Page 23 of Omega’s Fold

She has a casserole dish in her hands, covered in foil. She sets it down on the counter by the stove, like she has set it down there a hundred times before, and turns to me.

“Lasagna,” she says. “For you and the boys. Wyatt knows where the oven is.”

“I’ll tell him.”

“He’s out back?”

“Always is.”

She smiles at me and sits down at the table. I close my laptop. “Can I make you a coffee?”

I am being polite. I am not actually sure I want to make Donna a coffee. But there is something that tells me she wants one.

“I’d take a coffee,” she says.

I put the kettle on. I find the jar of instant at the back of the cupboard where I found it last night, and two mugs.

If I’m going to end up staying, then I really need to buy a proper coffee machine and get the decent stuff in.

I stop where I’m standing, mugs in my hand.

If I’m going to end up staying. If. Where did that thought come from? Why on earth would I stay here?

I set the mugs down on the counter and open the fridge.

“Milk,” she says, when I hold up the carton. “No sugar.”

I sit across from her.

“The internet went in fine, then,” she says.

“It did.”

She looks at me over the rim of her mug. “I thought you were only staying two weeks,” she says. “That’s what Matthew said.”

I take a breath. “I am. I need it for my job.”

“You couldn’t take two weeks off?”

I get what she’s doing. I’m a strange alpha who has moved into a house with a man she sees as vulnerable for some unfathomable reason, as well as two boys, one of whom is only eight. She’s looking out for them. That’s fair.

I shrug. “Not really. This whole thing landed right in the middle of an urgent project. The Bureau have been real assholes about it. If I don’t stay here, I risk losing my professional accreditations. I didn’t have a lot of choices.”

“Mm.”

“The dish stays when I go and I’ve paid the year’s contract,” I say. “Did I want to lay out the money? Obviously not, but as I said, I have a job and I want it there when I get back.”

“Thank you. It’d be good for the boys to have it for their schooling.”

“They are.” She sets the mug down. “And Wyatt?”

I look at her. I feel my jaw set before I can stop it.

“I have barely seen him. I have tried to stay out of his way. That seems to be what he wants.”

She nods, slowly.

“There’s another town hall tonight,” she says. “The Linden people are coming down to answer our follow-up questions. The ones they wouldn’t answer last time.” She says ‘Linden’ the way she might say ‘dogshit’. “You should come.”