Page 6 of Crave

It wasn’t nothing, and we both knew it. He’d stepped in to defy his Alpha. He would have been punished for disobeying Wilkie like that, but I let it go.

Susannah dropped her voice low. “Where are they?”

Errol shook his head. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen them in a few days. They’ve been home, because they eat the food I leave out, but they’re gone again when I wake up.” His tone was a mixture of trepidation and relief.

Weird, but I wasn’t looking a gift horse in the mouth.

Susannah stepped closer to Errol and kissed the older man on the cheek. Then she turned and strode up the stairs. Our rooms were on the top floor, right at the back, as far from Wilkie’s room as we could physically get. We technically had two rooms, but we always slept in the same bed. Safety in numbers. We shared a Jack-and-Jill bathroom, which also kept us a little safer.

Locking the bedroom door, I unloaded my pockets of all the protein bars and chocolate I’d stashed as we were leaving. We’d hide them in the room somewhere so Wilkie couldn’t confiscate them. I stripped out of my shirt and jeans. These would have to be burned. Actually, it should all be burned. Susannah was obviously on the same wavelength because she was throwing her clothes on top of mine and heading straight to the shower.

God, she was fucking beautiful. She was pale, freckles dusting along her skin, like small kisses from the sun. Her Beast form was the same tawny gold as those freckles, which was something that always made me laugh. Her body was all sharp curves, though they’d softened slightly from the abundance of food at Merrick and Murphy’s home.

I needed everything that had been infused with my Omega scent gone. I couldn’t give Wilkie any hint that I was an Omega. I didn’t know what to do about Susannah, but she had that curl to her shoulders that said she was going to do something self-sacrificing. Probably lay down and take that fuck all in order to protect me.

I hated it. I turned so she couldn’t see me as I screamed silently at the wall. Helpless. We were so fucking helpless.

Sucking in deep breaths, I gathered all our clothes, stuffing them into the bathroom trash can and pouring a whole bottle of cheap cologne over it. Manix didn’t typically wear scents, but I’d burned out my olfactory senses using this just to give me an extra layer of protection. If even a whiff of my Omega pheromones snuck out, the shitty cologne would mask it.

My inner Omega whined at the thought of the perfect nest we’d just left, a place we’d felt safe for the first time in nearly a decade. But it wasn’t ours. It could never be ours.

I wanted to climb into the shower behind Susannah, but she needed this moment. It was a lot, this sudden revelation that your life had been a lie and now you were something else. In any other pack, it would be a miracle, but in this one? It was a death sentence. A curse.

So I’d let her have her moment under water so hot that it was steaming up both rooms, and I’d pretend I didn’t know it wasn’t just water pouring down her cheeks, that I couldn’t see her shoulders shaking with sobs.

Her pain burned my nose and I was helpless to do anything.

There was a soft knock at the door, and I froze. I looked at the trash can of scented clothes, and hoped it was enough to throw whoever was on the other side off the scent. Shutting the bathroom door, I walked over and undid the deadbolts that gave us the illusion of protection. Pulling open the solid door, I saw Errol was on the other side. He was holding two plates of food.

He gave me a tight, unsure smile. He smelled like anxiety, but beneath that, he smelled of hope. And that was more pungent than anything else. Because there was no hope for our Pack.

“I thought you might be hungry. You and the, uh, Omega.” He shifted from foot to foot, his eyes meeting mine briefly and then flicking away.

I swallowed hard and pasted a grin on my face. “If you start calling her Omega, Errol, she's going to get mad. She’s still Susannah. The last thing any of us wants is to make a big deal out of this.”

Errol finally met and held my gaze. “I don’t think we’ll have too much choice in the matter.” With that, he turned and walked away.

I thanked his retreating back for the food, then spun back into my room. Susannah stood there, dressed in one of my hoodies and looking wide-eyed. I guess she’d heard Errol’s words.

I walked over, handing her a plate and kissed her forehead. “One problem at a time, Zanny. First, eat. Then we’ll figure everything else out.”

She nodded, and I placed my own plate on my nightstand. I needed a long shower. Stripping off my underwear, I moved under the water and rested my head against the tiles. The muscles in my shoulders ached from being tense for so long. Nothing I did ever released them, but the burning hot water soothed them for a moment. Everything was better under a deluge of water. Maybe it could wash away all my fears and troubles, along with my Omega scent.

Susannah might think she was going to offer herself up as some kind of appeasement, but I wouldn’t let that happen. She’d once sacrificed everything for me, and it was my turn to return the favor.

I needed to get ahold of Jericho because he was the only outsider we knew. Everyone else was a part of this suffocatingly small community. If we ran we’d have no one to turn to, nowhere to go, except to a stranger we met one night so many years ago who may or may not still live close by.

I steeled my spine. If we couldn’t run, I’d do what I had to do. Even if I had to cut off Wilkie’s head in his sleep and suffer the consequences.

At least Susannah would be free then—from Wilkie and this Pack. And free from me.

4

MERRICK

The town still buzzed from the frenzy. There was a weird vibe in the air, and it set my Beast on edge. He’d been riled for a week, but today, it felt like there were invisible fingers running over my skin. It was making me fidgety. The added Omega pheromones around town were going to take a little to get used to, but hopefully, everyone would settle in the coming weeks. It was impossible to even contemplate how insane our lives had gotten since last week when all the Betas had turned.

I tried not to think about Susannah and Quinn being back home with Wilkie because it made me want to shift and tear that bastard limb from limb.

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