“Without regular mating, your claiming bite will heal over quickly,” Brand reminded me.
“But–can I still visit up here?” I pleaded. “I don’t know how to do anything beyond be your Omega.”
Edgar didn’t seem to want to meet my eyes.
“I think a clean separation is best. We’ll be meeting with new Omegas, trying to find someone who can give us a baby. You may remain at Koval Manor for 6 months. Enough for you to figure out what else you want to do.”
I could already feel the rejection seeping into my bones, the bite on my neck throbbing. Like my body already knew, and suddenly I felt so sick I could barely stand.
“We will arrange to send whatever you like down to your new room. There will be less space of course, but your things may remain in storage until you are able to move out.”
With the numbness of shock, I stood up and walked down the stairs to my new bedroom. The basement of Koval Manor was very chilly, with stark stone utilitarian rooms mostly used for housing visiting workers.
I still could barely comprehend what had happened when I sat beside my suitcase in the clean but very small room. What a change from my more luxurious quarters upstairs, where I had a big, open, comfortable space to set up my art supplies to catch the chill spring sunlight.
I could hear the steady thrum of the massive downstairs laundry from here, reverberating even through the heavy walls.
There wasn’t much. A small bed, one battered table, and a little attached washroom with a thin shower curtain. There was a worn quilt on my bed and it seemed very hard. Quite a change from my previous bedroom.
My hand drifted absently, in a familiar, aching motion, to my flat belly as I looked at myself in the mirror.
Who was I without my Pack?
The harsh lighting showed more lines around my blue eyes that I hadn’t noticed before, brackets around my full lips. My ice-blonde hair looked thin and lank.
I was free to find a new Pack. But who would want an old, failed Omega?
Discouraged and weak, I lay down on the bed and closed my eyes. The shivering had already started as my Omega began to realize that she was no longer bound to her Pack.
For several days I lay on my bed in agonizing pain as my body adjusted to life without my Alphas. I was too ashamed to tell any of my friends what was happening. They’d find out soon enough from the palace gossip.
And the idea that now the Duke and his Pack would know all about my rejection was a fresh humiliation.
How ridiculous I’d always been to make sure my makeup wasjust sofor their brief visits, that my hair curled perfectly around my face, that my dresses showed off the trim body I worked very hard to keep tight for Edgar, Penn, and Brand, because they would comment onanyweight gain.
Kind Mrs. Apel who now managed the laundry ended up bringing me bone broth to get me through the worst days, her face pinched with worry.
“You’ll get through it, sugar,” she said as I lay on my bed, teeth chattering, and I thought I heard her say something likeunfeeling brutes, but I was too out of it to comprehend.
The Koval Pack had rejected their Omega. It was going to be all anyone talked about.
I was an object of pity to my Pack. Nothing more.
After the pain subsided, it took several days of an almost catatonic state before I slowly began to adjust to my new reality. There was a little money left in my private account, but it wouldn't last forever. Only a few months.
My phone was full of concerned messages from friends, invitations to come stay, but I couldn’t bear to do that. I didn’t want to be a burden on anyone, a permanent guest. Always the odd one out, my friends’ homes filled with babies and toddlers and curious kids and goth teens and. . .everything I wanted but couldn’t have.
I began to work in the Manor laundry with Mrs. Apel, and there seemed to be more work than I could ever imagine, but I put my chin doggedly in to it, scrubbing the beer and wine stains from their satin smoking jackets, and washing endless sets of sheets, towels, and tablecloths, all of which must be changed every day at Koval Manor.
But things got even worse when I realized the laundry was right underneath the great Dining Hall, and one evening when the laundry was finally silent so I could fold clothes, I heard the sounds of Edgar, Penn, and Brand as they entertained guests at dinner.
“Of course we hope Jessabella finds a new Pack.”
There was a smattering of little giggles around the table, and my stomach sunk as I strained to hear.
“What other Pack is going to want such an old Omega? Let alone one who can’t have babies?”
“She’s so basic,” another woman snorted. “Like there’s nothing special about her. I mean, I get that she was like thisgenerationalbeauty in her younger years. But now she’s just your basic bitch really. The kind of woman who thinks it’ssoofun when pumpkin spice comes back in the fall and always talks aboutpie. She’s a follower, she’s not special at all.”
