Then Apollo died when I was twenty. Things changed for the worse from there. Orpheus started sending the guys out for tasks that would take days. I was alone a lot more which made it easy for Orpheus to start up his old pastime of torturing me.
Two years passed in a strange blur of happy memories mixed in with bad ones.
One night, when the guys were out on a run, I perfumed as an omega. I was in the middle of cleaning the bathrooms at the bar and suddenly my insides felt like they were melting in on themselves. I had no idea what it was because the only other omega that I’d ever met was Orpheus’s mother and she kept to herself when she was alive.
Like an idiot I stumbled right into the middle of the bar and came face to face with Orpheus.
I won’t go into too much detail but he tried to dominate me. He used his alpha bark and tried to do things to me that I can’t repeat, even in a written letter. It was truly the worst experience of my life and I was only just barely saved when the guys came back early and Rex kicked the shit out of Orpheus.
The guys got me out of there and we never looked back. It took me about six months to really feel comfortable in my skin as an omega and they only bonded me a year ago. I was finally starting to feel whole again.
And then Orpheus started sniffing around again. The guys won’t say it, but I think that his leadership is being questioned and Rex is the next best thing. I don’t think he’ll leave us alone until Rex is gone permanently.
I know this is a lot of information, probably more than you were expecting, but I just wanted to end this letter by thanking you for protecting me today. We may have both been dragged off if you hadn’t.
I think you are one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met. You don’t let being an omega keep you from sticking up for yourself. If our places were reversed and I was thrown back in time, I don’t think I could have done it the same way as you. You take everything in stride, Juneau, and I really admire that.
Yours,
Podcast
I finished reading the letter, turning all of the new information round and around in my head as I put together all of the pieces of the narrative that I’d been given. My eyes were still staring at the word ‘yours.’ I had to admit that it sent little butterflies fluttering throughout my belly.
Not one of the dozens of alphas and alpha packs that my mother had put in front of me had ever given me butterflies before. Only headaches and anxiety about choosing a pack that I would be stifled by for the rest of my life.
Yours. It was just one word, but was it insane of me to pull meaning from between those five letters? Podcast could say a lot with very little and his sign off was almost like a confession.
I pushed the thought to the back of my mind for now. I needed to focus on the content of the rest of the letter instead. “You should never have been put through that. Any of that.”
While omega’s rights had seemingly changed in the future, it was still evident there were still people who treated us like objects. Anger burned in the pit of my stomach and I had to push the sudden flush, of what I now recognized as magic, down so that I didn’t accidentally light Podcast’s nest on fire.
My emotionshadbeen more volatile over the past few days, but I just assumed that it was my omega hormones responding to the alphas in the house. Now I know better. I didn’t know how I was going to explain my newfound abilities to my family when I returned to the past, but I was most definitely going to need to learn to control them so as not to accidentally hurt someone.
Podcast looked like he was going to start crying again. I pushed the laptop aside and gently cupped his face in my hands.
“Thank you for telling me your story,” I whispered and he nodded, his green eyes fluttering as he rubbed his face into my palm.
He was scenting me, I realized as he brushed his nose across my palm to inhale the mixture of our omega perfumes. I should have pulled away, omegas weren’t supposed to scent someone outside of their pack after all. Instead, I found myself leaning forward and pressing my lips to his.
In my twenty-two years I had never kissed another person in a romantic manner. I’d seen my parents kiss and had read about it in books. But I’d never been filled with the desire to do it myself—until now.
The kiss was shy and clumsy. My anxiety ratcheted up as I tried to figure out how the blasted thing was supposed to work. Was it just the simple press of lips? If that was the case, I wasn’t sure why the maids giggled about it in the kitchen while they were working.
I was just about to pull away and apologize when Podcast shifted under my touch, his hands sliding under my arms. He pulled my body flush with his and his lips began to move against mine, taking control of the situation with ease. Without all of the petticoats and layers that I had grown up wearing, the only thing separating us was our individual shirts. I could feel the heat of his body seeping into mine and I chased the warmth as he held me tightly against him.
His tongue slid along the curve of my lower lip, asking silent permission for entry and my gasp of surprise gave it to him. His lips were hot against mine as his tongue dipped into my mouth and I squeezed my thighs together to soothe the sudden tingling that was exploding there.
My whimper slipped around our connected mouths and I found my fingers tangling in Podcast’s light brown curls as everything I thought I knew about kisses was rewritten by him.
Podcast’s scent surrounded me completely, the calming eucalyptus filling my nose as his lips moved with mine. Every time I started to slow, not quite knowing what to do next, Podcast would press in again until I finally had to break away to catch my breath.
We sat panting together, his verdant eyes locked on my face and I could see molten heat pooling in their depths.
‘You ok?’he asked, his hands shaking as he signed.
I nodded, swallowing so that when I spoke my words wouldn’t be hoarse. “Yes, though I have to say that was my very first kiss.”
The corner of his mouth quirked up into a smirk.‘Mine too.’
