Nolan shifted closer on the couch, not touching but present, his knee settling inches from mine. His scent—eucalyptus and honey—joined Kol's, layering over me like a weighted blanket, warm and grounding. His green eyes were soft, his freckled face open and patient.
"You don't owe us anything." His voice was gentle as morning light, his green eyes holding mine with careful tenderness. His hand moved to rest on the cushion between us, palm up, an offering he didn't push me to take. His sandy hair fell across his forehead as he tilted his head, watching me with that quiet attention that noticed everything. "Your story is yours to share when you're ready. If you're ever ready."
"I know." And I did—that was the thing. I believed him. Believed all of them. It was a strange feeling, trust. Uncomfortable and unfamiliar, like wearing shoes that didn't quite fit yet. "But I want to. I think."
I took another breath, deeper this time, and let the words come.
"I was in foster care." My voice went flat, detached—the only way I knew how to talk about this without falling apart. My eyes fixed on a spot on the worn rug, tracing the faded pattern of flowers and vines. "From age seven. My parents—I don't remember them much. They died, I think. Or left. No one ever really told me."
The fire crackled and popped, filling the heavy silence. I felt Reid's attention sharpen like a blade being drawn, felt the weight of his gaze on me, but I didn't look up.
"I got moved around a lot." The words kept coming, pulled from some deep place I usually kept locked and barred. My fingers had gone white around my mug, knuckles standing out sharp beneath my skin. "Different homes, different schools. Iwas... difficult. That's what they always said. Too quiet, too watchful, too feral." I laughed, but there was no humor in it—just a hollow, broken sound that echoed in the warm room. "Turns out they were right about that last part."
"You were a child." Reid's voice was rough, barely controlled, scraping out of his chest like it cost him something. I looked up to find his dark eyes blazing with something fierce and protective, burning in his weathered face like coals. His jaw was tight, a muscle jumping beneath his stubbled skin, his hand clenched around his whiskey glass hard enough that I half-expected it to shatter. His scent had shifted—whiskey and woodsmoke sharpening into something almost dangerous, the smell of a storm rolling in. "You were a child trying to survive. That's not difficult. That's strong."
The conviction in his voice made my chest ache, made my eyes burn with tears I refused to let fall. I had to look away, back to my cooling tea.
"I ran when I was sixteen." My voice was steadier now, falling into the familiar rhythm of recitation, the facts I'd repeated to myself so many times they'd worn smooth like river stones. "Didn't age out, didn't wait for permission. Just... ran. No diploma, no GED, no nothing. Just the clothes on my back and whatever I could stuff in a backpack." I laughed, the sound hollow and brittle. "I'd been on suppressants since I presented—state-provided, the cheapest kind. They kept me... manageable, I guess. Less likely to cause problems. Stole a three-month supply on my way out the door."
"Suppressants." Nolan's voice was tight, his usual gentle calm cracking to reveal something harder underneath, something sharp with professional concern and personal anger. His green eyes had darkened like storm clouds rolling over a meadow, his jaw setting in an uncharacteristically hard line. I could practically see him doing the math—years of cheapsuppressants, the damage they could do to an Omega's system. His hand on the cushion had curled into a fist, knuckles going white. "Since you were twelve? For how long?"
"Thirteen years, give or take." I shrugged, the gesture feeling hollow and defensive even to me, my shoulders hunching slightly. "Four years of state-issued ones, then whatever I could find after. Bought them off the back of trucks, stole them when I had to, went without when I couldn't get them." I stared at my cold tea, unable to meet his eyes. "They made it easier to hide what I was. Most people couldn't even tell I was Omega. Still can't, sometimes."
"That's not—" Nolan cut himself off with visible effort, his chest rising and falling with a slow, controlled breath, forcibly reining in his reaction. He uncurled his fist finger by finger, forced his shoulders to drop from around his ears, but his eyes were still dark with concern, still calculating. His voice came out softer when he spoke again, gentled by effort. "We can talk about that later. The medical implications. If you want."
I nodded, grateful for the reprieve, and pressed on before I could lose my nerve.
"After I ran, I just... drifted." My voice had gone distant, like I was reciting facts about someone else's life, someone I'd read about in a book. My tea had gone cold in my hands, but I kept holding it anyway, needing something solid to anchor me to the present. "Worked where I could—under the table, cash only, no questions asked. I was sixteen with no papers, no education, no family. Moved when I had to. There was always something—a jealous coworker, a handsy boss, someone who figured out what I was and decided that meant I was theirs for the taking."
A low growl rumbled through the room, vibrating in my chest. From Reid, I thought, or maybe Sawyer—maybe both. The sound was primal, protective, raising the hair on my arms in a way that should have frightened me but didn't.
"I learned to run." My voice was barely above a whisper now, the words scraping out of a throat gone tight and raw. My eyes stayed fixed on the rug, on my white-knuckled hands, on anything but their faces. "I learned to leave before things got bad. I learned not to get attached, not to hope, not to want anything I couldn't carry with me." I finally looked up, found four pairs of eyes fixed on me with varying degrees of rage and sorrow and fierce, protective want. "And then I came here."
The silence stretched like a held breath, filled only by the pop and hiss of the fire.
Then Kol moved—slowly, deliberately, telegraphing every motion, giving me plenty of time to pull away or tell him to stop. He crawled across the few feet of floor between us on hands and knees and settled at my feet, his back resting against the couch, his shoulder just barely brushing my leg through my jeans. He didn't try to hold me, didn't try to comfort with words. Just sat there, a warm presence, his scent wrapping around me like a blanket, offering support without demanding anything in return.
"That's not going to happen here." Reid's voice was low and rough with emotion he wasn't even trying to hide, each word landing like a stone dropped into still water. He'd leaned forward in his chair, his elbows braced on his knees, his dark eyes boring into mine with an intensity that should have been frightening but somehow felt like safety. His scent had settled back into its usual steady warmth, but there was steel underneath it now—a promise, a vow written in woodsmoke and whiskey. "No one is going to run you off. No one is going to hurt you. And if anyone tries—" His jaw tightened, that muscle jumping again beneath his stubbled cheek. "They'll answer to all of us."
"Reid." My voice cracked on his name, splintering around the edges, overwhelmed by the fierce protectiveness blazing in his eyes.
"He's right." Sawyer's voice was unexpected, rumbling out of the shadows like distant thunder, and I turned to find him watching me from his chair with those pale blue eyes that saw too much. His rough voice was quiet but certain, each word deliberate and heavy, carrying the weight of hard-won experience. His beer sat forgotten on the side table, his scarred hands loose on the worn armrests, his whole body angled toward me despite his position at the edge of the group. "We protect what's ours."
The words should have felt possessive. Controlling. Like all the times before when Alphas had claimed ownership over something that wasn't theirs to claim. But from Sawyer—from all of them—it felt different. It felt like shelter from a storm.
"Your turn." The words came out before I could think better of them, rough but steadier than before, desperate to shift the weight of attention off my own broken story. I looked at Reid, then let my gaze sweep over the others. "I showed you mine. Show me yours."
Reid laughed—a real laugh, surprised out of him, rough and warm and utterly unexpected. The sound transformed his face, smoothed away the hard edges, made him look younger, almost boyish despite the silver in his hair.
"Fair enough." He settled back in his chair, his whiskey glass dangling loosely from his fingers, firelight playing across the weathered planes of his face. His dark eyes grew distant, looking at something far away and long ago, and when he spoke again his voice had dropped into a lower register, rough with memory and old pain. "I inherited this place from my father. Though 'inherited' makes it sound a lot more civilized than it was."
He raised the glass to his lips, took a slow sip, the motion deliberate and unhurried.
"My father was a drunk." The words came out flat, matter-of-fact, but I could see the old pain lurking underneath them like rocks beneath still water. His jaw tightened, his grip on the glass flexing, the firelight catching the white of his knuckles. "A mean one, when he got going. He loved this ranch more than anything—more than my mother, more than me—but he was running it into the ground. Bad decisions, worse debts, deals that should never have been made. By the time he died, we were six months from losing everything."
"Reid." Nolan's voice was soft from the couch, gentle as a hand on a wound, an offering of comfort that asked nothing in return. His green eyes were warm with understanding, with years of friendship and shared history.
Reid shook his head, a small motion, his dark hair catching the firelight.
