Page 42 of Two For the Show
This is the life. I can think of very few positions that would be better than this.
“Alex, Matteo missed you terribly. So did I. But he’s bonded to you, and that was weakened when you left. Itgot worse and even grew painful when he felt your suffering through it, but none of your affection or joy.”
“Q,” Teo hisses, smacking me lightly on the stomach. “Stop. Do not guilt-trip her.”
“I’m not! I want her to understand why moments like this aren’t only important for me.” I look down at the Omega and stroke her dark hair. “I need you, Alex. I do. It’s no surprise that you leaving had my Rot flaring back up almost immediately. The clothes you left behind and even the way your pheromones changed Matteo’s scent helped, but it’s not the same as getting it directly from the source, you know?”
She breaks her eyes away from mine, staring somewhere in the direction of my navel. “I know. I fucked up by running. I can’t apologize enough for leaving. Neither of you deserved that.”
“We’re not mad at you,” I insist, snagging her chin and wrenching her head up so she can see the truth in my eyes. “We wish you had come to us, to let us help you, but not a single one of us is mad that you didn’t. I mean, we were at first, but that was more about the fact that we hadn’t made you feel safe enough to stay.”
Matteo strokes his fingers up my side, and I shiver at the feeling. It’s intimate and teasing, but not too obvious that Alex will notice what he’s up to.
“So where do we go from here?” she says quietly. “It feels like everything is happening simultaneously too fast and not fast enough. We lost three months, but it doesn’t feel like we’re starting where we left off. It feels like we hit the fast-forward button.”
I’ve thought about that, myself. In a way, it feels like our relationship continued to grow and develop while we were apart, which wouldn’t make sense under normal circumstances.
But maybe it does, when it comes to trauma responses. Leaving us so soon after finding us had to have caused some residual trauma. It would make sense that her Omega nature would latch onto us now that it has us again, forcing the issue.
The pain of everything that happened tonight is starting to catch up to me. “Teo, can I have a gummy?” I ask my partner. He doesn’t question me, sliding out of the bed and pulling out the small packet I keep in the pocket of my discarded pants. As I chew it, I brush Alex’s hair back from her face. “You got to know us before you left, but it was in a compartmentalized way. It wasn’t us, as your scent matches. We were your coworkers, maybe your friends. We had some fun moments, worked together, and got to know each other better. Then I got sick. And you got sick. And suddenly, everything changed.”
“And I freaked out, and bonded Matteo, and then you Alphas freaked out,” she says, snuggling deeper into my embrace. “And then before we had a chance to talk about any of it, I ran.”
“You ran.” My words aren’t accusatory. I’m acknowledging what happened. Matteo is quiet beside me, eyes closed as he rests his head on my chest. He’s still tired from the bouts of sickness that Alex shared with him. “But in the background, you started to process the way you knew us under the new light of us being your scent matches. Everything became reframed. Tell me, Doc, in all of your time in medical school and as a physician, what’s the longest you’ve seen someone hold off on bonding with their scent match?”
“Outside of me and Rich?” she asks pensively. “Because my Omega never made me feel like I needed to bond with him.”
“Outside of you and Rich.”
“The average time is three months.”
I hum softly to myself. “Isn’t that curious?”
“Curious indeed,” Matteo says without opening his eyes. “I wonder why that feels significant?”
“I get it, I get it,” she says with a chuckle. “I understand what you’re saying. But it’s so unusual for me.”
“What makes Foresaken Omega Syndrome better?” I ask, switching tactics.
She rolls her eyes. “Bonding with a scent matched Alpha.”
I think she knows where I’m going with this, but I push on. “And what helps make Alpha Rot get better?”
Alex taps me on the chest with the back of her hand playfully. “Bonding with a scent matched Omega.”
“Wow, that’s interesting,” Matteo says, and I can hear the smile in his voice. “I wonder if the fact that you both need each other could be spurring you on faster than you expected? Maybe that Omega instinct that took over and had you bond me is forcing you to Quinton?”
Alex tries to roll out of my arm, but I gently hold her tight. She wiggles into me, one of her legs twisting with mine below the knee. “I get it, guys. I do. But I’ll tell you what I told Jude. I don’t want to be forced to bond or be intimate because it’s medically necessary. I want it to be what we all want, what is best for us as a pack.”
I smile broadly. “Then, Matteo, grab your phone. Let’s get everyone over here before my gummy kicks in. It’s time we have our first pack meeting.”
Chapter 18
I throwa blanket over the three of us when I hear my trailer door open. It’s one thing for them all to know we’re naked and cuddling, it’s another to see it. Sure, we’ve all seen each other bare before, but this is different.
I think.
Jude enters my bedroom, holding a few bottles of water and protein bars, followed closely by Dexter and Dario. Both of them are still in their tiny hot pants, and I can see the pale yellow of the glow-in-the-dark paint swirling on their bodies. Sweat slicks their hair, and their cheeks are pink from the exertion.
