Page 67 of Gold Rush
She’s all I’ve wanted for the last week, and she probably won’t even let me touch her at this point. All I’ve done is yell, make her feel like shit, and keep a random assortment of bags piled in the corner of my room because I’m too embarrassed to give her what I bought for the nest.
Stalking downstairs, I shake out my hands, all my muscles screaming and my body aching from the rigorous gym routines I’ve been putting myself through. I turn, heading down the hallway toward Arin’s room, sucking in a breath that I swear tastes of honey.
Now I’m hallucinating her perfume. Great.
I make a pitstop in the laundry room, switching out two loads of clothes and dropping some clean towels into a basket to fold later. I can at leastdosomething with the mindless housework to keep myself from thinking of her. I haven’t seen Bennett or Seth this morning, though I did scrub a pan earlier and put some leftover pancake batter in the fridge.
It’s probably best not to breathe in the house anymore — they’re probably going to fuck all over it. I’m going to have to open all the windows and invest in a mask so I don’t go insane.
I stop as I stare at the basket of towels.
Or I could justleave.
If her heat is truly this close — she doesn’t want me anyway — I could go to a hotel early. I can tell Arin and maybe he’llcome with me — fuck the townhouse — she, Bennett, and Seth can defile every surface for all I care. Then we hire professional cleaners, she goes on her merry way back to America, and I lobotomize myself so this never happens again with any other omegas.
I stride out of the laundry room, my mind made up. My hand is on the doorknob to Arin’s room before the sounds coming from inside register in my brain.
“No one fucks me as good as you do!”
My mind short-circuits as I stare at the door, willing myself not to lean forward to look through the small open sliver, but my body does what it wants.
Arin’s soft accent spews filthy things, the sound of their bodies colliding, skin against skin slapping, matching the tempo of their movements as I glance through the door and see Arin’s corded back, lean, bent over her on his bed, slamming home between her legs. From this angle, I can see June’s face, flushed, pink lips open as she cries out, gasping and moaning.
Where Bennett lets me join in and Seth eagerly accepts whatever we do to him — Arin is different.
When I end up in Arin’s room — he’s in control. It looks like he’s in control of her too.
What the fuck am I doing?
I jerk away and turn around, the floor creaking for a heart-stopping moment, but the sounds behind me don’t falter. I can smell it now, the mix of mint, burning down my throat, soothed only by the herbal honey — it’s like it’s dripping from the fuckingwalls.
How didn’t I notice that? How didn’t Ihearthat?
I barge out of the hallway, nearly barreling into Seth in the foyer.
The beta takes a startled step back, looking up at me. “Whoa, Theo —”
“Gotta leave —” I cut myself off, my eyes finding Bennett immediately.
Fuck, fuck, they both know. Everyone knows I’m a disaster.
“Where’s June, Theo?” Bennett’s calm, even voice is like nails on a chalkboard.
I make a strangled noise, stepping toward the front door even as I look back at the hallway to Arin’s room. Giving it away, givingthemaway.
Seth snorts, his eyes darting down to the front of my shorts. “What’s wrong, buddy? Got ahardproblem you can’t solve?”
I growl at him, shooting him a look as anger flares through me. “Noneof this would be happening ifyouhadn’t brought her into thishouse, into ourspace—”
“Theo,” Bennett barks my name, “go take a walk.”
Fuck him.
He’s right.
But alsofuckhim.
I stalk away, ripping open the front door and inhaling lungfuls of fresh air as I run down the steps and out the front gate, fleeing from the only place that’s ever truly felt likehometo me.
