Page 11 of Omega's Virtue: Part One (The Hartwell Sisters Saga 2)

“I bring him back within the hour, you’ll ask him to move in?” My batman asked hopefully. Half of his job lately had been tracking down my friend and passing on my invitation to join me. But since the day he’d found me in bed after my Vixen had shot me, Jack had been ornery, and if I wasn’t mistaken, had been avoiding me.

I grunted in response. No need to tell him that was my intention. After his reaction to learning I’d met Beatrice Hartwell, after she’d visited me last night, still flushed and sweet smelling from her heat, I’d decided to have her as my mate and bring Jack into it. His scent had spiked when he’d sniffed her out on me. Then, with a snarl that he’d have nothing to do with me if I brought her between us, he’d left. Since then he’d not stopped telling me to stay away. The alpha truly protested too much.

To Meeker’s disappointment, he found Jack shooting at Manton’s. Perfect in every proportion and dark featured—a creature of the shadows who hid in plain sight. Not many knew his demons. What caused them, I did not know, but I wanted to draw out his secrets to better bind him to me. For as much as I wanted to add Beatrice to my collection, Jack was an equally alluring prize. However, while I anticipated Beatrice’s omega price to be in the range of fifteen thousand pounds, I’d no notion what the cost of keeping him would be. One could not buy an alpha so fiercely independent and proud—how like Beatrice in that regard.

“You want me to move in?” His eyes laughed merrily as if I’d made some joke. “And what do I get out of it?”

“This is no laughing manner. You’ll take her to mate as well. I’ll have both of you. Understand?”

“Beatrice Hartwell?” Jack growled the name like a curse. “Put her out of your mind, Pax. Now. Forever. She’ll give you an ulcer.”

“She is mine,” I told him. “Mine. Ours.”

“Not yours,” he bit out. His scent was so bitter that I nearly gagged.

“What did she do to you?” I asked.

“Not just her. All the Hartwells. If not for them, my mate would still be by my side.”

I flinched. We rarely spoke of his dead mate. I knew her memory stopped him from making any connections with omegas. And I’d seen his mate stain on his back, how dark and almost swollen it became. Her loss had changed something in him. Left him bitter and angry at the world even when he tried to mask it with humour. And yet… Instinct told me that if anyone could inspire him to look towards the future and put away those dark thoughts it would be the fiery Beatrice Jane Hartwell.

Pax

The walkfrom Curzon Street to the house the Hartwells had rented was too quick. I’d gone on instinct but that could only carry me to the door and into a plain drawing room, its shabby genteel furniture an odd contrast to the well-known family. Perhaps the estate was not so great. Perhaps that worked in my favour. Beatrice was old for an unmated omega, who almost universally mated before their twentieth year.

“I’m here to propose marriage to your daughter Beatrice,” I informed Mrs Hartwell who had entered the room with a briskness that led me to believe she expected my visit.

“You’d take my eldest?” The female alpha asked. Her eyes flashed with a fierce triumph. “Marry and mate her?”

“Yes, what is her price?” It was a crude thing to ask, but better to get the business over with, the papers drawn up, and Beatrice into my care by the end of the day. I would pay whatever price they set for her.

“Two thousand.”

I suppressed the instinct to growl. Two thousand was risibly low for an omega, let alone one such as Beatrice.

Something in my face must have betrayed my thoughts because Mrs Hartwell coloured a deep red.

“Her Papa insisted no omega child of his should be out of reach because of her omega price. He did not want to exclude a good alpha whose fortune was not great.”

I bit back a retort. Two thousand might not be out of the reach of the gentry. But there were numerous alphas who would never be able to pay even that paltry sum. Alphas like Fordom. Good alphas.

“I accept your suit… If Beatrice will have you, she is yours. If you wait here, I shall send for her.” She swept out of the room, her whole being radiating with a pleased hum which inexplicably had my hackles rising. I walked to the window and was unsurprised to see Jack prowling along the opposite pavement. A smile tugged at my lips—there was more to this than met the eye and soon I’d know every detail of their relationship.

The sound of the door being opened had me turning around in time to see Beatrice storm in. A thundercloud above her head would not have been out of place for she scowled at me as if I’d committed some great sin.

I’d sin an infinite number of times if I could capture her image while she radiated with unholy fury so perfectly packaged. Short, and built along lines that Rubens himself would have coveted for his model. Her form and shape shown off to perfection because she wore men’s fashions. Her heavy breasts were accentuated by the cut of her waistcoat and the fall of her cravat. And those breeches left nothing to the imagination. Her thighs, Goddess, I needed to see them bare and quivering. Map out the dimples with my hands while I fucked her from behind. I wanted to sink into her soft, ample curves, press her deep into her nest while my knot stretched her quim. The thought, the feast she presented, had my cock growing hard in my breeches. Good. I wanted her to know what she did to me.

“What are you doing here? I did not desire to see you—”

“Your scent says otherwise.” I felt my lips twitch. The aroma of roses filled my senses as if I’d buried my nose in a bloom. “Your mother has accepted my suit. Once you have, we shall marry this afternoon. During your next heat, you shall become my mate. In the meantime, you will move into the nest in my house.”

“I’d rather mate the desiccated corpse of a slug than you,” she hissed.

I scowled. Not at her words, but the way she spoke them. There wasn’t just anger in her voice, but anguish, as if contemplating any union with me was a fate worse than death. Worse still, her scent had turned bitter—if ever there was proof she meant every word she said, it was that. Her scent could not lie, and it was telling me she wanted nothing to do with my marriage proposal. Even the searing attraction between us could not overcome her disgust.

“Explain.”

“I— I don’t need you!”

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