Page 12 of A Murderous Omega

I eyed the young man with more interest as he examined Conor and me. “Would you like to dance?” I asked him, offering my hand.

Kane flushed prettily, rose blossoming over his pale cheeks, making his blue eyes brighter. He was a cute little cherub, but didn’t hold a candle to the omega Conor and I were waiting for, planning for, aching for.

I swept Kane into my hands, sniffing discretely. The Institute had suppressed his scent, but the delicate rain was still distasteful to me. I’d found a scent match, and she was the only one I wanted.

“Is this where we make awkward small talk?” he asked me as we whirled around the room. Lark would never. She’d just try to murder me, which was infinitely more refreshing.

“Exactly that. You only recently presented?” I said, doing my polite duty.

“A few months ago,” he said. “I thought I was a beta—my family is poor, and my parents’ pack is all betas except for one.”

When I didn’t comment on the unlikelihood of that, he grinned. “Thanks for being polite about it, but it’s easier if I explain everything up front. The doctors think my bio dad is an unexpressed omega.”

“How are you adjusting?” I asked him. Goddess, he looked so fucking young, and the Omega Institute was out here trying to find him a match already.

“It’s wild! But …” he trailed off. “The Omega Institute is paying my family a lot of money. They’ll get reimbursed when a pack selects me as their omega, and⁠—”

I frowned. “You’re not selecting your own pack?”

He looked at me flatly, and suddenly looked much older. “Have you ever been homeless?”

“No.” The word felt obscene in my mouth, here in a ballroom where a single bottle of bubbly cost more than most families made in a month.

“Then don’t judge me for making the best financial decision for my family. The Omega Institute is going to hold an auction with pre-vetted packs. As long as they smell okay to me, they’ll be able to participate.”

My heart broke for this young man, but he was right. It was his financial decision.

“It’ll be a mutual bond,” he continued. “That way I have the right to an equal share of their assets, no matter how shitty they are. I’ll be able to take care of my family.”

“You’re a brave man,” I murmured as we continued to turn around the dance floor.

“Am I?” he asked. “I live in luxury now, dancing with the packmate of a billionaire, hoping he’ll take an interest in me before the auction, all because I’m omega.”

I couldn’t stop my sad smile. “I hope you find your pack,” I murmured.

“Not you?”

I shook my head. “No. But you should dance with Conor anyway. If he shows interest in you, other packs will notice.”

Kane nodded, and I led him back to Conor in time for the next dance.

With a subtle shake of my head, I confirmed my lack of interest, not that it had ever been in doubt, but pushed the young man into Conor’s arms anyway. “You’ll like him,” I murmured. “And I hope he finds the right pack.”

We’d played this game before. Conor nodded sharply, then proceeded to flirt with Kane through the entire dance.

“Looks like Conor likes him,” his mother said, her alpha scent stronger than it should have been, unless she was about to go into rut. “Charming boy. Pretty enough, I suppose. But he doesn’t bring any advantages to your pack. Or ours.”

Cordelia Whitmore ran her pack, and their empire, with an iron fist. Conor’s siblings had all made advantageous matches, and it irritated her that he’d packed up with me, a human rights lawyer who defended omegas from abusive alphas, who didn’t hesitate to go up against the most cutthroat packs in the nation.

She hated even more that Conor refused to take his place in one of the pack’s many businesses. Still, she loved her son, even if she hated his choices, which is why I told her the truth.

“He’s not the omega for us.”

Cordelia smiled, showing all her teeth, letting her alpha-ness roll over me, even though she knew by now that it wouldn’t intimidate me.

Before I knew it, another omega was in my arms, this one a woman with long brown hair that reminded me of Lark’s, and the same unhinged willingness to commit violence in her eyes.

“Lark would like you to stop interfering with her research,” the omega said.