for the first time in years. Snow and the last of the fall’s leaves crunched under our paws. The bare branches of deciduous trees stood stark amid the dark green of pines, and thin ice on the surface of a little creek cracked as we crossed.

It was amazing and beautiful and somewhere in my human mind, I recognized what my betas had seen and my wolf always knew. There were times to work and times to play. Times to worry about the future and times to live in the moment. To be fair, my wolf was usually about the moment.

I had trained my betas well, and they would keep things running while I was gone. My return was soon enough to worry about a mate. For these days, I would simply be. Or give it my best shot. Relax, shift as often as I wanted, provided the resorthad available lands. And it seemed unlikely that my betas would have sent me somewhere I couldn’t run. Eat good food, drink good drinks, restore my energy so I could do my job better on my return.

In a way, it was my duty to do this.

Why did it take a thought like that to give myself permission? No more whys.

I ran until we were panting then returned to dress and grab my empty cup. Before leaving the gas station, I stopped to thank the attendant for their advice. He grinned and gave me a big bag of teriyaki bison jerky. “Shifting always leaves me starving. Safe travels.”

“Thanks again.” I got in the truck and drove on.

I was exhausted when I arrived at the resort. And startled to find someone already in my cabin, but when I took a good look at the omega, I couldn’t ask him to leave. Far along in pregnancy, thin and pale with a hectic light in his eyes, he explained that he’d been given the room too, but not like me as a paying guest. Sounded like the owners had taken him in out of pity, but why in my cabin?

“No need to leave, tonight,” I told him. There would be time enough to figure it all out in the morning. “Just stay and we’ll talk to Theo and Elias in the morning and get it straightened out.” I was too tired to do anything until then.

“I’ll go sleep in the laundry room.” Wade started away, but I reached for his arm and stopped him.

“No way.” Even if he weren’t pregnant, that was not happening.

“Seriously, it’s nice and warm in there. I’ll grab a few blankets from the linen closet and be very comfortable.”

What was he used to that this was an acceptable choice? I had just met him, but my wolf was already in turmoil,demanding to know who had done this and where we could find them. The images in my mind were violent and savage, the wolf beyond irate.

“Come and sit down. You’re not sleeping in the laundry room.”

Wades eyes glistened, tears pooling before dripping down his face. “Then I’ll leave. You paid for the place, and I am just a charity case. I’ll find somewhere else to stay…”

“Omega”—I sat on the couch and patted the cushion next to me—“sit and tell me how you came to be here.”

To my surprise he did exactly that, sharing how he’d been forced to mate with the pack alpha and when he was challenged and lost, he’d been thrown out in the cold because he was bearing the former alpha’s young. He was light on details, but I got the picture. Like some of those other packs I’d heard about, Wade’s had still had brutal leadership changes. And he was a marked rogue.

His scar was livid on his cheek, a criminal act by criminal hierarchy, and one my wolf was now beyond enraged over. He struggled to get free, no matter how I tried to calm him and tell him that the perpetrators were far away and we couldn’t just run there.

Later,I finally insisted.The omega needs us now.

There was nothing else I could have said and garnered the result. He stilled. The wolf still planned revenge, but he was willing to put the omega’s immediate needs first.

“You’ve been through a lot,” I said, understating it all but not wanting to make him feel worse. “And there’s room for both of us here. I’d welcome the company, in fact. Stay with me tonight.”

“But there’s only the one room.”

“And it’s big enough for two.”

Chapter Five

Wade

Whether I was going to stay or not, I needed to get dressed. I couldn’t be walking around in a bathrobe in front of the alpha. But that meant I had to put my dirty clothes back on. I excused myself, went to the bathroom, and put them on. All the clean, refreshed feeling I had from the shower was gone.

I pulled my hood up over my head. He hadn’t reacted the way I thought he would to the scar—the way I thought any shifter would. But that didn’t mean I wanted him seeing it, didn’t mean I wanted to remind him that I was worthless. He seemed nice. Beyond nice, like one of the good guys you read about in books or see on television—not the kind that really exists. But that didn’t mean I needed to keep reminding him that I was damaged and worthless.

Sure, not for a second did I see any disgust in his eyes. Not over my scar, not over my pregnant belly, not over me being in his cabin. All I saw was compassion.

And how did I respond?

My wolf pushed at me to get closer to him, to scent him deeper. Gods, I wanted to listen to him. I wanted to reach over and touch the sexy alpha, which told me the cold had gotten way too deep in me and messed up everything. That was not how I thought about anybody—ever.

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