Page 28 of Our Haunted Omegas
“I’ll survive,” I shrugged.
“You’ll keep the pups safe if you have them,” Indigo said. “Believe that.”
“Easy for you to say,” I said through gritted teeth.
“Knowing what our carrier and uncles went through and the fact us and all of our cousins turned out alright too does make it a bit easier,” he nodded.
I glanced at Cobalt, and he nodded, “not to mention our sire was convinced we were all going to drop dead of some random freak accident for the first few years of our lives. So, this isn’t new to us. The war was real. Bad things happened to you. Things like that have a way of carving themselves into your soul. You just have to remember those grooves don’t have to stay empty forever. You’re allowed to let other things fill them in.”
“Or not,” Indigo added. “You’re allowed to keep them too. You’ve earned your scars.”
The brothers exchanged a weird look in the rearview mirror, and I leaned my head on Cobalt’s shoulder. Life was fucking weird. My mate squeezed my hand and rested his cheek against my head.
A few minutes later, Indigo pulled the truck into a roadside gas station and went inside without saying anything to the rest of us. Ambry glanced over his shoulder at me and I wanted to shrink down to the size of an atom. He wasn’t angry. He felt bad for me.
“Don’t do that, Am,” I sighed at him. “You have your days too.”
“I do,” he admitted.
“But what?” I huffed.
“I think you’ll be a good dad. I think you’ll be a good dad now or if you wait. Our kids will have to be friends because they’ll still be around each other now or later. For once, just think about what’s best for yourself and not everyone else.”
“You don’t want me to do that,” I said.
“Why not?” he unfastened his seatbelt and twisted around in the seat to face me properly.
“Because I’d just take a bite out of Cobalt’s shoulder and get on with stopping this spiral of whatever it is. Everyone goes on and fucking on about how great this experience is. Well, he’s great but this,” I pointed to my own stomach as if the anxietypulsating there was visible to everyone in the truck, “isn’t. This magic is trying to kill me. Like how the fuck is the universe trusting me with something like this---”
My words died in my throat because Cobalt’s mouth closed around my shoulder and a second later the clear magical fluid seeped up around his elongated canine. I squeaked and sank further back into the seat. Ambry’s confused scent filled my head for a second before it was all Cobalt. For a moment I was certain he’d rip my clothes off and take me right then and there in the parking lot with Ambry and every other passerby getting a big eyeful. Instead he stroked my hair and lapped up the magical fluid as if it and I were dainty and delicate. I squeezed his thigh, everything inside me hardening and melting at the same time. I knew what he was seeing. He was seeing IT. It was always IT.
I’d fallen asleep reading at the park and woke in a fiery world of confusion with the sirens wailing in every direction. Then he was there suddenly – my stepdad. He was always there as much as anyone else’s dad had ever been. He scooped me up over his shoulder and dashed for the shelter. Then when a whistle sounded, he tossed me down. I fell and fell until I eventually hit the floor of the shelter and someone above me had slammed the door shut and dragged me further inside. My giant dragon of a stepdad literally tossed me out of the way of whatever explosive the hate group set off. My parents took the brunt of it, and I lived to see more days than I thought was ever possible without them.
When the clear magical fluid ran dry, Cobalt leaned back against the seat as if nothing had happened. I stared at him, drilling into him with my eyes, but his expression didn’t change. My wolf cocked his head from one side to the other and shifted my eyes to his.
“You have to say something,” I finally said as Indigo swung open the truck door and slid back inside. He glanced back at us but acted as if nothing happened too. He passed out snacks anddrinks and told us how the gas station employee wore an old vintage Grim Howlers tee.
“Did that just happen?” I asked, glancing around the truck from man to man.
“Yeah,” Cobalt nodded. “I sort of lost it there for a minute.”
“Um…. You did what I wanted to do,” I said.
“Yeah,” he nodded again. “Is that okay?”
“I think so. It was strange. Everyone says it’ll hurt without sex.”
“I was gentle. Not everything has to hurt.”
“You have questions,” I said.
“Not really,” he shook his head. “I’m not here to pry into your past. Ideally, I would’ve waited until we were alone and it would’ve been more romantic or something but it sort of consumed you. So, I bit you. I keep waiting for you to be mad at me. I didn’t even ask.”
“I’m not mad,” I said after thinking about it for a minute in case it was the sneaky sort of anger that you don’t know about unless you search it out. “I’m--- Relieved.”
“I know,” he nodded, “because now you know I’m in it for the long haul.”
“It’s not a you thing,” I said and regretted it instantly. Wasn’t that how people broke up with each other all the time? “Really. It’s not. I’m too much for most people.”
