How can I let myself be vulnerable to people who have heard my darkest secrets while concealing everything about themselves?
No, there is no moving past this.
I can’t afford to break the contract, so I’ll stay here for the week. I’ll stay as far away from them as I can, then we’ll go our separate ways.
And I won’t get sick.
I won’t.
I’ll reduce my contact with them so much that there will hardly be any Alpha pheromones for my body to cling to.
I’ll be okay.
I’ll be okay.
I can do this.
This won’t be the biggest mistake of my life. This won’t ruin my life.
One week won’t kill me.
Chapter Ten
“Get away from there,you idiot. What if she opens the door and you’re creeping on her? What would she think?” Derrick grabs me by the collar of my shirt and hauls me away from the door that’s separating me from my Omega.
“She’s crying!” I try, and fail, to wiggle from his grip. “And yelling.”
He pushes me onto the couch and frowns at me. “Do you trust our Beta to take care of her or not?”
“Of course I do! But that doesn’t mean she won’t need us. I want to be the one in there smoothing her hair and wiping her tears.”
Smoke starts to fill the space, and Derrick swears, running back to the stove. He’s on his third batch of eggs, each one more burnt than the last.
He’s a hopeless cook, always has been, but he’s trying. Normally, I’m the chef of the pack, but he wanted to do this. I know he wants to impress Onion, especially since we got off on the wrong foot - eh, feet, and all.
“This is a delicate situation. We knew that going intothis. We knew that she’d be hurt, scared, and feel betrayed.” He tosses the eggs into the garbage can and starts rifling through the fridge.
“Which is why I said we shouldn’t do this. I said we should tell her over a video call so she could have a bit of time to come to terms with all of this.”
“And we agreed that she’d never speak to us again if we told her like that. There would be nothing stopping her from blocking our number and forgetting we ever existed. We didn’t even know her name. How would we have tracked her down if that happened? This was the best option to get her to give us a chance to explain.” Derrick has always been the most level-headed of the three of us, and it’s no surprise that he’s not rising to my challenge.
When we received the producers’ message saying Onion had applied and wanted to meet with us, it was a shock. We knew she watched the show, but the fact that she was willing to leave her home for this?
We couldn’t give up this opportunity when she had gathered the courage to put herself out there.
Before Derrick can snark something else, Grant appears in the doorway of the bedroom, looking worn out and devastated. His shoulders are slumped forward as he curls around himself.
“Alphas.” His voice is cracked and bleeding, and emotion seeps from every letter he speaks. “I messed up.”
Derrick has Grant in his arms faster than I can blink, whisking him to the living room and squeezing him onto the couch between us. I rub my hand down his arm to soothe his frayed nerves.
“What happened?” I don’t think I want to know, but I can’t stop myself from asking.
“What didn’t happen? She begged to end the show, shetold me we’ve ruined her life, I kissed her, she locked herself in the bathroom…”
“Hold on.” Derrick cuts our Beta off. “You kissed her?”
“She asked me if I loved her! I wasn’t going to tell her yes and not kiss her.” Grant crosses his arms over his chest and stares at Derrick, daring him to say something. “And don’t think about getting on my case about it. She handed me my ass already.”
