Page 43 of Omega's Triplets

Chapter Eleven

“It’s called imprinting,” Jamie said.

“How come we’d never heard of it before?” Mark asked. He sounded even gruffer than usual, if such a thing were possible, and Harley had the sense he was trying to suppress some emotion for the sake of this conversation. Harley and Mark hadn’t spoken since their encounter in the kitchen. Harley knew it was probably his responsibility to approach his brother and try to smooth things over, to apologize for his own anger when he’d learned that Mark and Maddy had been together. To admit that he’d been a hypocrite.

Instead, he’d gone to Jamie.

Jamie had listened with a sort of tired acceptance as Harley explained everything that had happened. Harley had expected a confrontation of the sort they’d had with Mark, but to his surprise, Jamie had just nodded and said he’d expected something like this to happen.

While Harley had tried to digest that surprising statement, Jamie had gone to get Mark.

And now, here the three of them sat, staring uncomfortably around the room at each other, and Harley was struck all over again by just how much distance had grown between them since the Death Fangs’ auction.

He missed the bond he used to have with his brothers. Always before, it had felt like they were sharing one mind. It was true, perhaps, that Jamie was the brains and Mark was the muscle and Harley...well, he supposed he was the heart. But it had always felt like they were part of the same organism, in a way, helping one another to thrive.

Now, it felt like they were working in opposition to each other. Like each of them was acting on his own interests, with no regard for how it might affect the others. And Harley felt as though something deep and fundamental was broken.

Mark wouldn’t evenlookat him, for God’s sake.

“It’s really rare,” Jamie said now. He pulled down the book from which he’d been reading and handed it across the table to Mark, who hesitated slightly before taking it. “Most omegas don’t experience it. I could only find one recorded instance in the Hell’s Wolves’ history, and that was several generations ago. It caused a big brouhaha back then too, because the omega was supposed to mate with the alpha of another pack before she imprinted on the alpha of ours. Of course, once the imprinting had taken place, the two couldn’t resist each other.” He looked at Mark and Harley with a touch of asperity. “I suppose that comes as no surprise to the two of you.”

“If it’s so rare, how come it happened to us twice in two days?” Harley asked.

“I don’t know,” Jamie admitted. “That’s the part that doesn’t make sense.”

“Are you sure it is this imprinting thing?” Harley asked. “Maybe it’s not that at all.”

“No,” Mark said, looking up from the book. “This is definitely it.”

“Let me see that,” Harley said, taking the book from his brother.

“Right here,” Mark said, pointing.

Harley read:

The imprinting of an alpha onto an omega is a rare occurrence and should not be considered a prerequisite for a successful mating and breeding. However, when an imprint does occur, the emotional and physical bonds between alpha and omega have been demonstrated to be significantly more powerful and, at times, all-consuming. Imprinted alphas report feelings of inevitability and loss of control, and, indeed, there are no recorded instances of an imprint occurring where copulation did not follow either immediately or within a matter of days.

It is unclear, at this time, how omegas experience this bond—

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