Page 52 of Feeling the Heat: Part Two
“I don’t remember you being this shy, Cami,” I tease, and the sigh she releases makes me worry I’m fucking things up. “Shit, sorry, I’m moving too fast, aren’t I?” I reach across the table to hold her hand with an apologetic smile.
She squeezes my hand back and shakes her head. “No, no, that’s not it. It’s just…I feel like I’m always moments away from someone recognizing me and laughing or taking a photo or…”
My smile falls, brows knitting together.
“I know I’m being ridiculous,” she says, releasing a heavy sigh. “Most people don’t know who I am, but with all the stuff on social media, it feels like they do. And there’ve been enough people staring and ‘old omega’ catcalls that it’s hard not to be on edge.”
“That’s not ridiculous at all.” Guilt rises in me for missing the signs of her discomfort, and not checking in more about if she was feeling unsafe. I’ve been trying so hard to keep our conversations light and fun, worried that more serious topics would scare her away. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize it was that bad. I would’ve taken you somewhere else if I’d known.”
“It’s okay. I need to get over it because unless I want to dye my hair or start wearing sunglasses and a wig all the time, it’s going to keep happening. I can’t keep hiding. I have to live my life.”
I nod. “You’d look hot with any hair color, but is it wrong that I’m glad you didn’t go that route?”
She snorts, shaking her head at me. “Don’t worry, I’m keeping it natural.”
Giving her hand a squeeze, I let my goofy smile fade a bit. “If anyone messes with you, or makes you feel unsafe, call us. It doesn’t matter when or where. We’ll be there.”
What I really want to offer is to be her full-time bodyguard to scare off anyone who bothers her, but I resist the urge. Maybe I could get my own disguise and follow her around without her knowing.
No, dude, back off, that’s weird.
“Thank you, but I’m sure I’ll be okay,” she says, shrugging my offer off.
I narrow my eyes at her. “I know you’ll be okay. You’re strong and capable on your own. But just because you can do it alone, doesn’t mean you have to. That’s kind of the whole point of a pack.”
“I know…”
I let go of her hand and cross my arms over my chest. “If you don’t reach out to us and we find out you were in a bad situation, Daddy will get angry. You don’t want that, do you?”
Her tension deflates as a snort bursts out of her. “I mean…” A cheeky smile twists her lips. “Might be kind of fun to see how he’d punish me.”
I laugh, dick giving a twitch at the thought. “True.”
She licks a drip off of her ice cream, her eyes on mine like she knows I’m getting turned on. Then she winks.
“Okay, okay. I’ll be a good girl and reach out if I need you.”
Thank fuck. I don’t know if I’m cut out for being a masked stalker.
22
Life startsto feel bearable again in a surprisingly short amount of time. Astrid jokes that getting dicked down by three hot guys rebooted my brain and banged me out of depressed, anxious hermit mode, and I’m honestly not sure she’s wrong.
Sure, going into the office and seeing Lauren and friendly new coworkers most days of the week, getting back into client work after being unemployed for months, and generally having distractions from the specter of my social media infamy have helped tremendously. But being an omega is weird, and I have a strong feeling that I wouldn’t have been able to embrace those things as fully as I have over the past few weeks if it weren’t for the heat spike and subsequent pheromone infusion. I certainly wouldn’t be smiling as much, because I wouldn’t be getting a near-constant stream of texts from the men courting me.
It takes everything in me to fight the worry that it’ll all be snatched away as quickly as it was before. I can’t imagine a scenario where Lauren would fire me out of the blue. She’s already seen me at rock bottom, and I doubt I’ll become even more of a PRliability than I already am from the “old omega” nonsense. Even if the pack suddenly decides they’ve changed their minds, or gets tired of waiting for me to take things at my glacial pace, I won’t be completely ruined again. At least not financially. Emotionally, I’d probably need a full calendar year to recover. Maybe more—one year for each of them, because I’m already thinking of the pack as mine again, despite my best efforts to go slow.
I’ve only seen them in person three times since my heat spike. Once was a week ago when Jackson took me to get ice cream after the world’s most intense meeting about my potential case against Pulse. Which I’m still on the fence about pursuing, and simultaneously guilty and terrified about. The other two times were for medical reasons, because Ambrose wants to monitor my response to the increased suppressant dose I’m on. The results of those quick meetups, where he was charmingly and frustratingly professional, weren’t promising. Apparently, my body is so fucking determined to go into heat to make up for lost time that even the maximum dose of super potent, and frankly terrifying with its list of warnings, suppressants aren’t enough to keep my hormones stable.
I’ve kept communication with the pack to texts and calls to protect my heart, but it’s becoming clear how much of a lost cause that is. The more we talk, the more I want to see them. Not only because my omega is craving their touch and a higher dose of their pheromones than I can get via dirty laundry, but because Ilikethem.
Before, when we were courting, things felt like a freight train barrelling down the tracks without me knowing much of anything about my fellow passengers, and forced onto it by my damn omega hormones instead of selecting the destination after careful consideration.
Now, I’m actually getting to know them. And it turns out,much to my logical, skeptical side’s chagrin, that they’re as amazing as my instincts told me. Maybe even better, because they’re not just nebulous hot guys who smell good, but real people with needs beyond “make Camille our omega.”
I’ll continue this charade of going slow a while longer, to satisfy the side of me that’s still scared of getting hurt. But it won’t matter. I can’t protect myself from getting hurt by these men, no matter what pace I set.
I’ve built up my defenses against any potential source of pain over the past forty years, and my omega came in and tore them down in a matter of months. I’m practically allergic to vulnerability, but it’s impossible now to live my life in a way that avoids it.
