Page 10 of His Unicorn Alpha
“Yeah. They’re easy to please.”
“Most kids are.”
Beck eyed me curiously as we left the bathroom with my bags and the kids still in tow. “How do you know so much about kids anyway? I didn’t think you were a kid person. I wasn’t. Not before these guys came along, anyway.”
“I’ve actually always wanted kids,” I admitted easily. It was always easy talking to Beck or Sandy. They were my pack away from home, even if we no longer lived together. “I came from a large, supportive pack. Nothing like Ollie’s. We were one big happy hippy commune, mostly. So I was always surrounded by the pack kids, I guess.”
“So, why’d you leave?”
We exited the main building, and Beck led the way towards the parking lot while I considered my answer. While it was easy talking to him about some things, others remained too personal. “I love my family, but I didn’t really fit in. The small-town commune life wasn’t for me. I wanted to travel. I wanted to live somewhere big and eclectic.” I’d wanted to find people who could work around my less-than-impressive physical traits. Somewhere where I wouldn’t be seen as a disappointment as abeta. “I stumbled into makeup artistry and the rest his history, I guess.”
“And now? When you called, it sounded like you wanted to escape for a while. Not that Sandy and I aren’t thrilled to have you back with us, but…why not go back to your pack?”
My instincts revolted against the very idea, but I didn’t know how to explain it. I didn’t fully understand it myself. Why would I feel more drawn to staying with my friends instead of my family? It was a small-town existence either way. The only difference was my shifter side was telling me I’d be more at ease in Beck’s pack than in the one I’d grown up in.
“Honestly?” I found myself answering. “This is where my gut is telling me I need to be. I’ve wanted to be back here since your wedding.”
Beck raised his eyebrows. “Really?”
“Really. I can’t explain it, but…I guess you’ve got a good thing going here. Shifters of all shapes and sizes. Potential alphas.Dragons.” I paused. “Maybe that’s it. You and Sandy were my family away from family—shut up, that’s as sappy as I’m getting,” I rolled my eyes at the expression on his face; something between amusement and fondness. “But on top of that, your small-town pack is actually pretty exciting behind the scenes. However, I’d like to avoid any culty ambushes while I’m here. Think you can keep those at bay?”
The Moonmusic people had made two separate attacks on Beck’s pack since he and Ollie had moved there, but ever since Beck and the rest of his town council had reached out to neighboring towns, they’d made allies of the mixed lot of humans and shifters who lived nearby. In doing so, they’d taken a gamble by making their status as a shifter pack known, but the Moonmusic cult had seemingly backed off.
It didn’t hurt that Joe Morstein —their weasel shifter leader— was losing followers at what felt like a breakneck pace. Morepeople were starting to realize that they didn’thaveto pay his cult tithes, that his ‘religion’ did nothing for them, and that perhaps the ‘neo-shifters’, as Beck’s lot were being referred to, might have the right idea when it came to treating omegas as equals rather than minions.
After all, it was only ‘neo-shifters’ who had the fortune of discovering alphas again. Perhaps that said something about magic and fate favoring those who treated each other properly?
Of course, if that were true, why hadn’t any alphas appeared in packs like the one I had grown up in? They weren’t cult-ridden lunatics. They were hippies, yes, but they were all about equality and love.
Well.
Except for betas like me. But I hadn’t exactly helped myself to fit in with them, either. I’d resented my pack and I couldn’t wait to graduate high school and leave for greener pastures.
“We’ve got proper security measures in place now,” Beck was saying in response to my teasing, and it took me a moment to remember why we’d been discussing it at all. “You’ll be safe in Shifters’ Sanctuary, Micah.”
I nudged his shoulder with my own and grinned. “I know. I hear the pack has a pretty awesome alpha.”
And dragons.
I had no idea why I was so fixated on that part of the town, either. I mean, sure, what kid didn’t grow up loving the idea of the mythical creatures? They could fly and breathe fire, after all. And learning they weren’t as mythical as I’d thought was a trip, though I still hadn’t actually seen one with my own eyes.
I supposed that was why I was still so drawn to the idea of them. When I visited the town for Beck’s wedding, I was hoping to meet the four dragons that lived there, but two of them (Sage and Dexter) were travelling, researching magic of all things, and I keptjustmissing the older one, Brandt, any time someonecame close to introducing me. I did get to meet Eric, the dragon who had also been Ollie’s boss in Manhattan, but he was unable to join the pack during the celebratory run as he had been designated as the on-call emergency doctor for the night.
But I was planning on staying for a couple of months at least this time. Surely I’d get to see a dragon during this visit.
My inner horse whinnied at the idea, practically prancing around in my soul.
I didn’t understand his excitement, but I couldn’t help but share in it.
“Oh, sorry, I need to make a quick stop before we get home,” Beck told me as we pulled off Main Street in the quaint little shifter town. We headed down the country road which I remembered led to the farm he and Ollie lived on, but he took an earlier driveway than the one I knew belonged to his house. “I need to grab Ollie’s meds from the clinic. Brandt said they’d be good to go today.”
“Meds?” I cocked my head to the side. “Is he sick? I wouldn’t have come if—”
“No,” Beck looked into the rearview mirror, and I looked over my shoulder, smiling at the two sleeping toddlers in their car seats. “We’re, uh, trialing Eric and Brandt’s omega birth control.”
I blinked. “Trialing?”
The truck rumbled over bumpy gravel, and some part of my soul sang as I looked out over stretches of green grass and copses of fruit trees. It would be magical to shift into my horse form and run through acres of fields. I didn’t get many opportunities like that in New York or LA.
