Page 51 of Generation Omega: Revealed
His voice lashes at me. “Don’t call me that.”
I lean back in this unpleasant chair, summoning my own demeaning/complimentary mashup tone. “You’re still searching for the escape hatch, aren’t you? Good luck with that.”
His words erupt in a stream of Russian expletives, all of which I know from my good buddy, Sergei.
“I’d recommend a self-help group but you’d terrify them. Arealpha-helpgroups orpack-helpgroups a thing? I’m suddenly seeing a lot of therapy in our shared future.”
“Fuck off.”
The urge to reach through the phone and throttle my new packmate is strong, but I force myself to exhale and consider his position like he’s a character I signed on to play for thirty million,pluspoints on the back end.Nameless Killer/Unconsenting Alpha, a character study by Gideon Blake. The title itself displays the significant difference between my new packmate and me. Like him, I didn’t get a vote in this, but unlike him, I wasn’t transformed into the thing I’ve spent my life trying to destroy.
Maybe he liked his life before he ended up in that alley. Maybe things were simple and made sense to him. Violence can be a way of life, like anything else. While I consider this change a step up in the world, he knows better than anyone that it’s a death sentence. Everything that defined his life is over, and everyone he knew is now his enemy. If that weren’t enough, he’s now helplessly drawn to his literal target. I feel anxious being a few feet from her. How must he feel?
Helpless… the instincts provide the most salient detail about my new packmate.
“Do you feel the instincts?”
“Yes,” he answers, displaying his utter contempt for them.
I inhale deeply, breathing in Tillie’s fragrance, before exhaling and trying again. “We’re going to have to work together. I know you didn’t want this. You hate it. I get that.”
“Do you?” he counters.
That speed-setting concrete analogy returns and the instincts are shoving me to do the right thing to build a solid foundation, not just with Tillie but with my new packmates who are essential to her survival.
Be their leader.
Be the alpha they can trust.
Sure thing, omegaverse—but how?
“No, I don’t.” Honesty, the last resort of desperate men, is all I can give. “The purpose this has given me is a gift—she’s a gift. Yes, I know I’m being manipulated with her scent, her beauty, these instincts that compel me to protect her and make her mine. But the rightness I feel, the connection, is extraordinary, and the worst parts about this—the danger, the fear of failing her—are better than the best things about my old life. Your situation is different. I can’t apologize for that—and I won’t—because, unlike me, you brought this on yourself.”
“How do you fucking figure that?!”
Oh, there it is—clarity. “You came to kill her. You were the greatest threat to her survival, and the omegaverse neutralized that threat by recruiting you. If you hadn’t shown up there, you would still be free.”
Another stream of curses and then he mutters, “That’s never happened before.”
My empty stomach turns when I catch the meaning behind his shocked statement. “Killed quite a few of them?”
“What do you think?”
“I think you’re a killer and this legacy made a risky choice in a last-ditch attempt to keep Tillie alive. I know how powerful these instincts are, but I wonder if they’re fierce enough to turn you into someone worthy of the air you breathe.”
He unsurprisingly says nothing, and failure nips at my heels like my sister’s yappy mutts.
I clench the arms of the chair and try again. “Let me ask you something that truly matters. Do you understand how vital Ethan is to Tillie? Without him, your old buddies won’t have to find her to end all of us. I haveouromega, but you have her beating heart with you, in your power. Is it possible for you to just acknowledge Ethan’s value?”
More stinking silence, followed by a surprise. “He’s vital to more thanher. Without him, I would have already freed myself from this curse using a tall building and a long drop. He’s why I won’t. He’s why I called you. He’s what matters.”
I don’t understand the killer’s intense regard for Ethan, but I’m not touching that right now. It’s given me a new strategy though. “That’s good to hear. Is there something you need, something I can help with?”
The silence that follows feels different somehow, more vulnerable. While I wait, I try to feel anything about this alpha who will share my omega. The possessiveness might be a factor, but I don’t sense any connection to him at all. But neither does Tillie, so that might not mean anything yet.
“I need to leave him,” the killer confesses like it’s an actual crime. “I need information and supplies now that my entire life has imploded. I need to make sure my contingencies are still viable. I need to know what they know about me. It won’t be long before I become prey to all my oldfriends.” That word clearly doesn’t mean the same thing to him that it does to me. “They will come at me hard and I’m looking forward to it, but…”
Oh, now I’m getting it. “You have Ethan to protect now, and that’s a new variable for you.”
