Page 61 of His Gentle Omega
“Oh.” Blowing out a breath, I unwrapped a cough drop and popped it in my mouth, feeling the tell-tale beginning of a tickle. My lungs were definitely over all the talking I had done today. “Sorry for being so defensive. It’s just…Edward…he used to track my phone. Where I went. Who I talked to. He used it as a way to control me. My head gets why you used it to find me, but in here,” I pointed to my chest, “it just brought up a ton of bad feelings.”
A myriad of emotions crossed Asher’s face at my confession. Shock, anger, regret. His shoulders slumped, and he looked contrite. “Thank you for telling me that. I can turn it off. But honestly, I’d feel better leaving it on until after all this with Edward settles down. I promise I won’t use it unless I need to.”
It wasn’t a terrible suggestion to leave the phone’s tracking on until this mess was behind me, as a safety precaution. Even if a part of me still balked at the idea, I needed to trust Asher. Nodding, I agreed. “Until it’s over. Then I’m getting my own plan. I’m thirty years old, I don’t need my big brother worrying if I’m breaking curfew.”
Asher smirked at my lame attempt to make a joke.
“How did it go with Alex?” Asher asked, his tone gentler than it had been, steering the conversation into somewhat neutral territory. We were getting good at changing the subject and not talking about the issues still between us.
Swinging my foot, I scuffed the grass with the toe of my shoe. “He’s filing the paperwork needed for Alpha Law. He sent me toa psychiatrist. Said the judge will order it and it will look better when we go to court.”
Asher nodded, “Which doctor?”
“Tessa Carpenter,” I told him, not meeting his eyes. “She’s nice. We talked a long time.”
Hours, in fact. And in the end, I had to admit, it had done me a world of good. For the first time in a long time, I felt like there was a small ray of light at the end of my very dark tunnel. But she’d given me a ton to think about, too, and left me looking for answers to some extremely hard questions.
“She’s good. I like Tessa.” Asher didn’t make a move to sit on the bench or move closer. There were only a few inches between us, but it felt like miles.
“She wants…she thinks it would be good…at some point…” Fuck, why was it so hard to ask my brother for this one thing? “She thinks you should come to one of my therapy sessions. If you are open to it. You don’t have to,” I hurriedly tacked on. “Where we can talk about…stuff and have a neutral moderator.”
Which we apparently absolutely needed. Asher had jumped straight back into his overbearing, bossy, my-way-is-the-best-way role, and I had reverted back to sullen teenager.
Asher stared hard at me for a minute, and I tried not to squirm under his look, before he softly told me, “If you want me to come, Shay, I’ll come. I will always come for you.”
“I got a job today.” Blurting it out, I changed the subject before the prickly heat in my eyes could turn into something more. Peeking at Asher from beneath my lashes, I watched his face.
“Yeah?” He smiled, beaming, and his approval made something warm flare in my chest. “That’s wonderful. Where at?”
“Lo’s garage.”
Tessa had sent me to Lo’s–a.k.a. Lola Fairchild–with instructions to let Lo know I was one of Tessa’s. Whatever that meant. Lo–don’t fucking call me Lola if you want me to answer–was what my dad would have described as a salt-of-the-earth omega. She was one tough broad, no-nonsense, and got straight to the point.
She’d stared hard at the fading bruises on my face and neck, her eyes shrewd. “Walk into a door, did ya?”
At my mutteredSomething like that, she had snorted, relaying, “Yep, I’ve walked into a few myself. Before I wised up. You wised up, boy?”
Once I had assured her that I had indeed wised up, we spent the next hour talking cars while she showed me around her garage. The smell of oil and grime was familiar and made my hands ache to get to work. At the end of our talk, after proving I knew my way around an engine, she had offered me a job. She was even more than willing to work around my therapy, and upcoming court appointments.
Handing me the name of a local daycare in town with a muttered, “Hard as hell being a single parent. You just let me know about your appointments. Do what you need to do to take care of business and don’t you worry about it. I ain’t gonna fire ya. Unless ya fuck up an engine or start doing shady shit. You ain’t gonna do no shady shit, are ya?”
When I had assured her I wasn’t planning to do any shady shit, she had told me to come back a week from Monday and be ready to get my hands greasy. It had felt amazing being back in a shop, the sights and smells so familiar, even after all this time. Lo’s had reminded me so much of my dad’s garage, that I had been hit with a sharp pang of longing and regret as soon as I had walked through the door.
“I’m excited,” I admitted to Asher, a little shyly. Then reminded myself there was nothing wrong with me being excited and showing it.
Asher nodded, “You were always amazing with engines. A natural. I’m glad you found something so fast.”
Well, I probably wouldn’t have found Lo’s without Tessa’s help, and today felt like information overload, and being passed from one person to the next. It was overwhelming and a bit mind-blowing, but I had accomplished a ton of things.
“Tessa gave me homework.” Which I figured would be good practice for when I had actual homework, since I planned on studying for, and taking, the G.E.D. test to get my high school diploma.
“Yeah,” Asher raised a brow, “what kind of homework?”
Instead of answering and telling my brother that I was supposed to name five things I liked about myself and five things I didn’t, I asked a question that had haunted me for years. “Tell me about dad’s accident.”
Might as well just kick the hornet’s nest.
Asher’s lips pursed together, and he gave a small shrug, though the tenseness in his shoulders said the gesture was anything but relaxed. “Does it matter?”
