49. Chapter Forty-Eight

Chapter Forty-Eight

Shadow

I t’s a bright day outside, and Owen seems determined to carry out this risk assessment in the shortest time possible, which is a serious pain in the ass. I’ve done nothing but chase him around so far, while he occasionally makes some notes on his phone and stalks around the property as if he’s trying to win a race without actually running.

I finally corner him in the gardens, where the path goes around in a circle.

He doesn’t seem to realize that before he walks in, so he’s not looking too far ahead, which means he’s not really paying attention. I put my hands on either side of the fence at the only entrance and exit to the circular path.

“Okay, what is this?” I ask as he looks up at me. “Because it sure as shit is not a risk assessment.”

He frowns at me. “You don’t know what a risk assessment is, Shadow.”

“Maybe I don’t, but I know it’s not this, whatever this is. You’ve been acting weird all morning. What’s going on?” I fold my arms and wait.

He looks around before he lets out a sigh. “It’s not important.”

“Is it because I snuck out?”

I really hope it’s not. I’d hate for him to be mad at me.

He takes the few steps to get to me and he puts his hands on my arms, leaning down to rest his forehead against mine. “I’m not mad at you for sneaking out.”

I let out a relieved breath. He’s not mad at me.

“I’m never mad at you, Shadow. Tell me you know that.”

“I know.”

It doesn’t sound convincing, because I don’t fully believe it.

It’s kind of hard to when I spent the first eighteen years of my life with someone always telling me I was doing something wrong.

Doesn’t matter that I know now my parents were assholes who turned my older brothers into even bigger assholes with their bullshit.

I still always feel like someone’s mad at something I’m doing, or not doing.

But I’m not the one with the issues today.

Owen’s got something going on.

I just don’t know what it is.

“Are you mad about being here, or is it Lana?”

He lets go of my arms and steps back. “It’s nothing.”

“It’s not nothing, Owen. You’re angry. I can feel it.”

Sometimes it really sucks to be an Omega.

I can feel that he’s emotional, but I have no idea what’s behind it.

Pete and Ezra would talk to me if I asked them why they were feeling a certain way.

Owen has a real problem with communicating.

He’s never been good at it.

He shakes his head. “I’m just frustrated.”

“About what?”

“Me,” he blurts. “I’m mad at myself.”

He sits down on the path and kicks a pebble into the plants.

Sitting down next to him, I make sure I’m still blocking the exit so he can’t rush off again.

Not that he’d try to actually lose me. He’s been keeping me in sight, being the protective Alpha he always is. He’s just also been keeping his distance, clearly because he’s going through something.

“What happened?”

He sighs. “I spoke to Ezra about Lana. I like her, I felt what you guys felt when I met her.”

“It’s this place, isn’t it?” I ask, knowing it the second it’s out there.

“I promised myself I’d never come back, and here I am.”

“For a good reason.”

“Doesn’t matter.” He shrugs. “I’m here.”

“Why does that bother you so much?”

He looks at me. “All this time, I thought I hated my parents.”

“You don’t?”

My question comes out in shock, because it’s a universal truth in our home.

The sky is blue, baby animals are never not cute, and Owen hates his parents with the fire of a thousand suns. We hate them, too. Anyone who hurts one of us, hurts all of us.

“It’s my fault they disowned me. I wasn’t who they wanted me to be. I was the problem. Me.”

“No, that’s only what they made you think, Owen. They saw you as the problem, because they were narcissistic assholes who never spent time raising you to have their values, yet they expected you to somehow develop them on your own. They were the ones at fault. Not you. You came out right.”

He laughs. “I came out right? I’m so fucking angry right now, and it’s because I hate myself.”

“No. You don’t. You hate how they made you feel about yourself. It’s not the same thing.”

His shoulders slump. “It feels like the same thing.”

“Well, that’s probably because you’re not used to dealing with your emotions.”

He blinks at me. “I deal with them.”

“No, you don’t. You … find ways to burn your anger off. You don’t ask yourself why you’re feeling it. You don’t try to resolve anything. You just burn it off and you do the same again when it comes back. It’s a vicious circle.”

And he’s been trapped inside it for at least a decade, probably longer.

It’s not a shock that he seems so defeated right now.

“It’s time to slow down, Owen. You can’t keep going the way you have been. It’s not healthy for you, and it only makes the rest of us worry.”

He leans back, looking up at the academy’s main building.

“Why did she have to be working here?”

I shrug when he looks back at me, as if I should have the answer.

“She’s here for good reasons. That’s enough for me.”

It’s kind of hot that our new mate is doing something no one else before her could do, or would do, and the fact that it’s something that’s going to help Omegas gain independence is fucking amazing.

“Can you imagine how different things could have been if she’d been the one in charge of this place ten years ago?” I ask, knowing it would have changed things for both of us.

He smiles wanly. “Maybe if she had been, and if I’d known it wasn’t the same hell hole where my shitty parents met each other and struck up the business deal they called their marriage, I might have been tempted to come to one of those socials.”

“If you had, we might never have met.”

“Right, because I never would have met Ezra.”

“Everything happens the way it happens for a reason.”

He nods slowly. “I was always going to have to come back here.”

“You were, so you can’t be mad at me for it.”

“I was never mad at you.”

“Prove it.”

I get to my feet and hold out my hand.

He sighs softly before he takes my hand and stands up.

“Where are you taking me?”

“You’ll see,” I tease, leading him out of the gardens.