Page 54 of Pack Rivals: Part Two
I exhale. “No, it’s fine.” Maybe I do feel a little better with him here. Although, I’m sure that must just be my stupid omega hormones because I’m still mad as hell at this man. “However,” I add, “you’re not standing around and watching me work. You can help.”
“Pick up trash?”
“I thought you were a soldier. Are you telling me you’re scared of a bit of trash?”
He jerks out his hand, and I hook out one of the spare trash bags from the waistband of my shorts and hand it over.
“Got another one of those attractive pair of gloves, sweetheart?”
“No,” I snap.
From the corner of my eyes, I watch him roll up his sleeves and get to work.
“Why don’t you have anything to do?” he asks me after a while. “Don’t you have that job?”
“I quit it – for obvious reasons.” He nods. “And it seems no one else will hire an omega. I think they assume I’m a flight risk. That I won’t stick around for long enough.”
“So you’re not being paid to clean the beach?”
“No, I’m not.” I pause, resting my hand with the knife on my hip and letting my gaze float out to the ocean. “Although I’m beginning to think it would be my dream job.”
“Cleaning the beach?” he says, prodding out what looks like a box of rubbers with the toe of his shoe.
“No, not cleaning the beach. But doing something ecological. Something with the ocean.” I sigh. “Not likely to happen though. It’s not like I have a degree.”
Silver kicks at the box and it leaps into the air. He catches it in the bag with a satisfied grunt. “Why not?”
“Were you listening when I told you about how the job hunting is going?”
“I was a little distracted by the outfit.” I frown at him. “But have you tried?”
“Tried what?”
“Applying to organizations like that? The World Ocean Federation, for example?”
“No,” I mumble.
“Well …”
I consider jabbing the smart ass with my knife, but actually it’s not a bad idea. “Maybe I will.”
We work for the next hour, until both our bags are full. I tie mine up and hook out the other bag I brought with me.
“You’re not done?” he asks.
“Nope not yet.”
“You have another bag?”
“Nope,” I say, finding my water bottle where I left it on the beach and downing several long mouthfuls.
“I’ll go get another one from the house,” he says walking away. “Stay here. Don’t go wandering off.”
I roll my eyes. “The house is locked,” I call after him.
“No problem,” he calls back.
“And alarmed,” I shout.
