Page 82 of Generation Omega: Claimed
“Truthfully, I would have been the best traitorever, but once you see what I did to keep Thatcher alive, you’ll understand why my loyalty should never be doubted again.” I pull away, forcing him to look at me. “I got poncy professor cooties on me, and I’ll never be the same.”
Ethan tilts his head as he assesses my face and then my body. “You don’t look anyponcier—is that even a word?”
“I don’t know, but I know who could provide the etymology of everysnootorificword in English or Latin.” Glumness hits me like it was fired from a cannon. I turn, directing my words at the three of them. “We need to talk before you see him. I need to explain what happened, why I did what I did, and what it means. I also will be sharing some ground rules. Our pack is in uncharted territory, with two anomalies now. I don’t know what this is going to look like, but I’m committed to making it work.”
I flinch—dammit—when Tillie releases Gideon and takes a step toward us, extending her hand tome. I stare at her puny offering like it’s made of lava and might eat my shiny, new soul.
The little minx is battling a laugh as she says, “Big ol’ assassinafraid oflittle ol’ me?Humph.”
I’m suddenly awkward and a source of amusement to everyone in the back of this truck. Soon, Ory and Jameson will appear at the opening, and I’ll become a running pack joke for the rest of my life, possibly with an embarrassing nickname. To smother the life out of that possibility, I gently touch Tillie’s delicate finger, waiting to see if I get zapped, before consenting to hold her hand. The power in our contact sets off a bomb of rightness that explodes like confetti in me, but it doesn’t stop there. Ethan moans when he feels it and grasps my free hand so that the three of us are linked.
Tillie’s practically glowing, her eyes bright and a little unfocused. “Now, was that really so hard?” Her words are slurred, and she sways toward me. No, that was me—I’mswaying toward her.
I’mswoony. What the actual fuck? I rip my hand away from her, hopefully preventing this infection of giddiness from running completely amok. Her wicked smile and sinister happiness reveal that she’s not even slightly upset that I’m repelled by her. She’s gazing at me like I’m a future source of foot massages, enormous bowls of obscenely buttered popcorn, and even… no,poetry. And this is before she’s in my head and fully squatting in my heart. I might need to go kill someone, just to clear my head.
Ethan’s arm supports me as I experience this meltdown fueled by the sheer heinousness of becomingapproachable. “I doubted you, Kaz,” Ethan croons. “But your omega didn’t. She’s the one who made the decision to trust you.”
Her smugness reaches new levels, and I can’t look away from her, because it’s starkly clear that I’ve never met this version of Tillie. She’s standing taller. She’s more empowered. She’s daring me to doubt her. It’s certainly not a stretch to see the fierce child she was in the woman standing before me, but this is more than that. Tillie is owning her place in the omegaverse, in this pack, inall our lives, declaring her right to survive. She’s not a queen yet, but I would have to be a fool not to observe the shades of power just waiting to bloom in her.
Myomega is going to take this fucking world by storm, and I’m more than happy to be a lightning bolt in her arsenal. Yeah, I’m one sappy monster, but that’s on a need-to-know basis, and no one needs to know. But who the fuck do I think I’m fooling? Ethan is as drunk on possibility as she is, as I am, and fuck, it feels good to be building something instead of always tearing everything apart.
“Awe, howsweet,” Jameson pronounces in a sickeningly sugary tone that makes me think his mouth would look better filled with wet concrete. To Gideon, he adds, “Why,pappy, I think they’re courting now.”
I can’t stop my snarl at him, before I grumble to Tillie, “I can thin the herd whenever you like.”
“Nope, I’m keeping all of you, even the sassy one.” The spell broken, she returns to Gideon, who leads her to the back.
Jameson steps forward to help her down, but he gets shoved out of the way by Ory, whose beefy hands immediately take hold of Tillie and lower her to the driveway.
When I turn back to Ethan, his eyes are a bit too cunning and his mind inconveniently blank. “What?”
Oh, my, he’s squaring up like we’re about to fight or…
“You said if I was yours, you’d never deny me again. Is that a promise you intend to keep?”
My cock answers before I do, rising to a state of readiness. I crowd my beta, grabbing Ethan’s ample package and watching his eyes reveal the right amount of pain, desire, and desperation for carnal oblivion. Into his ear, I growl, “After we deal with things here and reach our next destination, I’m going to fuck you all night and into tomorrow. They’re going to need a fuckingcrowbar to get my dick out of you, and if you’re very good, I might just let you meet my knot. It’shuge.”
“Oh, fuck,” he breathes, releasing a groan I want to taste for myself.
So I kiss him again, while torturing his cock with uselessly gentle caresses. When I finally manage to create some distance between us, I realize only one person is witnessing this scene, and she’s as red as a tomato, panting shallow breaths, and snaring my attention to her teeth compressing her lower lip. I want to see those lips stretched around Ethan’s cock, while I slowly, torturingly penetrate his ass. I can’t read her thoughts yet, but she’s picking up what I’m putting down—no doubt.
To confirm the reality of her interests, Ethan plants an image in my head that has me almost climaxing in my damn pants. I gape at him and then at her.
“You naughty, naughty minx,” I murmur, my voice a husky gravel that inspires her perfume to reach us in a wave of perfection.
“Does that mean you’d consider it?” she whispers.
“We’ll see, angel,afterI master my beta.”
My omega’s blue-grey eyes spark, lust a living, breathing, demanding force within her. “Yes, you shoulddefinitelydo that. He needs mastering, and then, just maybe, you’ll be ready for me.”
CHAPTER 40
THATCHER
“Thatcher, wake up,” Kazimir commands, his usually harsh voice barely recognizable with its soft timber.
I open my eyes, reacquainted instantly with the punishing torture that is my life now. Then I embrace the necessity of aggravating my condition by moving into a seated position. My gaze seizes every detail about the room, a book-lined den where Kazimir probably imagined I would derive some solace, but any comfort is forever beyond my reach. My greatest regret is that I never experienced any true peace before it was irrevocably denied me. Such a waste.
