Page 53 of Carmichael's Omega

"He rejected you, and you slept with him? Did he reject you after fucking you?" Tansy asks.

"No. Before. I'm working on him," I explain, startled. A work in progress, that's my mate. It sounds better than the truth; I agreed to be used until he tosses me away.

“He is her mate,” Krissy snaps at Tansy.Tansy spins around and leaves, sniffling, slamming the door to her room. Miranda huffs but follows her into the room. Krissysighs, and her arm falls from around me. "Sorry," she apologizes abruptly. "I don't seem to have patience anymore. My mate... he believed another female's lies about me and... Tansy just reminds me of her. Manipulative."

"Tansy isn't an omega, is she?" I whisper my question, thinking about the word 'manipulative.' I've heard that word too often, lately.

Krissy snorts, "she's a Beta-born. Not an omega at all." She turns dark eyes on me. "Not like you, at least. She may have been made into an omega, which I doubt, but you..." She eyes me speculatively. "You're like rainbows and sprinkles, aren't you?"

I stiffen, affronted. "There's nothing wrong with rainbows and sprinkles!" I snap.

Krissy stares at me a moment, deadpan, before she tosses her head back and laughs. "Let's go to my room, and I'll tell you all about this place," She waves her hands around, "since Miranda will be occupied with the drama queen for a bit."

I follow Krissy into her room. It's nice. The window has the same dark tint that the sitting room has. It matches the decor. Krissy favors dark colors, blues, and black. I'm already re-decorating her room in my mind. Yellows and reds. I'd use the blue to accent.

Over the wall of her bed, she has posters and pictures of men. Lots of different men. Surfers, men in suits, advertisements for men's clothes that I recognize from magazines. There's one picture of a dark-haired biker that makes me blush because it reminds me of Carm.

"They remind me that there's plenty of fish in the sea," Krissy tells me quietly. "I can find someone else one day. Every time I see a picture that I find even remotely attractive, up he goes."

"I'm sorry that happened to you," I tell her softly.

She looks at me and smiles sadly, "you believe me?"

I stare at her. There isn't a lying bone in her body. She strikes me as being, perhaps, too honest. She's certainly the type to be blunt and open in her honesty.

"Yes," I reply simply. Some of her tension drains away. To keep her relaxed, I concentrate on her room. I flip over the dark purple throw flung over a chair in the corner. The other side is bright red. I smile. Better already.

"So," Krissy clears her throat, "before I spill my whole, sad story to an omega, let me tell you about the LaNu's."

I sit, eager to hear this revelation.

"The LaNu's were begun by four friends over forty years ago. One was a witch. Two wolves. One was human."

I nod. I know this. We were told during Rush week.

Krissy smiles. "One of the wolves and the human were abused and rejected and rescued by the other two."

I feel my eyes widen. This I did not know. Clearly, they missed some of the story during LaNu orientation.

"They formed this sorority as a front to a greater rescue operation. Rejected and abused females from all over the world are secretly brought to LaNu Houses to recover. Every House is equipped to help us recover and to let us create new identities."

My mouth drops open. "The Lambda Nu House does what? This house? Here?" I point to the floor with both hands. "Here, here?"

Her serious expression falters. Her lips quirk. "Yes." For a moment, pain twists her features. "I haven't chosen a new name. Krissy is just a holding place. It's a stupid one, too. Do I look like a Krissy?"

I don't ask her what her name used to be. If she wants to tell me, she will. I'm still reeling from this new information that has been sitting just under my nose. It explains why I always felt like I was missing some of the other girls in this house. I really was.

"I'm from South Africa," she continues quietly. "I lost everything. My mate, my family, my home. Even my country."

"You didn't want to lose your name, too," I guess quietly.

She nods, looking away with a fierce expression on her face and tears glinting in her eyes. "It feels like it's all I have left. They deep-sixed me, and after changing identities and names so often, I felt like I was losing my mind. The pain from this," she indicates her scar, "didn't help."

"What is being deep-sixed?" I ask to pull her attention off of her scars.

She looks at me again and smiles. "The LaNu's have a system. If necessary, they deep-six you. It's a play on words, right? Humans talk about death being 'six feet under.' Just like the name, LaNu? I mean, really? We're not all lunas," she scoffs a little. I jolt. I never thought of that. LaNu. Luna. Huh.

"So, they come for you, and that contact is number one, right? They, contact one, takes you to contact two. They make sure that contact two doesn't know anyone from your previous life, if possible. Then contact two takes you to contact three and so on, six times, six different contacts. And, each contact tries to make sure that the previous contact doesn't know the next one."

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