I quirk a brow at her. “So like Cinderella? Cause that’s just about the difference in our social standings.”
Haven scowls but she’s not deterred. “I don’t see why not. I’m sure they’ll fall in love with you the moment you sweep into the introduction ceremony in some fabulous gown you’ve designed and sewn yourself.”
“Yet another sign of how very different our stations in life are. They’ll be wearing Tom Ford and I’ll be in a Florence Karlin original.”
“And you’ll look lovely, Ren,” Hale says, not looking up from the book. “You could go in wearing a garbage bag and still blow all the other omegas out of the water.”
Haven turns her head toward her alpha slowly, eyes wide and scent spiking. Hale’s mouth quirks into a smirk. He knows what he did just then. For whatever reason, having her alphas care about me, about my emotional wellbeing is a huge turn on for her.
Probably because she loves me so much and knowing her alphas love me too—like a little sister, of course—makes her appreciate them all the more. It's only gotten worse since she got pregnant.
“Need something, mouse?”
My best friend makes a sort of choked needy sound, before she stiffens her chin, looking pointedly back to me. “Nope. I’m just… I’m fine. I don’t need a damn thing.”
Her self-control is a thing of beauty.
I wave her off. “Go away. You’re stinking up my house with your perfume.”
Hale chokes out a laugh and snaps the book closed, holding it up to me as he pushes to his feet. “I’m borrowing this.”
“Of course you can borrow my book, Hale. Thanks for checking with me first.” Haven’s scent spikes even more when he laughs, making my nose wrinkle. “Get your mate out of here, dude.”
“As you command,princess.” Stuffing the paperback into his back pocket, he bends and scoops my very pregnant friend into his arms.
“Don’t call me that!” I call after their retreating backs.
Hale only laughs. “Why not? It's what you’re gonna be, isn’t it?”
That I don’t dignify with a response, shaking my head as I move to open a window and try to air out as much of my best friend’s scent as I can.
Sweat slicks my skin, my heart thundering in my chest, as I stare up at the ceiling, hands fisted in my sheets. My knee throbs with remembered pain. Memories assault me, the empty restaurant. The chair. The inability to do anything, to make my body move, because an alpha bark held me in place. The hammer as it swung to make a point.
I flinch, jerk in my sweat soaked nest and try to pull myself out of it.
I’m not there. I’m not there. I’m safe.
Safe. Safe. Safe.
The word echoes in my head as I try to make myself believe it.
I don’t. Not really.
No unbonded omega can truly feel safe. Not when it's so damn easy for alphas to take away our autonomy, our agency. A single command with the right amount of power behind it and we’re fucked.
Knowing I won’t be going back to sleep tonight, I reach for the lamp on the bedside table and flick it on. Squinting against the light, I stare up at the ceiling, forcing my lungs to slow. Breathe in for a count of four, hold for four, out for four. Over and over and over, until my heart is no longer thundering and my breathing is calm.
Almost two years and countless hours of therapy later and I still have nightmares. Still wake up clutching at the sheets so certain that I’m back there, in that abandoned restaurant having my dreams shattered.
Haven is right.
I can’t keep going on like this.
I need to shake myself out of the fog that has swallowed me up. Out of the fear of alphas—alphas that aren’t the Calloway pack—that makes it hard to get out of bed in the morning, go to work, do anything. I’m always braced for an alpha command, for a bark that is going to take away my autonomy.
My therapist, a lovely omega named Fiona, who specializes in helping traumatized women of our designation, has told me repeatedly that not all alphas are bad. Not all alphas will hurt me.
I know that on some level, I do. Logically. The problem with PTSD is that it's not logical. At all.
