Page 22 of The Omega Lesson

Well, fuck. Regret really stings, even when it’s kept you company for years.

But my best friend isn’t finished as he crouches and slings an arm around my brother. “You’re not heartless, Travis, you’re a coward. You could have fixed things a long time ago, but you chose to suffer in silence instead of admitting you needed help. You think any of us don’t know how much pain you’re in? What that old fuck did to you, trying to twist you into his heir? Well, he’s dead. And we’re here. So, are you going to let all that bullshit ruin your life, or are you going to make a new one? Starting with helping Lexi through her heat like she deserves?”

I don’t know what makes me say it. I’m meant to have titanium nerves, but his words slide right under my shields. And instead of telling him what we all want to hear, I snarl, “When exactly did she becomemyproblem?”

And then I lift my gaze from that soapy, oily,disgustingbucket of water and right into Alexa’s astonished face. She’s still wearing her crumpled dress, but her feet are bare, one curled around the other as she grips the edge of the door. Her hair is down, a midnight tumble I want to wrap around my hands. But Matthew is right at her back, his arms wrapped around her like armour. “What do you mean a heat?” he demands, his voice rough with sleepy outrage. “Lexi’s an alpha, numbnuts.”

“She’s also a switch,” Ben says quietly, gesturing to the one clean couch in the sea of chaos. “Sit down and we can explain.”

Alexa looks ready to bolt, but then she straightens her spine, picking her way through the clutter to the chair. Mattie is glued to her back, while Jackson drags himself up off the floor to join them. It’s a big couch, but they all cuddle in close, and I get another flashback to the limo. Only this time, Ben slides into the mix, inserting himself in the middle and pulling Alexa into his lap. Leaving me staring at the four of them while I strangle the dirty rag in my hand.

And if that’s not a glimpse at my fucked-up future, I don’t know what is.

Until I feel a cold hand on the back of my neck and a sour cherry scent wafts over me. I catch the edge of Noah’s wide grin as he asks, “Is this a private pity party, or can anybody join?”

Jack

Jesus. Christ.

I knew Travis was hurting, but I never knew how badly. Which despite the fact he’s an arsehole, makes me feel like a complete shit. For a long time, when it came to my brothers, all I could think about was how they didn’t fight for me. Not just that first time, when dad’s goons ripped me out of school and dragged me onto his private jet, headed for a conversion camp I still revisit in my nightmares. But during all those video calls – and the handful of visits home – when Travis acted like nothing was wrong, and Noah was too drunk to work the camera on his phone, or too high to thread a coherent sentence together.

But now that I look at them together – Travis folding his cleaning rag over and over, and Noah grinning like a maniac - I realise how badly I’ve let them both down.

“It’s not a party,” Ben mutters. “But you look like you need to sleep one off.”

Noah waves a carefree hand at the trashed room. “This was days ago. I’m just back from a lovely jaunt down south.”

He’s wearing a pair of bright pink riding breeches, a skin-tight white polo, and sparkling black jump boots. It’s hard to tell if he’s really been checking out horseflesh, or partying it up at the Pony Club. But I texted him as soon as I got to the airport last night and he said he was looking at a racehorse, so I have to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Which is hard to do with our baby brother. Because even though I’m braced for it, it still hurts like fuck to come face-to-face with Christian’s ghost. He might disguise it with eyeliner and a fauxhawk – currently dyed hot pink – but Noah is the spitting image of our dead brother. They weren’t biological twins since I was born between them, but in every other way they were two peas in a pod.

Not that Christian would ever be caught dead in pink jodhpurs. He preferred old denim and black leather, infused with motor oil and cigarette smoke. But I know the tattoos all over Noah’s chest and arms are an exact copy of Christian’s, right down to the one over his heart. I can almost see the ink through his thin white polo spelling out a single word.Lucky.An echo of old pain rips through me, making Noah’s eyes snap to my face.

“Well fuck me surprised,” he drawls, slinking through the mess towards me. “Is that really you, Black Jack?”

I hate the stupid name, but Noah is a gambler. Cards, horses, even sports. He bets on everything, and has no incentive to stop, because he never loses. I learned as a teenager to never bet against him, so of course he calls me Black Jack just to remind me of his superiority.

“Hey, bro.” I grimace as soon as the words are out of my mouth. Mattie can get away with talking like a punk, but then, he’s probably closer to being Noah’s brother than I am.

Not that Noah’s in much of a state to notice. His eyes are red-rimmed and he reeks of whiskey. But his arms are tight and warm as he leans in to hug me. And damn, it feels good. Like a little piece of me that had fallen off is suddenly stitched back on.

And he doesn’t let go, even when he pulls back. Noah was always the most tactile of us by far, and he slings an arm over my shoulder as he asks, “Whatcha bring me?”

I assume he’s talking about a souvenir from London, since he’s addicted to their peanut brittle, but then I realise he’s studying Lexi through slitted lids. His tongue touches the corner of his mouth and it’s hard to miss the tiny pink diamond in the centre. Because, along with the tattoo tribute to our dead brother, Noah is pierced all over.

I once made the mistake of asking him why, and he told me he wanted as many holes in his body as Christian had the day he died. When he came off his motorbike at 180 km/hr on a gravel road.

But I shove that into the box labelled ‘nightmares’ in the back of my mind and focus on Noah. He’s pulling on his lip ring as he studies Lexi. She looks tousled and sleepy, but there’s no hiding the glow to her skin, or the sweet perfume peppering the air. “If you’re interviewing for my housekeeper position, precious, I should probably explain my little problem with women in uniform.”

“How about you go upstairs and take a shower?” Ben cuts in, but the edge to his voice just makes Noah grin.

“Thanks for inviting me to use the facilities in my own house, Benjamin, but I’m not the Lyall with the dirt fixation.” He slopes a look back at Travis, who instantly pockets the cleaning rag and mutters something under his breath as he leaves the room. Noah stares after him for a long moment and then gives Mattie his full attention. “Unless you want to come and make sure I clean out all my nooks and crannies, Bratty Boy.”

I roll my eyes, but it’s no secret Noah’s interested in Mattie. Subtlety isn’t really my brother’s thing, and I sometimes think if we’d left these two alone for long enough, we’d all be packed up by now.

“Shut it, Trouble,” Mattie grunts. But he wraps a hand around Noah’s waist, pulling him down beside him on the couch. Of course, Noah instantly slithers onto his lap like a cat, squirming around until there are bright pink flags in Mattie’s cheeks. Ben looks like he wants to kick my brother to the floor, but Noah just raises his brows at us. “I never realised my couch was quite so lumpy.”

To my surprise, it’s actually Lexi who chokes out a laugh. “Um, if you’re uncomfortable, we could always swap places. As far as I can tell, there are no lumps over here at all.”

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