I heard the door open, heard his footsteps cross the room, felt the mattress dip as he sat on the edge of the bed. Outside the nest. Respecting the boundary, even now.
"How are you feeling?"
I laughed—a broken, hysterical sound that scared me almost as much as the heat did. "How do you think?"
"I think you're scared." His voice was so calm. So steady. Like he wasn't the architect of my destruction. "I think you're in pain. I think your body is doing something it hasn't done in six years, and you don't know how to handle it."
"I hate you," I whispered from under the blankets.
"I know."
"I hate all of you." I whimpered out.
"I know that too." A pause. "Can I see you? Just for a minute?"
I didn't want to. Every instinct screamed at me to stay hidden, stay protected, stay in the sanctuary I'd built. But some part of me, the stupid, traitorous Omega part, wanted to see him. Wanted to smell him. Wanted to be closer.
I pushed the blanket back just enough to expose my face.
Mason was sitting exactly where I'd felt him, at the very edge of the mattress, his body angled toward me but not encroachingon the nest. He was wearing a simple white t-shirt and jeans, his golden hair slightly mussed, his honey-brown eyes warm with something that looked horribly like love.
"There you are," he said softly, and something in my chest cracked open.
"Don't," I managed. "Don't look at me like that."
"Like what?" He asked, raising an eyebrow at my words.
"Like you care. Like this isn't exactly what you wanted." I pulled the blanket tighter around myself, suddenly aware that I was naked underneath the towel. "Like you didn't plan this down to the last detail."
"I do care." He didn't deny the rest of it. "I've always cared, Red. Even when you were a skinny little kid following Ethan around asking about black holes and quantum entanglement. Even when you were a teenager who used to blush every time I walked into a room. Even when you ran away and broke all our hearts and spent three years pretending we didn't exist."
"I wasn't pretending." My voice cracked. "I was surviving."
"I know." He reached out, slowly, giving me time to pull away. His hand stopped just short of the nest's edge. "But you don't have to survive anymore. You can live. You can thrive. You can have everything you've been denying yourself, if you'd just let us give it to you."
"I don't want it." I told him, the desperation was in my voice.
"Your body says differently." His eyes dropped to where my hand was clutching his cashmere throw. The one I'd brought from my apartment, the one that had always smelled like something I couldn't name, the one that apparently smelled like him because they'd sent it to me years ago. "Your nest says differently."
I wanted to argue. To tell him that biology wasn't consent, that my body's responses didn't override my mind's refusal. Ihat just because I was physically preparing for them didn't mean Iwanted them. The words wouldn't come. Because some of them, too many of them, would have been lies.
"I brought you breakfast," Mason said, pulling back. "And water. You need to stay hydrated." He stood, crossing to the desk where I now noticed a tray waiting. "Can you eat something for me?"
"I'm not hungry." True. The fever had killed my appetite. The thought of food made my stomach turn.
"Try anyway. Just a few bites." He picked up a piece of toast and held it out toward me like I was a wild animal he was trying to tame. "Please, Red."
I shouldn't. Accepting food from him felt like accepting something else, his care, his authority, his place in my life. But my body was weak, getting weaker, and some small rational part of my brain knew I needed fuel for what was coming.
I reached out and took the toast. Mason's smile was like the sun. I hated how much I didn't hate it. I ate mechanically, barely tasting anything, while Mason watched from the chair by the desk. He didn't speak. Didn't push. Just sat there, a steady presence in the chaos of my unraveling. When I'd choked down half the toast and a few sips of water, he stood.
"I'll check on you in a few hours," he said. "If you need anything before then—anything at all—just call out. One of us will always hear you."
"Because you're always watching," I said bitterly.
"Because we're always listening," he corrected gently. Then he was gone, closing the door softly behind him. I lasted maybe an hour before the fever spiked again.
This time was worse. So much worse. The cramping hit like a fist to my gut, doubling me over in the nest. I couldn't breathe. Couldn't think. Could only feel—the pain, the need, the desperate, clawing hunger for something I refused to name.
