Page 60 of Their Perfect Omega

Alvaro groaned. “I know exactly what you’re going to ask.”

“You can’t blame me. Anytime someone asks what the N is for on N’Pact, you guys get these sheepish little grins and I’m dying to know why. I promise I won’t tell a soul.” She batted her eyelashes and put her hands together in a plea. “Pretty please?”

“We’re the only four that know its meaning. It’s highly classified and confidential,” I warned, serious as all get out.

“We can do a blood oath or pinky promise if that makes you feel better.” The hopefulness in her eyes was enough to make us all putty in her hands.

“Tell her,” Avery said, walking out of the bedroom in just his boxers, his iPad in hand. He sat down in a chair and started writing on the screen like a man possessed.

Alvaro touched Kara’s cheek so she’d look at him. “Swear on all of our knots you won’t even tell Kayla this.”

She gasped and put her hand to her neck as if she were clutching her pearls. “Not your knots!”

“Swear it. It’s the only way.” I wrapped my hand around her foot. “You breathe a word of it and no more knots for you.”

She raised her hand. “I swear on all four of your knots that I will not tell anyone.”

We let the silence go on for longer than was necessary before I nodded for Alvaro to go ahead.

“When we were coming up with name possibilities, we started playing with our names, like many bands before us have. The only two words we could come up with that would have a letter for each of us was beta and pact. There was no way we were using beta, and since Avery’s last name is cool, it made sense to use his last name for it.”

Kara nodded because this was common knowledge. “Yes… but the N. And why not an M?”

The number of times we’d been asked both of those questions was laughable. I squeezed her foot, drawing her attention to me. “Someone, who shall remain nameless, is bad at spelling and thought the word had an N at first. But it did sound better.”

“That’s it? That’s honestly kind of lame.” She was asking for her foot to be tickled again.

Avery stopped and looked up from his iPad. “I mentioned we could find another meaning for it. Something only we knew. This was right after we started singing together, so although we’d seen each other around, we hadn’t formed a pack yet.”

Cal chuckled. “Alvaro was like…well, we discovered each other naked.”

“And since we had been drinking, we settled on using an N to represent how we met and the apostrophe we like to think is a dick.” Alvaro grinned. “It’s stupid, but we were eighteen and nineteen years old.”

Kara blinked several times, her lips turning up into a smile. “What do you mean you met naked?”

“One night, we were all showering, and Tate started singing. Then we just all joined in, and it was so effortless and amazing that we decided to start a group. We were acapella at first and then started songwriting and recording with Tate’s parents.” Cal sighed. “All those good grades didn’t even matter in the end.”

Kara patted his hand that was resting on her thigh. “They matter. They shaped who you are.”

Avery put the iPad on the table next to the chair. “What’s the plan here? With us as a pack? With Kara?”

Kara’s smile fell, and I could see her brain going through different scenarios, mostly ones of worry. “I thought… I thought you wanted me.”

“No! I mean. Shit. Fuck.” He stood and came over to the couch, lowering to his knees in front of it. “I meant now that you’re with us, what’s our plan? I’m going to have a real hard time letting you go.”

“Jesus, man.” Cal reached forward and flicked his ear. “Don’t stress out our omega like that.”

“Children, let’s not start a fight.” Alvaro flicked Cal’s ear. “Once we get Kara through her heat, we’ll just have to hope they let us do the fall match. If not…”

“If not, I can move to the Los Angeles compound and hopefully find ways to sneak out.” Kara sat up straighter. “Or I can tell them that unless they want me to come forward about the probable tampering of my matches and everyone else’s, they need to match us.”

“Blackmail?” Alvaro snorted. “That’s just going to create even more problems.”

She deflated like a balloon poked with a needle. “Omega Match needs to change.”

We all agreed, but not even what happened with Kara’s sister was enough to cause any crazy changes. It wasn’t like any of us had any ideas about how it should be done. The most important thing was that omegas were protected, and Omega Protective Services and Omega Match did a good job of that.

“No one knows you weren’t at the meet and greet besides that girl you said helped you escape and your friend. You could write a letter to Omega Match telling them that you really hope we’re in the fall match. They know who you are, don’t they?” I didn’t think there were any other options, and if worst came to worst, we’d have to deal with it when the time came.

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