How pathetic am I?
Lev was so excited for tonight, and I was too. So was Monroe. And here I am, ruining it.
“Talk to us,” Monroe says. “Tell us what’s wrong. Are you that overstimulated? Do we need to leave? We can leave. There’s no pressure on us tonight. It’s okay—” He’s only trying to say what he thinks I need to hear, but he’s wrong.
He’s so, so wrong.
“It’s… there’s an omega over there,” I say, my throat so very dry. My hands feel clammy. My heart is beating too fast in my chest. All that to say I feel like I need to crawl out of my own skin to escape this feeling, or at the very least, tear off this damned suit.
“You want to talk to her?”
I shake my head no, then I close my eyes and say, “No, that’s not…” I should just come out and say it. Dancing around the bush like this is not something I like doing. As difficult as it is to face, I need to face the truth.
And the truth was I walked away from my scent match and probably hurt us both, all because I didn’t know what to do at the time.
“I think she’s my scent match,” I whisper, finally saying the truth out loud. Even now, it feels like an eternity has passed between now and when I first smelled her. Years when, in reality, it has only been mere minutes.
The look Monroe gives me tells me enough, but Lev cannot hide his excitement, “Your scent match? No way. What the hell are you doing over here, then? We need to go talk to her, get to know her. Where is she?” The beta in our pack, taking the lead, while both me and Monroe are speechless.
Lev sets his hand on my arm, and as a result, he helps ground me, helps calm down the inner emotions in me that were previously out of control. In a gentler tone, he adds, “It’samazing is what it is. Fate brought us here tonight. We were meant to find her.”
Monroe gives a quick nod. “He’s right, Redd. If she’s your scent match, she’s ours. Let’s go talk to her.” His blue eyes hold a seriousness they did not hold before; he believes what he said with no hesitations, and that makes me feel a certain type of way.
Good. It makes me feel good that I have these two in my corner.
I nod once. Even though a part of me still wants to find someplace quiet to decompress and relax, I know they’re right. We can’t put this off. If she’s feeling anything similar to what I am, she’s not feeling the greatest right now.
Together, I lead Monroe and Lev to where the omega was, but as we walk across the ballroom and come upon her table, the table where the omega should be, I find she’s not there. She’s gone, having abandoned her overflowing bowl of candy.
I walk around the table, to the chair she was sitting in, and I place my hands on the back of said chair, my fingers curling around its wood. A poor substitution for the omega that was here before.
“She’s gone,” I whisper, unable to hide the sorrow in my tone.
“Where could she have gone?” Lev asks as he plucks one of the candies out of the bowl and pops it into his mouth. “The bathroom, maybe? Or maybe she’s trying to look for you.” He whips his head around and searches the nearby area—a feat made not so easy for him thanks to his five-foot-eight frame.
Monroe stares at me, but I can tell he’s also sniffing the air. If he’s anything like me, he can still smell her even though she’s not here. Lev probably would only be able to catch her scent if she was here, but us alphas were born to pick up omega scents.
“She left,” I say, feeling it in my bones, in my very soul. Speaking those two words aloud makes my shoulders slump. I should never have walked away from her like that to begin with.What was I thinking? She is probably upset, and rightfully so, and yet the mere thought of never seeing her again fills me with such sharp agony I can barely stand. “I’m so stupid.”
“No, you’re not,” Monroe says, while Lev quickly agrees with him.
“I am. She’s gone because of me, I know it.” I slump down, pull out the chair she was in and sit in it. The others pull chairs closer to me and sit down with me, one on either side. The only thing I can do is stare at the abandoned bowl of candy and wish the omega was here, still eating out of it. “Why did I walk away from her? I’m so fucking stupid.”
Monroe sets a hand on my shoulder and squeezes. “Stop saying that. You’re not stupid. You weren’t expecting to stumble across her. It’s not a crime to not know how to react in a situation like that.”
“You would’ve known how to react,” I mutter. “Why can’t I be more like you?”
The hand on my shoulder moves to my back, where he gives me a gentle pat before dropping that hand to the table in front of him. “Because you’re you. Being you isn’t a bad thing, Redd. We’ll find her, we’ll apologize, and we’ll beg her for forgiveness. If you’re scent matches, you won’t be able to stay away from each other.”
He’s right. I know he is, but that’s not enough to make me feel better. If I made her feel terrible enough that she wanted to leave… it hurts me more than words can say. I’m not used to this. I wasn’t expecting this. I’m such a fool.
“It’ll be okay,” Lev says as he goes for a second piece of candy. “You know, these things aren’t even that good, but I can’t stop eating them—”
My downward spiral into self-hatred and depression is interrupted by the woman who put this whole thing together.She approaches the table and folds her arms over her chest as she studies us and then the bowl of candy.
“You’re the one, aren’t you?” she asks me, somehow already knowing.
I swallow hard, guilty. “Yeah. I… I messed up.”
