Page 44 of Bliss & Her Idols

“It’s beautiful,” Cricket breathes.

“Like you.” I glance around the low ceilinged room. It’s a glamorous meeting room with velvet seats on one side and a long table with only a single seat on the other. “At least his staff know how to brand Jin well.”

The floors are the same swirling blue as Jin’s merchandise. The lights in the ceiling twinkle like the stars on Immortal’s signature outfits. Banners hang over and behind the table with photos of the album cover.

Cricket looks like he’s trying to start a sentence several times but can’t quite get the words out of his throat.

I’ve noticed that Cricket is struggling to talk now that we’re around other people.

A gang of Beta journalists and reporters are gathered in conspiratorial groups around the seats.

I catch sight of a pink-haired woman with glasses, who is lurking with a cameraman at her shoulder. She clutches a recording device in her long nailed hand.

I bare my teeth.

April Lavere.

April is a Traditional journalist who writes for the most popular magazines.

She’s also my nemesis.

April has received every assignment, from which I’ve been rejected.

She’s a Beta, I’ll simply be dismissively told.You’re an Omega.

What can I say to that?

She’s also a hack? Lazy? A bad writer?

An asshole?

“Disgraceful,” April mutters, casting me another disparaging look. “What type of Alpha allows their unbonded Omegas out alone and looking likethat? Sometimes I wonder why people are surprised when their Omegas are kidnapped or worse.”

I grit my teeth.

Is this the type of person we should be content is writing for our media? Who is setting the narrative?

I want to show the world that an Omega can be anything that they dream.

Go anywhere alone and be safe, and if they’re not, then it isn’t the victim’s fault.

It’s the fucking Alpha’s.

I will prove that I can be as good a journalist as any of the cynical, bored looking assholes, who are swimming through this room like sharks hoping to scent blood.

Since some of them have also been shooting Cricket and me contemptuous or suspicious glances as not simply the only Omegas but also the only Rejects, I’ve been hanging around at the back of the room.

At least that also gives Cricket more breathing space.

Thank fuck for the invention of ventilators that suck scents out of some public places like this amphitheater.

I drag the long sleeve of my blue Dragon band top firmly over my Rej bracelet.

I’m pretty unmissable with my ruffled leather skirt, which is another of Piper’s punky designs.

I’m also a thirty year old unbonded Omega, which is a rare sight.

Plus, I have a gorgeous younger Omega at my side.

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