He opens his mouth to say something then closes it again as his cell phone rings inside his jacket.
“You should get that.” I start to back away. “Again, I’m sorry. You should stop by Omega Village tomorrow. I’ll leave a batch of cookies with Margie at the gate for you. As a thank you. She may be a bit funny with you when you first arrive—she’s wary of alphas—but just tell her Delilah sent you.”
His eyes almost pop out of their sockets. “Delilah.” He repeats my name under his breath, running his hand over his now-wet head. “Hold on?—”
“Thanks again!” I attempt a feeble wave and dash away before he can say more.
Hopefully, he’ll just forget about this whole encounter.
When I reach the corner, I steal a glance back at him to see he’s still fixed in position, like a marble statue, staring vacantly into the road ahead.
FOURTEEN
Nash
My head is swimming.
Of all the omegas for me to meet on campus, what are the chances I run into Delilah? Any doubts I had over whether she was the omega Tae and Jagger are obsessed with were dashed when every step she took away from me elicited a strange tugging sensation in my body. I had to command my legs to stay still to stop myself from following her, overcome by the primal urge to take care of and protect her.
I came to campus for a quick meeting with Orin Strike, SVU’s head of security. Like me, he’s a man of few words, but he takes his work seriously and feels just as strongly about keeping paparazzi and campus hysteria around Jagger to a minimum.
I never expected to run intoheron my way back.
I lift my sleeve to my nose. I can still smell her on me. Her delicious apple pie fragrance is baked into the soft cotton of my shirt. It reminds me of a cozy mom-and-pop shop where you’d sit at the counter and order a slice of pie with a fat dollop of ice cream. The kind I never tire of eating.
I understand now why Jagger and Tae like her so much. My muscles tense, realizing I more than like her. I’ve never smelled an omega so inviting before, my reaction to her primal. Herbody fit perfectly against mine. Her round breasts squashed into my chest made me want to share more than my body heat with her. And fuck… she is breathtaking, even if the sight of her tear-soaked cheeks shattered me.
Seeing her like that made me want to punch my packmate in the face for being part of why she’s so miserable. Jagger’s crushed, but I could see in her alluring brown eyes today that she is too. He hurt her. Badly. And all I could do was just stand there.
Usually, I’m not an emotional person. It’s easier to push my feelings down and avoid facing them. After my brother’s death, I became an expert at finding ways to distract myself from the pain—namely, by fixing things.
Perhaps that’s why when I see her crushed book, splayed out under the glow of the streetlight. I stoop to scoop it out of the puddle. It’s in really bad shape. Probably beyond salvaging. I grimace, holding it between my thumb and forefinger, water dripping from it. I quickly shake it to get rid of any excess liquid. While most of the pages are soggy, miraculously, the author’s signature page is still intact.
So she likes pretty books. Huh…
I turn it over, examining the painted book edges. I could easily recreate a similar pattern. A plan forms in my mind as I go through a mental checklist of everything I’ll need—a new copy of the book, cloth, a stencil…
Bookbinding is a skill my mother taught me. My father taught me and my brother a number of skills, like how to strip an engine, change a gasket, and lay a floor, but bookbinding was my and Mom’s special thing. Robbie was never interested, so while he and Dad worked on fixing washers and stripping parts, I’d quietly work with her on her books on the other side of the garage. I liked the precision it took, loving to watch the care she’d take over all the small details. How she’d sing while she sewed the pages together, measured the cover perfectly, anddrew delicate patterns across the edges. It’s a hobby I always return to whenever I need to calm my mind.
Although I may not be able to fix the damage Jagger has done to her heart, I’ll be darned if I can’t give her a perfect book again. Resolve sweeps through me as I stash the wet book underneath my jacket. At least that’s something I can solve. Something I can fix.
“You arrived just in time.” Tae looks up from the pot he’s stirring when I return home. He’s making his mom’s famous gochujang jigae—a delicious, spicy red stew. “Although you should dry off first.”
Even though I’m soaked, I can’t feel the cold, my thoughts still fixed on her.
“What is it?” Jagger asks from his spot at the table, slouched over a notebook while he works on new lyrics. He inhales sharply then jumps up, chair screeching across the laminate. “You met her.”
Tae looks up from the pot again. “What?—”
“How is she?” Jagger descends on me, his hands curling around the fabric of my shirt to yank me closer like a desperate addict seeking his fix.
Since he ran into Delilah, Jagger has barely slept, walking around here like a zombie with dark circles under his eyes. He has the look of a man who’s haunted by his mistakes. I don’t know how I never noticed it before. Maybe I wasn’t paying close enough attention to him.
“What did she say?” Jagger’s eyes bounce frantically around my face. “How did you find her?”
“Get off.” I shrug him off then adjust my shirt. Mostly because I don’t want him to taint her scent. I’ll be putting this shirt over my pillow to sleep on tonight. I push aside the thought of smelling Delilah in my bed, hoping to avoid getting a hard-on in front of my packmates.
“But you saw her, didn’t you?” Jagger pushes. “You smell of her.”
