Page 50 of The Omega’s Nest

I drag my gaze up to rest on his profile. He’s focused on the coast road stretching ahead of us—the darkness of the mountains hugs us on one side, the stretch of black ocean on the other, and the long, white line in the centre of the road an unbroken path to freedom. His face is calm, gaze steady, and he smells like a gentle breeze coming off the ocean.

“Addie,” I croak.

He whips his head to the side and the smile that overtakes his face is sunshine breaking over the horizon after a night of endless winter.

“You’re back,” he says, voice brimming with that same joy.

I nod and push myself up with the hand I now realise is clenching Addie’s thigh.

“Sorry,” I mumble, caressing his leg.

Addie shakes his head, his smile and scent telegraphing happy-relieved-freedom.

“Is he dead?” I ask, because I might as well find out if I’m now going to be wanted for a murder on top of bonding another alpha’s property. A low rumble comes out of me at the memory of it. Addie is mine.

He shoots me a quizzical look but answers the question. “Yes.”

I nod. What else can I do? I beat a man to death with my bare fists, and I’d do it again.

“Erasmus will take care of it,” Addie says.

“Erasmus?” I ask, a vague memory of an extremely attractive and very slight omega floats through my mind. He’s got nothing on Addie. Sure, the guy was beautiful in a conventional sense, like a model, but Addie has a warmth under his less conventional good looks that is unbeatable. I know why Benji wanted to fuck him. Probably has fucked him. Another growl threatens, but I tamp it down. He’s dead now. Good.

“Yeah, he kinda runs the show. I trust him. We’ll be fine.” He shoots me another smile. He’s so happy. He just watched me beat someone to death and he’s practically glowing.

“But …” I begin and rub my forehead. My alpha’s reluctant to let the human part of me take back control, which is understandable. We’ve got precious cargo onboard here. Although we’re hardly running things anyway—Addie is driving, looks like he knows where he’s going too. I can’t help it, fondness floods me.

He glances at me and smiles, a question in it.

“Nothing.” I don’t know how to explain how much I love that he’s just here, that he’s okay, that he’s driving us somewhere, that he’s safe. “But he was kind of small?”

In other words, how’s he going to move the body of an alpha at least three times his size?

“Oh, the others will help. Seriously, Leo, don’t worry about it.”

“Do you omegas do this a lot, then? Make alpha bodies disappear?”

The thought of it sends an unexpected thrill through me. But there’s shame too. I visited that brothel with the—very drunken—intention to sleep with an omega. And now I’ve seen the reality of the lives of the omegas there, what they were going to make Addie do. I’d never given much thought to how brothels operated, to what happened to omegas who’d been left in Addie’s position. It was the kind of problem that didn’t happen in my world, and so, shamefully, I’d never considered the implications of it.

But Addie just laughs. “Well, this is the first time I’ve been involved in it, even if tangentially, but I wouldn’t put it past Erasmus.”

Wow, okay. That guy looked younger than Addie. I decide I don’t want to know any more. And then I recognise the vehicle we’re in.

“This is my car,” I say, dumbfounded.

“Yeah, Stephen said you could borrow it.” Addie smiles over at me again.

Jesus, the squad were too good to me.

“And Terry?” I ask.

“Dropped us off at a park near the base where Stephen was waiting with the car. Now we’re heading south. Will’s got a beach shack we can use until we decide where to go next, but you know that. We’ll need to keep moving, but we can probably spare one night to get, well, cleaned up.”

His scent spikes. A knowing smile spreads on my face, and I slide my hand further up his thigh, running my pinkie finger along the outline of his cock.

“Among other things,” I murmur.

Addie’s answering laugh is breathless.