“Yep, there’s just the three of us. Me, Nash, and Jag,” he states proudly. “The dream team.”
We walk for a few moments in silence while I battle to ignore how good he smells. If he left me alone, it’d make life much easier.
“Look, I know what Jag did was…” He shakes his head. “Unforgivable.”
I clutch the paper cup so tightly that I’m afraid the bottom is going to give out.
“Yes. It was.” I pick up my pace. “That’s why he and his packmates are the last people I want to see.”
I gasp, almost spilling my drink on Tae when he steps in front of me to block my path.
“I can’t even imagine how you’re feeling or what you went through.” He’s speaking more softly now. “But the Jagger I know wants to make things right. He knows what he did was wrong. He feels fucking awful about it.”
“Yeah, I’m sure it’s really been tearing him up inside while he’s been off touring all over the world.” I laugh coldly. “I’m a nobody. I know exactly what I was to Jagger. I was stupid for allowing myself to get close to him.”
Before Kady made me block all traces of Jagger from my phone and computer, I had a few moments of weakness when I ended up searching for him. I saw photographs of him with his arms draped around supermodels, partying at huge events, singing at sold-out shows. Just the thought of what I saw makes me sick.
“You’re not a nobody, Delilah.” Tae brushes a curl off my face, his eyes piercing mine. “How could you ever think that?”
“Jagger discarded me like a piece of trash,” I remind him, taking a step back so I’m out of his reach.
“I have no right to ask this of you, but…” Tae buries his hands in his pockets. “All I ask is for you to hear him out. Give him a chance to explain himself.”
“Explain himself?” My eyes widen as fury bubbles out of me. “Give him a chance?” I poke my finger into Tae’s toned chest. “Jagger Knight hasn’t earned a second chance. I owe him nothing.”
Tae rubs the spot where I jabbed him. “Have you listened to his last album?”
“Do you really think I’d listen to the album of an alpha who left me in a hotel without saying goodbye after lying to me about being my scent match?” I lower my voice as I notice a group of nearby betas watching our interaction with interest. “Do you think I’m that pathetic?”
“Fuck, no! I don’t think you’re pathetic at all. No one does. Shit, I’m really screwing this up, aren’t I?” He clutches the back of his neck and exhales deeply. “All I’m saying is that listening to his songs may help you fill in some of the blanks. After that, if you still want nothing to do with him—withus—then I’ll understand. I can’t force you to listen to them, come to the show or do anything you don’t want, but if you’re really scent matches?—”
“Thanks for the drink, Tae,” I cut him short. “Have a good day.”
This time, he doesn’t follow me when I storm away to my relief. Tears sting the back of my eyes, but I’m not sure whether they’re from anger at Tae’s audacity to ask me to give Jagger a chance or because I’m upset that Jagger shared with him that he thought we were scent matches. Why would he tell his packmate that if he didn’t really mean it?
The rest of my morning passes in a flash. I end up burning my cronuts because I’m too distracted listening to some of my peers gossiping about what they’re going to wear to Jagger’s show and thinking about what Tae said.
When I mope out of class, a familiar figure is waiting outside the building for me.
“Faye?” I tilt my head. “What’re you doing here?”
“Oh, I just finished picking some rosemary in the greenhouse and thought I’d stop by.” While that may not be a lie, the intent way she studies my face tells me that she was sent by the other Stellas. “Maybe we can take a walk or grab coffee, if you’re free?”
“It’s sweet that you’re here. Did Kady and Sabs tell you what happened?”
“I was trying to be discreet, but yes,” she groans, twirling a strand of her long golden hair around her finger. “Everyone’s worried about you, Del. I thought you may want someone to talk to who is a little less… opinionated.”
Faye wasn’t here last year while Sabs and Kady literally held me together during my peak period of heartbreak, so talking through my mixed emotions with her might be easier than it is with the others.
“Thank you.” I link my arm through hers, inhaling her clean and comforting honeysuckle scent. Although she still wears some scent blocker out of habit, she doesn’t have to mask her scent since bonding with the Silverwood Pack. When an omega is bonded, her scent is only super potent to the alphas she’s bonded to. “I guess a walk would be good.”
“I still have the tickets to see Jagger’s show,” Faye informs me as we take a quiet, leafy path around a duck pond to walk back to Omega Village. “If you decide you’d like to go.”
“I… I don’t know what to do.” It’s all I’ve been thinking about all day. “Although I know Sabs and Kady think avoiding him is the best way, and the logical part of my brain agrees, a small part of me…” I put a hand to my heart. “It’s not that easy. I have no closure.”
“I can understand that.” Faye nods. “Not knowing is hard.”
“Tae showed up at the OV gates this morning and asked me to listen to the latestPack Firealbum,” I continue. “He said it would help fill in some blanks.”
