When he finally knocked, I opened the door to find Cole waiting. Unsurprisingly, he was as put-together as ever, outfit meticulous, pants pressed, wearing his usual suit and tie. He still stank of chemical de-scenting but I didn’t call him on why. We were still strangers and it wasn’t exactly my business.
Yet. It wouldn’t take long for curiosity to win.
“Am I going to get to see the elusive Cole Hawthorne in sweatpants at all during this trip? If not, I’m not going,” I teased.
He almost cracked a smile. He might not realize it, but that was now my goal this trip. To help him smile, laugh, and maybe give him a taste of the life his mom wanted him to find.
“We’ll see,” he said, taking my bags from me without being asked.
It was strange to be around someone who was decently chivalrous. My former pack was not well-practiced in that regard.
To my surprise, the car Cole led me to was not the same one as before. This one was a sleek coupe.
“You have more than one car?” I asked.
He looked almost embarrassed but didn’t deny it. “I have two, and you’ve seen them both now. This one gets better gas mileage. Generally, I’d take the SUV, but this one’s more fun.”
He smiled then, an actual, unprovoked smile. It lit up his face, his brown eyes brighter now and his features losing some of their harsh angles. His eyes crinkled at the edges, a little reminiscent of his mom.
“Oh look, hedoessmile,” I teased again. It was too easy to give this man grief. For now, he was going to have to get used to my brand of sarcasm if we were going to survive this trip.
Cole put my things in the trunk, then opened my door and helped me inside. He started to reach for my seatbelt but hesitated, closed my door, and let me do it myself.
When he was in the driver’s seat, he started the car, classical music filling the air. He moved so quickly to shut it off he practically smacked the dashboard, then gave me a sheepish smile.
“It helps calm my nerves,” he admitted.
“One thing you should learn about me quickly,” I said, “is that I’m not going to judge anyone. I’m a big believer in stayingtrue to yourself. That’s one of the things my pack did wrong, they were forever trying to fit me into a box I didn’t fit in, so I’m careful not to do that to anyone else.”
“You know, not to comment on your judgment or anything,” he said, giving me a look out of the corner of his eye as he pulled into traffic.
“He says before he most definitely questions my judgment,” I narrated for him.
“It’s just that I haven’t heard a single thing about your exes that could be counted as a positive,” he said. “You’re a gorgeous, unapologetically unique omega, and yet, you somehow ended up with a pack likethat.”
“They weren’t always like that,” I admitted. “I know it sounds stupid. That classic ‘oh, they changed when they finally locked you down’, but they truly did. For the first part of our relationship, we were fine... until we weren’t. It was never a loud, in-your-face argument. It was enough small comments to break me down over time. Between that and cheating with their little sister’s best friend... well, they weren’t the best pack at the end of the day.”
“And how did moving your things out of their place go? I was a bit nervous when you said you had to get the omega clinic involved.”
“It wasn’t badbecauseI got them involved. I just didn’t want to interact with them. Nothing good would’ve come from it. They sent me some shitty voicemails already. It just wasn’t worth the headache.”
His jaw was tense again as he listened. When he finally spoke, his voice was rough.
“Those assholes had no idea why you left, did they?”
“No, and they didn’t really care. It was all about how I embarrassed them and ruined my chance at a real pack. Oh, and a pointed comment about me always being alone.”
His hands tightened on the steering wheel and he took a deep breath, nodding once. “That’s behind you now.”
“It is,” I said definitively. “I’m looking forward to a few weeks of getting my life together. I’m going to take deep breaths and live in the moment, experience new things, find peace in the quiet life, reignite my passion. It feels like nothing excites me anymore.”
“We’ll find that spark again.”
“You said Pine Ridge is only about an hour outside the city?” We needed a subject change and I wanted to actively put this conversation behind us.
“Traffic willing,” he confirmed. “And that’s once we’reoutsidethe city. We have to get through it first.”
He still seemed tense as we wound our way through the congestion, so I eventually reached over and turned his classical music back on. His shoulders relaxed slightly the moment the lilting piano and violin filled the car.
