Page 52 of The Omega Princess
He shrugged again and took another drag. “I guess he’s got you in there with him. You were always willing to heel for him. Be his lapdog. Roll over, do tricks, let him pretend to be in charge.”
I snatched the cigarette away and took a pull off of it. Oh, gross. Why had I done that? I handed it back to him. “He’s a natural alpha.”
“Natural alpha, my ass.” He scoffed. “I could bend him to my will like a fucking pretzel.”
“You have something, Sinclair,” I said. “But whatever it is, it’s…”
“What?” he said. “What is it?”
“Well, I don’t know,” I said. “But it’s different with him is all. Submitting to him feels good and right. Submitting to you feels like surrendering to a comic book supervillain. You’d have to be stupid to trust you.”
He grimaced. He contemplated his cigarette for a second and then seemed to decide it wasn’t worth the effort anymore. He rolled the filter between his fingers until the cherry fell off. Then he put the butt back in the cigarette pack. “Yeah, maybe that’s true in some ways. I could bend him, yeah, but not to my will. I’m not in charge in that way when I let my alpha out. My alpha is in charge, and my alpha is, uh, unpredictable.”
I sort of got that to a degree. It felt that way to me around Devlin, but Devlin was always in charge of me then, so I guessed I felt safe enough. I wondered what it would be like to feel that way about my alpha side all the time. Why was Sinclair so out of sync with himself, anyway?
“So, is that what happened with you two?” I said. “Did you ask him to submit to you and he wouldn’t?”
Sinclair ran a hand through his hair. “We just… we were like a big forest fire together, I guess. He made me combust. Haven’t felt anything quite like him in years. Not until…”
“The omega,” I said softly.
“But she’s worse,” he said. “She makes me feel itchy in my skin, like there’s something inside me that wants out, like I’m going to shift on the full moon into a werewolf or some shit.”
“Huh,” I said.
“What?” he said.
“Nothing, it’s just the opposite with me and her,” I said quietly. “She makes me feel like I belong in my skin. But, um, maybe I don’t feel like that usually.” Which worried me, frankly. I couldn’t need her, not when Devlin would only let me have little bits of her. Would it be enough? I needed to get myself together on my own, that was the thing.
“Well, congratu-fucking-lations.” He fished out his cigarette pack.
“No, come on, the Queen wants me to bring you down.”
He groaned. “Well, whatever the Queen wants, right?” He tucked the cigarette pack away.
“Look, you can stick near me, if you want. I don’t mind being a barrier.”
“Rohan, so helpful,” said Sinclair. “I thought you hated my guts.”
I considered him. “I guess I let Devlin do the thinking for me when it came to you,” I said. “That maybe wasn’t cool of me.”
“Like I said, you’re his lapdog.”
“Maybe,” I said. “But I’m not a lapdog. I’m an alpha prince. And maybe it’s time I started acting like it.”
Sinclair laughed. He collided with me, throwing an arm around my shoulder, and I was struck by the potency of his scent. “Okay, Rohan. Protect me from myself, please?” He made his voice mockingly high, but there was something in his eyes, something that told me part of him was serious.
“Sure thing,” I said.
He pulled away, snorting. “Whatever.”
We went back downstairs together.
devlin
I LOOKED UP to see Rohan and Sinclair coming into the room where the luncheon was being held. They were close, shoulder to shoulder, talking, heads together now and then, and I found I didn’t like it.
Rohan was mine.
