Page 6 of The Omega's Bloodline: Part One

He shrugged. “I can smell how you’re reacting to me.”

My heart kicked up, a frantic buzzing in my ears. I steadied myself against the counter and swallowed hard. “Great. Love that for me.”

Caden laughed and Seth hopped up on the counter.

Don’t feel too bad,Seth thought at me.Caden’s an alpha. If you’ve got some omega in you somewhere down the line, you’ll react more to him than you would to a regular human.

“What are you?”

Beta.

“Does this mean you can smell me too?”

Seth looked at me with big saucer eyes.Yeah, but it hits different in human form. It doesn’t mean much to this body.

Well, that was a relief. At least my cats weren’t lusting after me.

My gaze slid back to Caden. “Sorry.”

I didn’t know why I felt compelled to apologize for being into him. By all accounts this should beweird, but my brain had already slotted his different forms into their own little categories—cute and for cuddles, might eat me, and oh gods I’m introuble.

“I don’t know what impressions you’re laboring under, but I have zero issues with a beautiful woman being interested in me in any capacity.” Caden leaned onto the counter, watching me with a too-hot gaze. “If you’re more comfortable with me being a house cat I can do that, and if you’d rather me stick around like this, then I’m at your service.”

I needed to sit down. I yanked out one of the chairs on the kitchen island and parked my ass. Seth immediately meowed, standing on his hind legs so I could lift him onto my lap.

Asking what kind ofserviceCaden might be up to providing sat on the tip of my tongue.

When I didn’t respond, he continued, “You saved both our lives taking us in. If there’s anything you need, within reason, I’ll do it. Plus, I promised you dinner.”

Seth rubbed his head under my chin. I closed my arms around him. “You guys are pretty cute kitties, and I’d already kinda fallen in love with your cat-selves, but I’d be cool with you hanging around as people. I’d feel bad shoehorning you into a single form.”

“Good.” Caden raked that sexy gaze over me again and I bit my lip. “I’m enjoying the experience of you in this form. Go do your kitten chores. I’ll start dinner.”

Oh no. I hadn’t thought far enough ahead with this. Cooking was one of my weaknesses with men. I was way too easy to woo with food and he was going to look so good while he made me dinner.

I swallowed hard and darted off to the nursery with Seth. He sat and watched as I prepped the formula, weighing and feeding the kittens.

He likes you.

I glanced over at Seth as I fed Turnip her bottle. “He’s been in people form for, like, five minutes.”

Yeah, but you’re easy to like. We haven’t had someone take care of us for a long time. We can feel the emotion stuff in all our forms, but now he can feel his attraction for you, too.

It made me wonder how Seth would feel when he was well enough to shift. I set Turnip on the scale and wrote down her post-feed weight before moving on to Potato.

“This is all kind of weird,” I said. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to feel.”

To be fair, you’re being a lot more chill than I was expecting.

I spilled over into giggles. “I’m not great at being afraid properly. I have some wires crossed in my brain.”

Seth got into a loaf to watch me more comfortably.

“How long until you’re well enough to shift, too?”

Dunno. It’s different each time I’ve gotten sick, though there’s way better medicine now, so maybe a few more days?

“How the heck did you two get so beaten up?” I did my charting on Potato and traded her out for Yam.

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