I frown as I look over my shoulder and see nothing and no one, but I nod anyway. “I will.”
Then he turns and makes his way toward his room at the far end of the hall.
It’s strange, but I have a feeling saying goodbye to Niko is going to be a bit harder than I anticipated. I don’t know why, and I don’t know how, I just have a gut feeling that it’s going to be difficult.
Which pisses me off.
I shouldn’t care at all, shouldn’t feel a weird twinge of guilt and sadness over leaving him. I should have zero feelings about anyone and anything that doesn’t directly involve my search for the truth.
It doesn’t change the fact that all of the above is happening.
I think, in another life maybe, we could have been close. Best friends. Lovers even. The pull between us is undeniable, so kindred spirits finding each other makes sense. I think in the right circumstances, Niko would have gone to the ends of the earth for me and I would have done the same, walking for miles through hell in order to make sure we came through it together, or gotten through it so we could come back to each other. It’s kind of like my heart recognizes his, like our souls knew one another lifetimes ago but we still haven’t found the one where we finally, fully reconnect.
There’s something there though, I can’t deny it, I just don’t understand it. It’s an odd feeling, missing someone you don’t know, experiencing a longing that seems out of place and right at home inside my chest, but I’m too damaged to figure it out, and so is he.
That’s why I’m just going to pretend like he’s another body walking these halls and leaving him is going to be as easy as leaving everyone else.
I’ve always been a pretty solid liar, it’s just a matter of being able to lie to myself.
I think I’m failing.
CHAPTER 2
LIV
BREAK STUFF - LIMP BIZKIT
Iflip my blinker on, signaling my need to go right seconds before I cut off a semi-truck and fly toward the exit I desperately need to get off at.
Come say goodbye, yeah?
I white knuckle the steering wheel as I scowl out the windshield.
Fucker couldn’t even stay put for me to do what I told him I would.
I went to say goodbye, I kept that promise, but Niko was nowhere to be found.
This is exactly why I’ve never been good with relationships. Platonic, familial, romantic. None of them. I was even a subpar omega in my pack of alphas because nothing about how I am isstandard omega behavior.I’m a fucking joy to be around. Despite the way I operate and everything I’ve been through, the little girl in me—the one who was never chosen, who was always left behind and had to fend for herself—is desperate to cling on to anyone stupid enough to bother with her.
The only time that ever worked out was with my pack. I clung to them at the first act of kindness and I never let go. Thosethree chose me and there was no way they would have ever left me behind, but it doesn’t matter because I don’t have them anymore. Whether by choice or not, they did leave in the end.
No one stays.
No one wants to stick around and clean up the mess someone else made, they don’t want to bother picking up the pieces and helping to fit them back into place.
Everyone I knew before I was free, they smashed those pieces smaller and smaller, leaving less of me each time I moved onto the next tragedy.
My father started it all.
The only girl out of ten kids, and one of two omegas. He didn’t want either. No girls, no omegas, and he had no problem reminding me every single day.
The All Father is unhappy with you, Olive. He’s unhappy with your weak and powerless designation. With your filthy sex. The All Father has commanded I teach you so that when He returns, He might deem you worthy of saving.
Yeah, he taught me, all right.
He separated me from my mother almost immediately after I started what the members of theHeart of Gospelreferred to as school. I wasn’t allowed to see her, I couldn’t ask her questions about being a girl, let alone an omega. I was told to forget she existed but that was impossible. My mother was the only person who ever showed me love, she made me feel worthy, but she was trapped with that horrible man in an even worse way than I was. Bound to him through a bite that was full of promises but was really dripping venomous lies. The only reason there weren’t more of us was because she struggled getting pregnant after me—something else my father conveniently blamed me for—and when she did finally conceive my baby brother, it was during her last heat. Someone, somewhere took pity on her and at least granted her that, but she’s trapped.
Everything I did was in hopes of being with her again.
