Page 44 of Shattered Omega: Part Two

She’d told me I could come for anything.

I needed her hug; her calm words. She had been rational and level even when she’d seen my eyes. Her answers to all the questions that were making me dizzy with fear.

Was I better off taking my chances with mates who wanted a princess bond, or a dark bond for life with a pack who just wanted to use me?

That shouldn’t be a hard question, but I’d fallen for them… I’d only taken a few unsteady steps around the edge of the building when I curled in on myself, hand on the stone wall beside me as I almost crumpled.

I took a shuddering breath. No tears. Not yet.

Wait until I was in Roxy’s arms.

But I didn’t want any of this…

Despite spending so long struggling to believe it, I didn’t want what Dusk offered to be a lie. For the first time, I’d finally admitted the truth I’d fled for so long.

That he mattered.

And what about Umbra?

That thought almost broke me. I thought I knew Umbra, I’d bitten him and felt him through a fleeting bond.

“Hecouldn’t have been lying, right?” My whisper was to no one but the stone wall of the academy. Was… some of it real?

Was that enough?

I forced myself onward, hurrying around the building, shoving back memories that choked up my mind, forcing themselves present even as I tried to ignore them.

Dusk held me in his arms, wanting me even though my scent was wrong…

He’d become something so beyond my wildest imaginings that I had been willing to give my mates up. I’d been willing to step into the unknown… to risk a life with no answers.

Scrambling to shove together my broken heart, I took deep breaths, carrying on to the front doors. I shoved back thoughts of Umbra’s boyish smile, of when he’d held me all night, purr rumbling in his chest.

I reached their door on the second floor, hearing the sounds of talk and laughter spilling out from under the door, so different to the home I’d just fled.

The party. Eric had mentioned a party.

Shit. Would Roxy want to see me with that going on?

But I was out of options.

I patted my hair down aggressively so it wasn’t such a mess. I didn’t want her to panic when she saw me.

Bracing, I lifted my hand and knocked.

I waited as the seconds passed, then I heard someone approaching. I jumped as the knob turned and the door before me swung open.

Eric’s green-eyed gaze dropped to where I stood, and his expression brightened. “Shatter?”

I swallowed, trying to find my voice. “H-hi. I’m here for Roxy.”

THIRTEEN

RANSOM

Years before…

I drove in numb silence, speeding through the pitch-black road to the city of New Oxford.

---