Page 60 of The Alpha: Part Two
"Why?"
"He's a male omega."
He raises his brows and lifts a hand to motion me to continue.
"I was thinking," I puff out a breath. Blunt is usually best. "I was thinking that it would be weird to be a male omega and go into heat. I was thinking that it might be strange to have a male omega and deal with him going into heat. Like, what if he wasn't into me or I wasn't into him but he was still my omega. Is it like that for Jasper? That's horrible if it is. He shouldn't have to live like that. Or what if it was one sided? I don't know, I was just thinking."
Seth laughs at me. Laughs. "Ben, it isn't like that for Jasper, I promise. But I'm sure he'd appreciate you worrying after him."
"How is it, then? Talia said he's going into heat. What would that even be like?"
Seth laughs again. "For one, didn't you study omega anatomy at all? And for two, I don't have any personal experience with a male omega in heat, but based on what I've heard, it's pretty similar to a female omega's heat cycle. I mean, there are obvious anatomical differences, but the concept is the same minus pregnancy. If your omega is in need, you provide."
"But what if he doesn't want it?"
Seth sighs. "That's a problem nobody wants. And I'm glad Jasper doesn't have to deal with that." He sighs again. "This probably isn't information I should share, but I don't think they'd mind. Trent and Nathan never had male partners before Jasper. I don't know about Devon and Kaleb."
"How did they handle that?"
"I wasn't close with them," he says. "I haven't been close with them until after the compound. But they don't seem to be bothered at all. They're obviously pretty happy about how things worked out."
"With Talia."
He cuts his eye at me. "Before Talia. For them, Talia is what is commonly referred to as a happy accident. They weren't planning for her, and they weren't trying to get her before Jasper decided for them that she was going to be theirs. It was purely coincidental that she ended up an omega. The minute she met Jasper everything was decided, it just took time to get them there. And then there is the Zaphir pack side of things…I don’t want to get into that mess if you don’t mind. Why are you so deep in this? Did something happen that I don't know about?"
Now it's my turn to sigh. "No, nothing happened. I was just thinking about how awful it would be to be a male omega going into heat with an all-male pack if you weren't into men. Then I thought about having a male omega if I wasn't into men. Just thoughts."
"Well, that explains the weird feeling. Jasper is fine. Trent and Nathan are fine. And if it had turned out that you'd have a male omega, you would have been fine. But you have Desie and you don't have to worry about that."
He's right, but I'm probably still going to think about it. Especially now that I know a male omega personally and Desie wants so many kids, one is bound to end up with a male of some designation. "So," I drag out the word, "about how long do Jasper's heats last?"
"Based purely on observed behaviors and whatnot," Seth hums. "About like any other omega. But they have mentioned that his cycles are different when Talia is pregnant. So, maybe this one will be shorter than it normally would be."
Good. A shorter heat means less time between now and food. Sure, we can cook the same stuff anytime, but when it's in large quantities and being shared with a lot of people it tastes better.
A week later, Jasper's heat is done and over. Food has been bought and prepared. Tables, grills, smokers, and roasting pits have been set and prepared. And people are officially piling into our yard. That's not entirely accurate. People are piling into our entire neighborhood. Our house is the central location with our pack, Talia's, Mateo's, Sebastian's, and even Minos's. Yeah, that was wild to come to terms with. The head of our council manning a grill in my backyard wasn't exactly on the list of things I thought might happen in my lifetime, but here we are.
Everyone in the neighborhood is out. I don't think there's a single empty yard. Kids are everywhere. Even Talia's kids. That was hard, though. I get being overprotective of your kids, especially considering all that's happened. But they're literally surrounded by all of us. Trent had to be convinced it was safe for their kids to go play with the rest of them. Not Zetty, though. Zetty's sour little self is staying on the porch with her mama while Jasper and Nathan run around with the rest of the kids.
We do, however, have a bit of an interesting development unfolding. Things must be different on the East Coast, but here packs start clumping together from a young age. Some of those packs gather around their omega even as kids, like what happened with us and Desie. Sweet little Iris is currently being doted on and surrounded by a group of neighborhood boys. Two of them, Joseph and Cody, are our cousins on our dad's side. Neither of them is very old, maybe seven or eight, but they run with Brandon. Brandon isn't related to any of us, but he belongs to all of us. His parents are some of the many who have disappeared, so every mother in the neighborhood takes care of him, especially Joseph's and Cody's. Michael and I have been worrying about how he'll turn out and if he'll end up in Long Shop. If things go the way they look like they're going to, Long Shop won't be an option for a multitude of reasons.
Somehow, a little girl barely old enough to throw a fit has three boys picking flowers and blowing bubbles for her. Boys who are usually in the thick of whatever small-time shenanigans happen to be available. It makes me wonder if that's what we looked like following Desie around. It's also the reason the vein in Devon's temple is visible and why Trent is walking around rubbing his chest.
"Sit down and drink this," Talia says, dragging Trent into a chair and handing him a beer. "They're just being kids." She leans over him as much as she can and kisses his cheek.
"Bullshit. She's not even three years old and look at them," he clips, "swarming her."
Talia swallows a laugh and kisses him again. "They're just little boys."
"My ass. They're stubby little vultures. Wolves circling our baby. Ouch! Hey!" he yelps as Talia pinches his side.
"They're little boys, Daddy. They could be pulling her hair and being little shits, but they're picking flowers and showing her bugs. Be happy they're not like my brothers were and how you probably were."
Trent pulls her around to sit on his lap. "Keep calling me Daddy and we can go find an empty room somewhere."
"No, no," I cut in, smirking at their display. "None of that. There are no empty rooms within a two-mile radius."
Zetty comes up to me, batting her bright green eyes as she reaches to be picked up. I bend down to scoop her up and tweak her nose. "You okay, sweetheart?" She wants something. I've been around her enough to know that the only time she bats her eyes is when she wants something.
