Page 13 of Omega's Flight
"He was asleep. Once he wakes up, it all stops, but then he doesn't sleep again. He can't keep getting by on three or four hours a night." Holland turned back to the counter, gave Bax a reassuring smile when the other omega put a questioning hand on his arm, and began slicing the roast. "Don't worry, he knows it's a problem. He's talking to the therapist twice a week now and I'm fighting with the VA to refer us to someone who knows something about shifters so we can find him medication that will work better than the crap they've tried to get him to take. Plus whatever help we as omegas can manage." He reached into the cupboard above him and got down another plate, laying out the slices of roast in a flower-petal pattern around the edge.
Abel squeezed Cas's shoulder. "He didn't want to worry you," he said. "Come on, let's raid the soda I bought for the pups."
"What if I want to be worried?" Cas snapped. "I'm not a pup."
"You've been busy, and it was as important to him as it was to you that you did well in school." Abel half-dragged Cas out of the kitchen, grinning like a fiend the whole time. "Come on, if you're a good boy, you can have a whole can of soda to yourself."
"You're going to end up with a whole can dumped on your head. Holland, are you going to let him get away with this?"
Holland laughed. "You are both a terrible influence. How am I going to get them to drink anything but sweet things now?" He turned to ask Bax a low-voiced question, then glanced at the two alphas over his shoulder. "Go on then. Might as well bring some for us, too. If we wait until the pups are here, we won't get any." He and Bax laughed and turned back to the food.
Abel wrapped his arm around Cas's neck and hauled him laughing away. "Let's go rescue our brother from Mt. Red Tape and sick the pups on him. Then we can all have soda."
"I like that idea," Cas said, and they made their way to the office door.
Quin was bent over the desk, his hand moving monotonously back and forth over what looked like the monthly population report. His huge frame dwarfed the standard chair that the office was furnished with and Cas wondered briefly why it hadn't already collapsed underneath him.
They'd timed their arrival well. The red emergency inbox was empty, the black regular one nearly so, and the outbox was full. Abel and Cas looked at each other. Cas quirked an eyebrow in invitation to his older brother and then they descended on Quin, making as much noise as they could in unspoken agreement not to startle him into some military style response. Quin jumped, then leaned back in his chair with a grin and a creak of protesting metal. "Did Holland send you in here?"
"Like we can't come aggravate our older brother on our own," Cas retorted. He and Abel each took an arm and, once they'd convinced him that the paperwork wasn't going to go anywhere before tomorrow morning, hustled Quin out the door to the outer office, Abel leading the way. Cas assumed he knew where the rest of the pups were, since the only one he'd seen in the apartment was Agatha.
Turned out, they weren't far. As soon as they got around the corner they could hear the noise of five over-excited pups and one exasperated omega who, regardless, couldn't seem to help laughing at them. Standing outside the door, it sounded like a riot. One that probably needed tear gas.
Quin shook the two of them off and knocked politely.
The shrieks and giggling grew louder then, all at once, disappeared. Well, mostly—they heard a few stray giggles that appeared to have snuck away from their owners.
The door flew open and Cale, flushed bright pink and with his hair in a frizzy mess, stood in front of them. "Thank Lysoonka you're here! Save me!"
"My pups giving you a hard time?" Abel asked and leaned in the door. Cas caught a flash of movement from behind a couple of pieces of furniture and then nothing—at least until Abel howled and strolled into the room like a monster on the hunt for its supper.
A flurry of pups burst into view, running in all directions like Abel'd discovered a mouse nest, every single one of them shrieking with laughter. Abel roared and declared his intention to eat them, and then Quin, who had been quiet up until this point, laughed like a movie villain and began to chase the pups around the room.
"No, Quin, you'll just get them worked...up," Cale said, his voice trailing off as it became more and more evident that the pups were already worked up. He shook his head and came to lean against the wall next to Cas, combing his hair back into place with his fingers. "I say we just close the door and leave them all in here."
"Isn't this your apartment?" Cas asked him, amused.
"Worth it," Cale said firmly. Then, in a louder voice, "Guys, I think the alphas came to call us in for dinner. Anyone hungry or do I get to eat all your food too?"
"Woo, food!" Fan and Dorian raced for the door, Teca and Beatrice not far behind. Noah was four-footed and furry, tugging ferociously on a length of rope that hung from Abel's hand.
Quin followed the pups as far as the door and stopped. Cas looked him up and down and breathed a sigh of relief that the tensely aggressive set of his shoulders had eased, even in just these few minutes. Quin's eyes met his and in that moment, Cas realized that Quin knew how tightly he was wound. There was guilt in there too, as well as the fire that burned inside all alphas.
Impulsively, Cas put a hand on Quin's shoulder. "You okay, bro?"
A wry smile twisted Quin's mouth. "Not entirely, but getting there." He looked down then back into the apartment. "We better go, or Holland will have my hide on the wall." He slapped his hand against the wall, a sharp crack that made both Abel and Noah look up. "Coming?"
"Food, brat," Abel said, and scooped up his second-youngest. "Hope the babies don't wake up in the middle, I'm starved."
C H A P T E R 1 1
C as sopped up the last of the gravy with one of Holland's biscuits and sighed happily as he shoved it in his mouth. "This almost makes me rethink my stance on mating," he mumbled through a full mouth.
"Don't say that around Mom." Abel set his fork down and reached for his glass of water. "You know you're almost her last hope of bringing home a suitable mate." He grinned at Bax.
Bax frowned at him, then dropped the last biscuit on Cas's plate. "Eat that. You're a rack of bones."
Cas laughed and picked up the biscuit to examine it. "Say what you want. If it gets me biscuits, it's entirely acceptable to me." He broke the end off and peered about for the dish of butter he'd seen floating around earlier, his mouth already watering despite not being entirely sure this last biscuit wouldn't be the cause of a sudden Cas explosion from over-feeding.
