Page 63 of One for the Money
I feel like I’m on a daytime talk show. You get a scent match! You get a scent match!
Everyone gets a scent match!
Even though I never asked for it, and I can’t afford to pay the taxes on it.
Why is this happening to me? There was one point inmy life when I was thrilled to have a match. It was a dream come true. Everything I could’ve ever wanted.
But now I know that the girl who cried tears of joy when she scent matched to the hot resident in her program is dead.
She’s laid to rest in a pretty meadow covered in flowers, and a bitter, jaded woman rose in her place.
No Omega is ever safe in this world. When our biology overrides our logical minds at every turn, how can we be? Without suppressants, I would go into heat and be happy with a knot shoved into me by any Alpha, even though right now the idea of accepting a knot makes me want to scream.
Without suppressants, my body will betray me.
And I refuse to give it the chance to.
The nausea is back, and my head is starting to feel fuzzy, like I’ve been holding my breath for a while. I stumble out of bed and to the bathroom, puking up red bile again.
I can’t go on like this much longer. I’m going to need an IV for hydration at the bare minimum soon, but I’m so dehydrated that I worry someone would have trouble finding a suitable vein.
If I weren’t dealing with all this Omega bullshit I would’ve given myself one ages ago, but now I’m too fucking weak. I’d end up blowing my vein out or something.
In the background, I can hear my phone pinging with messages, and then ringing twenty minutes later as someone tries to reach me. But I can’t get to the phone. I used up all my energy texting Matteo, it would seem, because the idea of standing up produces the same feeling as thinking about climbing a mountain.
My phone keeps ringing, and I have no choice but toignore it. My body refuses to move from where it rests beside the yellowed toilet in my bathroom.
If it’s an emergency, they’ll call 911.
They’ll have to. I can’t treat someone else when I can barely hold my head up.
There is a niggling in the back of my mind that begs me to reconsider my diagnosis. I’m starting to think that this isn’t the flu, despite what the initial symptoms seemed to indicate, as it shouldn’t last this long and shouldn’t be this debilitating.
Maybe I’ll feel better after a short rest. Maybe after a rest, I should consider asking someone to take me to the hospital.
It’s not like Rich can search my records and find me. He doesn’t have access to that kind of thing.
Just as I convince myself that a hospital is the right choice, darkness clouds my vision, and I slump down, resting my face on the cool linoleum floor of my trailer’s bathroom.
The hospital can wait.
Chapter 23
“I’m telling you,this isn’t normal,” Dario is saying as he follows me around the ring. I’m in the process of making sure we’re set up for tonight’s performance, and he should be stretching or resting or something, but instead, he’s bothering me with worries about the Omega.
“And I’m telling you this isn’t any of our business,” I snap at him. It’s been three days of this. Ever since we found out that Alex is our scent match, he seems to think that I will care about it.
I don’t. I don’t care. Not a fucking bit.
I don’t care that she smelled like my favorite dessert.
I don’t care that when she was distressed, I wanted to pull her to my chest and purr until she was better.
I don’t care that when she looked at me with those sad, pleading eyes to let her slip out, I felt pride in being the one she could trust to let her escape.
I don’t care at all. Can’t care. Because the last person who wants an Omega is me.
And yet, my brother thinks this is the best thing that has ever happened to us.
