26. Resa

Chapter 26

Resa

I spend two days going out of my mind with boredom.

I also learn how it feels to have a house full of men take care of me.

When I discovered I was pregnant, I was throwing up constantly. Morning sickness, I soon learned, wasn't something relegated to the morning hours.

The second I woke up, I needed to throw up. Get up too fast? Throw up. Turn around? Throw up.

One week was so bad, I swear I was permanently green.

Other than a bucket beside my bed and a glass of tepid tap water, no one gave a shit. The alpha cared more about my inability to fuck whenever he wanted, and that my pregnancy meant no more omega who went wild for sex, begging for an alpha's knot every three months.

One time I woke to him discussing getting rid of my baby.

I quietly considered how I could kill him in the most painful way possible. It hadn't come to that. Thankfully . Mostly because, in our world, an omega capable of having babies will always be more valuable to alphas than one who can't.

So I got to keep my baby. I spent days, then weeks throwing up, trying to force down bananas and the most tasteless food possible, so I had the strength to fight back and escape the first chance I got.

Then the morning sickness eased and my alpha traded me to Nathaniel Lang, who, one Friday, took me to Asylum for their usual omega auction. It was there that a terrified blonde omega stumbled into the cell beside mine.

Everleigh.

For the longest time, I'd wondered what had happened to her. They'd dragged her away to the auction, and I hadn't seen her again. I'd known I wouldn't. After the auctions, they take the sold girls to the receiving rooms to await collection.

Other than being bored silly, I've been watching a lot of TV. People are turning on the Omega Institute for not doing enough to protect omegas. Some families are now refusing to send their children to Haven Academy because a lot of the alpha families have been implicated in the abuses.

Things are changing in the city.

They're not changing fast enough for my liking.

I'm ready to get back to work tracking down Dexter Pieter or his assistants. I'd asked to borrow a laptop to continue my search from bed. Instant no. In their eyes, bedrest means… actually, you know, resting, so no laptop or research or work for me.

Just bone idleness, trashy TV, greasy food, interspersed with news, bathroom breaks, and napping until a nightmare shocked me awake. It's time to get up.

I slip one leg out of bed. "I need to?—"

"—sit your pretty ass right there, use the pillow I got you for your back, and tell me what you need so I can get it for you," Vaughn interrupts.

I study said pillow.

It's long, narrow, and sloped. The perfect shape to cushion my lower back, which, as a back sleeper, I didn't know what I was missing. I don't know why Vaughn thought I needed a pillow for my back, but I'm glad he did. It has become my new favorite thing, surpassing the fancy apple juice.

I asked Vaughn if they had any, and someone must have sent Lex out or he ordered some in because I woke up to six different cartons of apple juice. When I identified the fifth as fancy apple juice, I've had a steady supply of it since then.

I'm approaching the point I should dial it back before I make myself sick. Or, most likely, the store they're buying it from runs out.

"You've been sitting on the floor for hours. Surely you have stuff to do." And not only sitting, sometimes he's sprawled over my floor near the door thumbing through a book he refuses to let me get one peek at.

When I asked why it was only him and Lex who came in to bring me things, he said they'd had a meeting and come to the agreement that this room was an alpha-free zone.

What did he call it?

Omega territory. No alphas allowed.

It confused me so much at first I wasn't sure what to think. Now I do.

Relief.

No alphas and a beta at my beck and call. My life has done a complete three-sixty.

"I have stuff to do." He turns a page. "I'm doing it."

And that something seems to be not letting me lift a finger to do anything or go anywhere but rest. Eat and rest. Rest and eat. That's it.

"What are you reading?" It's not the first time I'm asking him this.

Lex brought me breakfast this morning: scrambled eggs, bacon, and fresh melon with fancy apple juice. Vaughn asked if he could hang out, and I said I didn't mind. He sprawled over the floor reading that book. The same thing happened after lunch. He brought that. A thick roast beef sandwich with chips.

And fancy apple juice.

Vaughn must know I'm trying to replace the blood in my veins with the stuff, because it just keeps on coming. He also came back with that damned book. I think it's the same one he was reading in the clinic, and I need to know what it is.

He turns another page. "Porn."

I lean forward, squinting as I try to read upside down. "There seem to be a lot of words."

He lifts the book slightly so I can't see. "Well, there are pictures, too. Plenty of pictures."

"Can I see?" I ask, mostly because I'm positive he's lying.

"Nope. This stuff is so depraved my eyes are burning." Then he mutters something and sticks a Post-it tab on one page.

No one Post-it notes porn.

"Something interesting?" I lean closer to the book.

He sits back, angling it so I see nothing. "Just your garden variety porn. Nothing to see here."

Approximately two minutes of watching him through narrowed eyes later, boredom sets in again.

"I was helping Garrison out with the Jerome Walker case," I remind him, "so I can get out of bed now and do that."

Vaughn took the file back when my bedrest started, so all I've had is TV, food, and a beta paging through a book he won't let me see for entertainment.

"Garrison is still working on the case. We'll find him," he mutters, distracted.

"But I'm better."

He turns another page and makes a soft sound of surprise, briefly distracting me. "The appointment you have tomorrow morning will confirm it. Until then, bloodthirsty omega, you can stay right where you are. Resting."

I want to insist, but my heart isn't truly in arguing.

He's right. I hate sitting around doing nothing when it feels like I'm wasting time. The smart thing would be to ensure I truly am well before I wind up doing the same thing that made me bleed before.

"It wasn't your fault."

I flick my gaze up. Vaughn has set the book aside for now. By aside, I mean tucked it in a bag so I can't even see the cover. He's watching me, legs stretched out and crossed at the ankle, arms folded. I wonder how long I was staring into space, blaming myself.

"What wasn't my fault?"

"What happened."

"And why do you think that I'm blaming myself?"

"It's natural when something bad happens for good people to blame themselves for it."

" Good people."

He nods. "Yep. I've met bad. You're not one of those. No one knows why it happened. It was just one of those things."

"Don't the alphas care you spend so much time up here with me?"

I've taken to calling them the alphas. Since they dropped everything to take me to the clinic, I've caught myself thinking that maybe they weren't bad alphas. That I might be able to trust them. A dangerous thought to have about my scent matches. Distance is good. Distance means I'm not in danger of getting attached or forming feelings.

"Nope."

"Why not?"

He studies me for a beat. "I have a story."

"About?"

"Us."

"And this story is…"

"We're pack. You get one of us or you get none of us," he says simply.

"I don't get what that has to do with?—"

" You are attracted to me, bloodthirsty omega."

I blush. Can't help it, but there you go. "No, I am?—"

"You are." He cuts off my lie with a grin. "I know it, you know it, and so do Garrison and Blaine." His smile fades. "The cold hard truth it is not everyone sees us as a package deal."

I tip my head, curious. "What do you mean?"

His eyes drift over my shoulder, settling on the wall. "Met a pretty redhead at a bar one night. She liked me, and I liked her."

He doesn't speak for several seconds, and I'm not sure why, but even though his expression is still relaxed, suddenly I'm tense.

I lick my dry lips. "Then what?"

He flashes me an easy grin. "Had a fun night, brought her back. Slept together. Fell asleep. Then I wake up to yelling and find her trying to slip into Garrison's bed."

Oh. "Vaughn…"

He's still smiling as he says, "Because you see, the thing she wanted wasn't me. What she wanted was a way into the house and a way to get to Garrison." He shrugs. "Probably Blaine too. This was before his accident and he was always up and in the gym early, so who knows if she hadn't tried his room first and found his bed empty?"

It hurt him. He felt used.

"What did Garrison say?"

He snorts. "He told her to get the fuck out. A little more politely than that. But there was a definite air of, ‘If the door hits you on the way out, it's because you're not moving fast enough.'"

My molars grind together. "What did she do?"

"Grabbed her stuff and got the fuck out." He grins. "Left a pair of panties behind. They went into the fireplace. And that was that, over and done with."

But it wasn't over and done with. It left scars. Not visible ones, but I see them in Vaughn.

"Did you ever see her again?" Is it wrong to want to kill someone you've never met before?

He shakes his head. "That doesn't mean I didn't see other women with that same look in their eyes when we would hit the bar. See, the thing is, they don't want me . They want a way through me to get to them ."

"I'm sorry, Vaughn."

He uncrosses his arms and leans slightly toward me, his gaze sharpening. "But you do. Don't you? You have your scent matched alphas down there, and it doesn't bother you one bit that I'm a beta. You still want me."

Yes .

I have a fiancé waiting for me. A life waiting for me. And yet I am fighting an attraction to Vaughn that I should not have.

He pushes himself to his feet, snagging his bag with the book that's driving me crazy and my empty lunch tray. "I've bothered you long enough today."

It's on the tip of my tongue to tell him that isn't true. He never bothers me. I like having him around. But that admission would be stepping on a slippery slope.

He's reaching for the door to open it when I say, "You're not just a beta."

He stops. "Funny thing is, not everyone thinks the way you do. Only omegas and alphas matter in this world. Get some rest now."

And he slips out.

Sadie saw being a beta as a blank slate to carving out the life she wanted. Vaughn's designation is something that some women use to measure him against Garrison and Blaine and he must always come up lacking for him to sound so bitter.

I never imagined what it would be like to be a beta in a pack with two alphas.

Now I do.

I think of being overlooked, nudged aside, treated as too ordinary, too not enough that a woman would sleep with you to get to the alphas she secretly wanted more.

And I think if I'd been there that morning, there's no question that the door would have hit her on the way out.

I'd have made damned sure of it.