They all knew already, didn’t they? All of Avendene. They knew.
It wasn’tfair.
No one had told him anything about omegas, or about what it meant to be one, other than sending Clarke away in case Arden went into heat for him. Until yesterday, Arden hadn’t even known what heatmeant.
He’d thought it was a flirty mood.
Not a clawing, all-consuming need to mate. Certainly not one that couldmurderhim if he didn’t do something about it.
Arden dithered, his outraged sense of privacy warring with a yearning to be clean and comfortable.
Someone would have to come in eventually, he reasoned.
His bedding must be changed, and the evidence of last night taken away for a good laundering. There was no getting away from it.
Arden gave the bell pull a determined yank. And then recalled that he was naked, squeaked, and hunted around for his robe.
He spotted it draped over the chair that stood before the bay window, and hauled it on just as someone tapped politely at the door, and pushed it open.
Arden finished belting his robe and dropped his hands to his sides, attempting to look both nonchalant and ducal. Which was a waste of time, as he was neither. He tried.
It was Marl.
Arden stared at him in horror and clutched the fabric of his voluminous robe high at his throat. The butler shouldn’t be answering calls to the bedchamber, surely? It was a footman’s job. He wasn’t prepared for this!
Marl bowed and waited for Arden to speak. His sharp gaze flicked around the room, taking stock. He performed a similar subtle assessment of Arden.
Damage. He was looking for damage.
He thought Beckett had hurt him.
Indignation on Beckett’s behalf welled. Arden dropped the defensive hand at his throat and stood tall, making it clear that he wasquitewell, thank you very much.
He couldn’t pull off nonchalant and ducal, but he rather hoped he was managing to project calm.
“I should like,” Arden quavered, “to have a bath.”
“Your Grace.” Marl inclined his head. “Shall I have some refreshments sent up with the water, or will you be joining His Grace downstairs?”
“Up here, please.”
Marl departed and Arden rushed about, doing his best to straighten the bed. He made it up even though he knew he was supposed to leave that sort of thing for the maid, then he perched on the chair and stared across the room at it, gripping his hands together on his lap.
When another knock came at the door, he was in the middle of stripping the bed entirely. There’d been no point making it. The linens had to be changed, obviously, and?—
“Your Grace, why don’t you have a little sit down and let me do that?” Magda said at his shoulder, making Arden jump. He hadn’t heard her enter. She stood beside him, smiling gently. Behind her, two footmen came in carting the water.
Arden reacted without thinking, stepping to put her between him and the two hulking betas, like a coward.
He flushed, and he stayed where he was.
Coward.
“Come along, now.” Magda waited until the footmen had vanished into the adjoining bathing chamber before she put a firm hand on his elbow and guided him over to the window. “Cook’s sent you up some fresh rolls and a lovely big pot of chocolate.” She gestured at the tray sitting on a small table beside the chair. “That’ll restore your spirits right quick, see if it don’t.”
Arden was clutching a pillow in a compressed wad against his chest. One of the footmen, Yatt, emerged from the bathing chamber and slid him a quick glance as he carried an empty bucket across the room. It took everything in Arden not to cringe at the interest he saw in the man’s face. It wasn’t sexual, he didn’t think—not that he was any kind of expert in understanding when someone looked at him with that sort of interest—but it was filled with curiosity.
Magda extracted Arden’s pillow, sat him down, and instructed him to pour himself a nice cup. “Go on, do. You like your chocolate.” She bustled over to the bed, keeping up a stream of chatter as she efficiently finished stripping it and made it up with clean linens from the basket that she’d brought with her.
