Page 39 of Abel's Omega
Pups.
They were good all the way over to the daycare and, despite some fussing by Noah when I handed him over to the woman in the baby room, everything went smoothly. Well, except for the curious looks I got, but I wasn’t too put off by them. Jason had warned me that the gossip mill was grinding and I could expect some whispering.
The start of my first day went well too, despite some awkward stuttering, and one uncomfortable incident where I bumped into Abel and became shockingly aware of his body as he set me back on my feet again. I shrugged it off to having spent six months too exhausted even to take care of my own needs, and tried to put it out of my mind. Except that the warmth lingered where his hands had touched me, and I ruefully admitted that I was a silly omega, falling in love with his boss on two days acquaintance.
Too damn bad this isn’t a novel. I’d know it’d end all right.No guarantees in life, though. And the sudden shock of memory last night worried me. What good was an omega you couldn’t fuck? Our sex drives were half the reason we ended up mated at all.
I promised myself to work on that. If there was something between us, I didn’t want to ruin it by being a failure.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Halfway through the morning, the sudden heaviness of my chest reminded me that Noah needed to be fed. I glanced over at Louise, whose desk I was sharing, my borrowed laptop propped up on the corner by the window. “Um, Louise, is it okay if I run down to the daycare for a few minutes?”
“What’s wrong, dear?” she asked, looking up from the stack of invoices she was trying to balance.
Heat crept into my cheeks and I ducked my head. “Noah will be hungry.” Maybe he’d be better here in the office. Maybe this was all a big mistake. No one in Jackson-Jellystone worked until their pups were completely weaned.
“Oh, that’s no problem, dear. You run along. Take that file, the blue one, with you and read through it while you get him sorted out.”
I paused, taken aback. “It’s okay then?”
“Well, you can’t let him starve.” She set the invoices down and gave me a look of kindly concern. “I gather things were done differently in Jackson-Jellystone?”
I nodded. “Females usually went back to work once the pups were weaned. I never had a job, so…” My voice trailed off; my differences from the rest of the pack were making themselves felt now with a vengeance.
“Ah.” She snorted, a delicate, lady-like snort that made me want to laugh. “Trust an alpha. We go back to work earlier here—there’s too much to be done to afford someone taking an entire year off, though I understand Abel has plans to change that at some point. But we make allowances for parents who need to feed babies. As long as the work gets done, it doesn’t matter. You go, and hug that baby for me.”
“Thank you,” I said in relief, and gathered up the folder she’d pointed out. “I won’t be long.”
She waved me off, and turned back to her invoices.
It didn’t take much time to walk across to the daycare. On the way, I passed pack members hurrying about on business, or lounging in Central Park. Pups of all ages roamed the spaces around the daycare, their happy shouts brightening the day for me. This was a good place. I needed to do everything in my power to make a home for us here, for their sakes.
Noah recognized me as soon as I walked through the door, yelling, “Dabi!” from his spot on a brightly colored mat and holding up his little arms to me.
“How’s my baby boy?” I asked, and picked him up to snuggle him close.
“Hi, you must be Noah’s… uh, parent?”
I looked up to find a young ash blond woman staring diffidently at me. “I’m his bearer, yes.” I bounced him a little and cooed at his laughter.
“He’s a great little boy.” She was still staring at me, and I suddenly realized that she had probably never seen an omega up close, except maybe for Bram. And he would hardly seem like an omega without a baby in tow.
I shifted uncomfortably under her stare. There didn’t seem to be a quiet place to nurse here, and unless Louise was completely wrong, there also didn’t seem to be any other parents feeding their babies. “Is there someplace I can feed him?” Noah was starting to root and grab in hunger. I hoped they had a separate room somewhere; it was normal to stop and nurse when you needed to in Jackson-Jellystone and Buffalo Gap, but I didn’t know the rules here and I was starting to feel just a little bit like a freak.
“Oh, yes, I’m so sorry! They didn’t show you when you enrolled them?” Her whole demeanor brightened, and my weirdness was forgotten in her enthusiasm. “It’s in the new section, the one Abel commissioned last year. Follow me!” She grabbed Noah’s diaper bag and swung out the door, leaving me to hurry behind her.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t get your name.”
“Elise,” she said over her shoulder as she led me around a corner and down another hallway.
“I’m Bax.”
She spun in a circle, grinning. “I like it. It’s punchy.”
Punchy?Don’t ask.
Elise turned into a small, dimly lit room, mostly filled with young shifter women and the quiet sounds of suckling pups. “You can sit wherever you want. Hi, Patrice.” She waved at a red-headed woman at the end of the room. “This is Bax. He’s new.”
