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I moan into Saint’s mouth, holding Hunter to me with a white-knuckled grip.
“Come for us, Omega,” Hunter whispers. “Please.”
The tension that’s been building washes over me in a slow-build release that has me crying out.
“That’s it, good girl,” Saint purrs as he moves around us, staring at my face in fascination.
And then I stop, everything forgotten as I realise that Saint is purring. My mouth drops open, and I reach out cautiously and put my hand to his vibrating chest.
“Saint?”
“You are so beautiful,” he whispers and touches his chest. “I’m purring. Actually purring.”
Alphas purr from contentment, only in the presence of their pack, and not all of them are capable of it. I remember reading that in school. I’d gone home and spoken to Auggie about it. She’d said that while Wayne can purr, Charles can’t or never has. She said she wasn’t worried about it, but it feels amazing when they do purr. And I concur, it’s one of my favourite memories. I want to bottle this moment.
But he’s purring for me.
I close my eyes because whatever thoughts I had of them betraying me are gone. If he’s purring, then he’s serious.
He does consider me pack.
And isn’t that the same thing as love?
No, it’s not. And in two days, I’ll leave them. Unless they give me what I need.
Chapter eighteen
Bethany
I look at mylist and frown. They look after me when I’m sick. Feed me. Have provided me with shelter, clothes, safety, and protection. They have been excessively polite to my family and given me a job and a car. They’ve taken me on dates to starlit dinners. Sitting in the car, parked in a carpark, eating fries from the local takeout joint after a long night at work. They open doors, hold my hand, are respectful and kind. We have talked about everything, long hours of conversation where I feel truly known.
The only thing that is wrong with this pack is that they are hung up on love being the root of all evil and deadly afraid of commitment, but the line is blurring. They are committing to me, just not to love.
I feel like I’m sitting back waiting for them to realise the writing on the wall. They can’t cope if I leave the room. Someone is always with me.
Saint is sitting on the couch opposite me with reading glasses on. He taps the tablet screen and glances up at me, freezing when he finds me watching him.
“Do you need a hug?”
Do I need a hug? Yes, of course, I do. I get up and cross to him. He puts the tablet down, pulls me up onto his lap, and folds his arms around me. And there’s another one for the list–they stop what they’re doing to give me attention, even if I don’t ask for it.
“Saint?”
“Yea?” he asks gruffly.
“Do you think that what we are doing is just going to make it harder if you guys decide that you can’t give me what I need? When I leave, that is?”
“I think it’s ultimately going to make things a lot harder. I’m hoping we can find a compromise,” Saint says with a thread of sadness in his voice.
“I won’t, though,” I whisper. “I want the fairy tale. Why a bar?” I ask, changing the subject.
“We needed something we could do together. Our codependency runs deep. Didn’t you notice? But we also don’t sleep much at night. It’s safer to sleep during the day.”
I turn my face into his arm and kiss it. “I hate that you had such a miserable childhood. If I could, I would want to go back in time and kill anyone who even looked at you wrong.”
Saint chuckles. “That’d be a lot of people.”
“I don’t care. I’d do it for you.” My face burns, and I get antsy, so I pull free of him, my confession too much for me to face.
