Page 21 of Rot In Knotty Pieces

“You’re going into heat,” Blaze says, watching as she paces to him, reaching up and spreading her fingers along his chest. She kisses the small exposed V of flesh on his chest.

She tears her mouth free and scowls. “What?”

“You or the alters, some of you are going into a heat. So, by the smell of it, is he.”

Her gaze snaps between Pix and Blaze. “Well, shit.”

I snort a laugh, and she approaches as if she’d forgotten that I even existed. I’m not afraid of her, but I am cautious. So very careful. This alter will stab me, no questions asked.

“You came for us. I remember hearing her call for you.”

I swallow hard, remembering those moments in the dark and Dove’s cries.

“You saved us and kept her safe, Aaron.” I’ve never heard this alter speak so gently.

She lifts a hand, and her cold fingers that feel so different from Merle, Raven, Dove, and Kestrel, stroke my cheek. It’s seductive but kind, aggressive in its gentility, and somehow strong enough to make my knees weak.

“There isn’t a single alter in here that doesn’t love you, Aaron Roseland. You killed to save us and fight to keep us free, you gave up your career and your omega for us. I won’t hurt you, not now, not ever. You belong to us, and we are yours.”

My eyes close as I lean closer, our foreheads touch, and I just inhale her scent, slightly spicy, slightly darker.

“I’m so glad you are okay,” I whisper. “I was worried…I thought…”

“That we were gone? No, we’re here, just recovering. Come on, let’s go be pirates.”

I’m so startled by her sudden change of conversation that I burst out laughing before I can stop.

I swing up into the boat, and Blaze shoves us off from the rocks. She doesn’t sit; she stands in the middle, legs spread wide, riding the waves and currents. Letting out whoops and hollers.

Not a one of us is going to stop her.

She stands there and tilts her head back and just screams. It’s long and loud and leaves me shivering. The joy has changed.

The rage.

The pain, there’s so much in her. She’s the strongest, the most aggressive, the angriest, but she’s just as hurt as the others.

Sage is up, wrapping himself around her. When she whirls in his arms, sobbing into his chest, he jumps out of the raft and walks into the forest where no one else can see. We bank the raft and sit and wait.

In silence.

Watching, pretending we aren’t hurting for them.

“I’ve never…I don’t know how to help,” Rolly says hoarsely.

“We just be here,” I say quietly. “Keep them safe, be what they need.”

I look around at this group as we pull the raft up on the bank, the huge alphas, so violent and strong. Daega, the violence fairly dripping from him. We are a mix that is unlikely, blended, melded together because of one omega who is more wounded than any creature I’ve ever met. One who refuses to bend, refuses to break.

An omega we could love.

Who the fuck are we to walk away from her?

“No one touches her again,” I vow when I hear Raptor scream again. The hair on my neck raises, and it takes everything in me to stay where I am and not race into the forest and find her, crowd her.

They all need different things. Raptor needs a safe place to let out her fury and hurt. Sage is the best equipped to deal with that; we all recognise it.

Daega’s fingers slide in between mine, and I don’t shake him off. I squeeze them back because there’s no fighting this, not any longer.