Page 60 of Omega Chattel
I headed up the stairs, my feet stepping quickly though I didn’t really feel them—or anything—and when I got to the long hallway, I stood very still. I was listening for sounds from the living room. Any voice or echo.
But I was also undecided. Which room should I go into? My computer and some of my clothes were in Tarin’s room. My other things were in the guest room. Kee’s room.
Any move I might make seemed the wrong one.
The house walls closed in. The shadows of the evening from the far window intruded in alien shapes. My vision blurred.
I finally decided the path of least resistance led to Kee’s room. I was officially staying there. The permission for that had not been withdrawn.
I opened the door and stepped inside. I’d left a bedside lamp on. It must have been burning since yesterday. The light looked rusty, dingy, aged.
My shoes met the rug and it was all wrong, an unwelcoming surface meant to trip me up. I actually stumbled a little, blinking back my tears.
Every piece of furniture in the room took on a hard-edged countenance. The bed with all its pillows and shiny blue spread looked all too cold now, not cozy and comforting.
I wasn’t sure what to do. I turned around and around in the room, trying to think. Should I pack my things just in case? Should I just sit and wait for Tarin to come to me?
I thought about going out back to the garden beds and the stone benches. But I’d have to cross the foyer at the bottom of the staircase and that looked straight into the living room. I would see them. They would see me. It would feel so intrusive.
After some time—I couldn’t tell if it was a few minutes or more since my inner clock seemed stopped—I went to the side of the bed and sat, my legs stiff and bent, my back straight.
I inhaled so hard my body jerked the bed itself. Had I stopped breathing?
The link between me and Tarin, so open at dinner, had become muted and strange. Like the beginnings of a storm, clouds on the horizon, light darkening, but you could not yet feel a thing. Every breath I took felt like a pained effort. My body became heavy. All my senses were muted.
I stared straight ahead. Slowly, my eyelids slid down until they were shut and a deep lightless void enveloped me. I was dizzy for a moment, so I lay back, my feet still dangling over the side of the bed.
I heard distant voices. A door banged. Voices outside.
I knew them. Low and intimate, voices intermingling. Kee. Tarin. I could see them walking away. Down the drive and into the dark. Dark heads bent each to the other. Conversation obsessing them, enfolding them until the night absorbed them and nothing was left, not a speck or reflection of hair, clothing, aura.
Gone. They were gone.
At least, this was what I convinced myself of.
I’d read a few required-reading chapters on bonds in my Omega etiquette class at Zilly’s. The youngest bonds, newly forming and not yet consummated were the easiest to break.
I remembered the information said there were several ways to accomplish a fairly pain-free break. The Alpha and Omega should distance themselves, the more mileage the better, and the bond would retreat over a period of a few weeks, or even days. Or they could choose to bond and consummate that bond with another partner immediately, and the original bond would disintegrate. Accidental, new bonds that formed without consent could easily be tempered to nothing if no emotional connection was maintained.
With Kee returning to Tarin’s life, what I’d experienced last night for my first time could be negated, the link between us easily severed if Tarin decided to choose another. It had been so open between us at dinner and on the way home. I’d never felt so close to another.
A soft whimper escaped my lips.
My feelings of low self-worth came bubbling up—the same ones accompanied by dire threats from Gray that made me run in the first place.
No!I wouldn’t let that happen. I had everything going for me now. Even if Tarin did not bond with me, I had opportunity. It would hurt, yes, to live here and see Tarin with another, but I would force myself to get over it.
Yet my instinct was to leave. The powerful edge of it tempted me.
I rolled onto my side, drawing my legs up, and pounded the bed with my fist. Tears leaked from the corners of my eyes.
There had been so many things I’d done this past week that had been new, forcing me to be brave. I’d run away. I’d offered myself to an Alpha for money. I’d said yes to higher education, all while practically throwing myself at Tarin.
I could be brave now. Again. I had to.
With a trembling mind I probed delicately at our bond.
A sudden stinging sensation caused me to recoil. What was happening? Was Tarin already closing himself off from me? So soon?
