Page 143 of Omega's Flight
"Why would you say that? He's your Da, and he'll bring you back here after you've visited your Jackson-Jellystone family," Cas murmured to her. He shook his head at Raleigh when the omega tried to come over and did his best to convey his own complete confusion. Degan threw his hands in the air and gave a snort of disgust, but Duke's sharp glance shut him up before he could say whatever had been on the tip of his tongue.
Pip curled herself further into Cas's grasp. "He hits Papa. I hate him."
Cas felt the blood drain out of his cheeks and when his eyes met Raleigh's, he saw the knowledge there of just what it was that was upsetting Pip so. "Honey, you know we’re dealing with that, right? You don’t need to worry about Papa, or yourself.” She damn well better not have to worry about herself, or no one would be able to hold him back.
“I wanna stay. Please, Cas, can I stay here?" She lifted her face to his, her lips trembling with unspoken sobs and Cas had no answer for her. What was there to say? She was five, she didn't understand all the tensions and the politics that played into this visit.
But in the end, they'd convinced her to go despite Cas’s misgivings, and now he and Raleigh had the house to themselves and didn't know what to do with it. They'd killed a couple of days finally moving the last of Cas's things into the house so his now almost entirely unused apartment could be given to someone else, but that hadn't taken long. So Cas had started bringing work home, getting ahead of things for the pack so he could spend his Internet time researching for Garrick and Laine. Raleigh and Ori began planning the next book, even though the first one hadn't found a publisher yet. It gave them something to do, while the silence from Jackson-Jellystone grew ever larger.
"I should have given Ann my cell phone," Raleigh said one day, about three weeks after Degan had left with the pups. They were sprawled in the living room, Cas on the couch and Raleigh cross-legged on the floor with his art spread all around him. "Degan didn't answer my text again."
"Do you want me to talk to Quin?" Cas set his laptop aside and left the couch to stretch out on the floor next to Raleigh's knee. "He can check with Roland."
Raleigh bit his lip. "I wasn't expecting them back by now. I mean, we'd talked about him staying for Blood Moon." He propped an elbow on one knee and rested his cheek against his fist. "I'm being paranoid. What would Jackson-Jellystone offer him that would keep him there?"
"Right. I think they're just busy." He hoped that's all it was, but the hair on his spine had been tingling for more than a week because this wasn't an uncommon tactic in the human world. The lack of communication just made it worse. "What do you want to do?" he asked, reaching out to trace small circles on the cotton jeans stretched tight over Raleigh's knee.
"I should wait. Give him another week. He never was good at keeping in touch. That was always my job." Raleigh gathered up his drawings and set them aside, then laid down facing Cas. "I can't focus."
"You want to go for a walk? We could watch a movie, or go sacrifice ourselves on the altar of filial piety and see which of my brothers might want a night out without the pups."
Raleigh pulled a face, then laughed. "I don't think I'm in the mood to entertain someone else's pups today." He laid his head down on his bent arm and stared off into space. "I miss them."
"Okay, let's do something for you then." But what? Cas wracked his brain for something that might boost Raleigh's mood. "Why don't we go look at the new construction? There's some that will be finishing soon. Quin did promise you something over there."
"Yeah, he did." Raleigh rolled over onto his back and stared at the ceiling. "I don't know how I feel about that. I like having that space between me and Degan. And this," he waved in the general direction of the house itself, "has been my home since I got here. My home, not my mate's that he graciously allows me to live in, in exchange for orgasms and home-cooked meals."
"You don't feel that way about me, do you?" Cas asked carefully. They'd been down this road so many times, but Raleigh still teetered back and forth between what Cas had termed his normal personality and that despairing darkness that seemed to rise up at uncertain moments to swallow omegas whole.
Raleigh waved that idea away. "No, you never make me feel like that."
"We can fix this place up, then. Add a second story?"
Raleigh turned his head to send Cas a startled look. "Could we do that?"
Cas shrugged. "I don't know. I can ask—Mac's packfather would know who'd be the best one to see about doing it right, as long as Quin approves it."
"Let me think about it." Raleigh turned back to the ceiling, his hands clasped on his belly. "Maybe we should go see the new ones. But I don't want to leave Ori here all by himself."
"It's not all duplexes. There's a couple of apartment buildings, and something like the townhouses that Mac used to live in."
"Townhouse?"
"Like a row of houses all squashed together. They share the side walls, but they each have their own front and back and their own yards." Cas sat up and held out his hand. "Come on, we'll go have a look at the ones where Mac used to live." He got up and continued to hold his hand out. Damn, but Raleigh needed a distraction, and something to look forward to beyond the date the pups were supposed to be back.
Slowly, Raleigh reached out and took his hand. "All right. Let's go."
HE'D BEEN RIGHT THINKING THAT HOUSE EXPLORING WOULD PERK RALEIGH UP. THEY' D WALKED UP THE lane and made their way across the center of town, talking about the things that Raleigh did and didn't want in a home.
"I don't know why you don't want a dishwasher," Cas complained as they rounded the turn that led into the long rows of townhouses. "Think how much time you'd save."
"And have everyone around looking at me like I'm a lazy omega? Besides, how good a job can they do, really?"
"Laine has one," Cas countered. "Garrick says it does a pretty good job."
Raleigh rounded on him in amused triumph. "Aha! Pretty good doesn't cut it, and you know that."
"But what if I'm jealous of the time you spend with the dishes? All that scrubbing and stroking and wiping and handling. What about my share?" He danced out of the way as Raleigh swatted at him and laughed when the omega began to chase him around the trees clustered at the end of the first set of houses. "Here, you're supposed to be a well-behaved omega!"
