Page 4 of Dance Omega Dance

My scent suppressants weren't perfect. They never were.

"Well, look at this," the alpha drawled, pushing off from the wall. His eyes moved over me like invasive hands. "Don't think I've seen you around before, little Omega."

I dropped my gaze to the sidewalk, my body automatically making itself smaller. "Just passing through," I lied, my voice barely audible.

"That so?" He stepped closer, and the air seemed to thicken. "Cause I'd remember a scent like yours. Sweet, like cotton candy." His friends chuckled, and heat crawled up my neck.

Maddie stepped between us, five-foot-four of furious beta. "She said she's passing through. Your hearing broken along with your manners?"

The alpha's expression darkened. "You should teach your pet Beta some respect."

"And you should teach your knot not to rise every time you smell an Omega," Maddie fired back, her voice carrying enough to draw stares. "Or is that asking too much of your evolutionary dead-end brain?"

I tugged at her sleeve, panic rising. "Maddie, don't—"

"Listen to your Omega friend," the alpha growled, looming over us. "She knows what's good for her."

Maddie didn't flinch. She planted her feet and stared up at him with a fearlessness I'd never understand. "Back. Off." Each word was a bullet.

For a moment, I was certain he would strike her. Instead, something like grudging amusement flickered across his face. "Fierce little thing, aren't you?" He stepped aside withexaggerated courtesy. "Enjoy your stay in Shaker City, Omega. I hope it's a long one."

The threat beneath his words wasn't lost on me. I pulled Maddie away before she could respond, then exhaled.

"You shouldn't have done that," I whispered when we were a block away. "He could have hurt you."

Maddie snorted. "Please. That alpha asshole? All posture, no bite. Besides," her voice softened, "nobody talks to my best friend like that. Not while I'm around."

I swallowed the knot in my throat. "You're insane, you know that?"

"Sanity's overrated." She grinned, then pointed ahead. "Look, there it is. The Royal in all its faded glory."

The theater rose before us, an Art déco relic with its name spelled out in lights that would glow red against the night sky. Even in daylight, it had a certain haunted elegance, like an aging film star still clinging to her makeup and sequins. My heart did a complicated flutter at the sight of it.

"They've been renovating the east wing," Maddie explained, leading me toward the side entrance. "New rehearsal spaces, better dressing rooms. Nothing too fancy, the historical society would have fits but definitely an upgrade from the closet they used to put you in."

Tracing my fingers along the weathered brick, I said, "I don't care about the dressing room. I just want to dance on that stage again."

"And you will," Maddie's voice held absolute certainty.

We paused at the entrance, and I felt the weight of the dance settling on my shoulders. One performance. One chance to prove I belonged somewhere. That I was more than just an omega waiting to be claimed.

"You coming?" Maddie held the door open, framed in the rectangle of light.

I took a deep breath, feeling the fear and anticipation mingle in my veins. "Yeah," I said finally. "I'm ready."

The lie tasted like copper on my tongue as I followed her inside, leaving the afternoon sun behind.

The dressing room smelled of dust and ambition. Soft murmurs filtered in from the stage crew and performers, and the faint echo of the warm-up music pulsed through the floorboards under my shoes. Maddie flicked on the lights with a flourish, revealing walls lined with scratched mirrors and a floor that had absorbed decades of dancers' sweat. The space was larger than I remembered. It had been renovated, as Maddie had promised, but still carried that peculiar melancholy of places where dreams either soared or shattered.

"Ta-da!" Maddie spread her arms wide. "Quite the upgrade from the glorified broom closet they used to stuff you in, right? They even installed actual functioning air conditioning after Giselle Whatshername fainted during last summer's production."

I trailed my fingers along the makeup counter, noting the new lights framing the mirrors. "It's nice," I admitted. It was. But that sunken feeling within me kept on growing.

I glanced at her, my gut twisting. “What if I can’t do this Maddie? What if I freeze on stage? What if someone in the audience recognizes me?”

“Or maybe you don’t freeze? And you dance the way you used to, or even better than that? What if tonight’s the night everything starts to change?”

I stared at her. “You really think that’s possible?”

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