Page 44 of Generation Omega: Claimed
His beautiful blue eyes catch the sunlight. “That’swhat you were doing up there? You weren’t punishing me or giving me the silent treatment?”
I don’t have time to share the full truth—and I’m not ready—so I just repeat, “I love you.”
“But I should go with you, help you.”
I blurt a laugh that inspires one of his expressive eye-rolls. “Ethan, sayweget there, to Professor Angsty’s escape boat, and he looks at you like…”
Ethan’s resistance collapses. “You’re saying there’s no non-fatal outcome for Thatcher if I’m with you.”
The omegaverse erupts with another descriptive list of all the ways I’m supposed to slaughter Thatcher. “Things aren’t looking too good for Thatcher, even without you being there, but with you, there is zero chance I won’t gut him.”
Ethan leans into my hold, and I want to kiss him, but I don’t.
“There’s something else,” I grumble, hating the need to say it. “I can’t hear your thoughts from a distance. I don’t think I’ll be able to effortlessly find you, like I could with Tillie.” I say her name so easily now. “This is your chance to make some decisions about the kind of life you want. You were right before. Tillie has alphas now who will cherish her, and these bonds she’s forming will give you space to separate from this pack if that’s what you want.”
“Kaz, I…”
“No, Ethan, this is my command. You must decide what lifeyouwant. If you want freedom, then you’ll have it. I won’t keep you as my unwilling pet—I respect you too much for that.”
His eyes are wild now. “But we’re bonded.”
“I’ll deal with that, in one way or another.”
“How?”
I squint at him, and he feels my rebuke. He knows the answer, and I won’t say it again.
With panic building, he stammers, “Kaz, I don’t want that.”
“That part isn’t up to you. As long as you’re mine, I am your alpha, and I’ll do what needs to be done. Your responsibility is to take this time—when you’re free to think anything you want without an audience—to figure out what matters most to you. I’ll give you as long as I can, but when we’re back together, you need to have an answer, a truthful one. If you try to deceive me, I’ll know, and I’ll act on that.”
The storm inside him whips at me, but I hold my ground. “I’ve got to go.”
Will you kiss me?He sends that to me, with no way to know what it does to me.
I run my thumb over his lip, sending the reminder of just how much I want to bite him there. “No.”
“Why?”
My heart aches at denying what he truly desires. “When I return, if you’re still mine, I will never deny you again. But, right now, with everything swirling inside you, all the unfaced traumas you’re dealing with… confusing things even more by kissing you would make me a villain. I’m fine with being the bad guy to the rest of the world and even becoming the omegaverse’s indentured assassin, but I won’t be a villain to you.”
I swallow roughly, like a man with a functional soul. “I’ll be your alpha if you’ll have me, but I won’t be your abuser or your drug to dull every doubt you have about yourself and your life. I certainly as fuck won’t be your cage. Your consent matters more to me than it ever will to the omega legacy, and I won’t let that boundary be stolen from me—not today, not ever.”
My teeth clench, but I find the strength to finish things with Ethan in the best way I know how. “I’ll need your decisionbeforeI bond Tillie. After that, I won’t harm that courageous woman by removing myself from her pack, at least not if I have a choice. So, take this time and find your answers, and know that I will respect them.”
I point at the flybridge. “Don’t forget that your hero up there played a shrink twice and has probably been in therapy for years. And if not actual therapy, he’s done a ton of self-reflection or he wouldn’t be such an annoyingly decent human.” Don’t say it. Don’t you dare say it. I’m holding back a damn waterfall to keep from revealing just how vital Ethan is to me and the only future I’ll accept.
With a sick roiling in my stomach, I realize something I never considered about the fates of all the alphas I captured and the way their bonds could be weaponized. For not the first time, I wish I’d been more curious and willing to step outside my lane in Beta Dominion’s mission.
“Goodbye, Ethan.”
Ethan looks at me like he doesn’t recognize me or maybe himself, but either way, it’s time for me to go. So, I pull the dinghy closer and step inside, and then release the knot, fire up the engine, and race after the greatest threat to the survival of the omegaverse. That it’s Thatcher and not me is a bit of a letdown, if I’m being honest. I plan to make sure our dearlearned fellowfeels my disappointment in being one-upped in the threat department by a fucking professor. Maybe the pen is mightier than the sword, but I’ll need to test that out for myself.
Got knives?
I sure do.
CHAPTER 24
