I don't get out yet. I need one more second.
Just one more second of not looking at the bite mark on her neck.
The porch light flicks on and the front door opens.
Odette steps out, pulling a thin robe tighter around her shoulders. Her silver-white hair is slightly flattened on one side, like she'd been dozing in her armchair, and her feet are in slippers. She squints at the driveway, her eyes moving over the minivan she's never seen before.
"Rafferty?" Her voice carries across the yard. "What's going on? Whose van is that?"
Raff places one hand on the hood of the car. "Hey, Ma. Can I park it behind the house?"
She doesn't hesitate. "Of course." But her eyes don't leave the van. "Everything okay? You boys never come around this late."
Raff takes the keys from my hand as he passes. His fingers brush mine for half a second, and my feet start to move again.
I walk toward Odette as the van pulls around the side of the house and out of sight from the road.
Mama O’s arms open for me the way they always do.
I've loved this woman since the first time Raff brought me home, when she took one look at me, said "you're too thin," and made me eat two plates of pasta before she even let me speak.
“You look tired,” she says as her arms close around my shoulders. She squeezes me tight, letting her chin rest ontop of my head. She smells like cinnamon and dish soap and the jasmine lotion she puts on before bed.
But I can feel her body tense as she watches Cliff.
"Holy shit,” she whispers. "What the fuck happened to you boys? And who’s the girl?”
"Long story," Perrin says from somewhere behind me. He sounds as tired as I feel.
I catch a glimpse of Cliff as he moves past me and Odette. He’s carrying Elowen through the front door and into the house.
Odette watches him go. Then she looks down at me.
Her hands come up and cup my face, tilting it toward the porch light. Her gray eyes move over me slowly. It feels like she’s reading me. She frowns, her thumbs pressing gently into my temples, and whatever she finds there makes her mouth pull tight.
I swear this woman can see inside my skull.
“Whatever’s going on in that pretty head, know that it’ll be okay.” She leans down and presses a kiss to my forehead. Then she wraps an arm around my back and guides me inside, her hand rubbing slow circles between my shoulder blades as we walk.
The kitchen sits right off the front door with a pretty open layout. The flooring is the same mustard-yellow linoleum Raff used to slide across in his socks as a kid. Wood paneling lines every wall, dark and dated, with the small living room visible on the other side of the breakfast bar. It’s barely big enough for a couch, a recliner, and a TV that's older than me. On the other side of the room, there’s a little hallway that leads to two bedrooms and a single bathroom with a door that sticks.
The whole place smells like old wood and the lemon cleaner Odette uses on everything. It's dated in the way ofhouses that have been loved too long to change. Raff has drawn up renovation plans twice, and Odette threw both of them away without reading them.
She likes her house just the way it is, and honestly so do I.
Cliff carries Elowen to the couch and lays her down carefully, one hand cradling her head as he lowers it onto a throw pillow. He pulls the crocheted blanket off the back of the recliner and drapes it over her, tucking it around her shoulders.
She doesn't stir.
I stare at her from the kitchen doorway. She's asleep. Her breathing is slow and even, her face slack.
That's weird.Isn't it?
Omegas in heat don't simply fall asleep. Everything I've ever heard says a heat lasts days. Wave after wave, relentless, until the cycle burns itself out or an alpha knots them through it. She should be writhing and crying and demanding that Cliff knot her right now. Not sleeping like a kid who wore herself out at a birthday party.
But I don't say any of that out loud.
Cliff stands over her for a few seconds, looking down at her face. Then he turns and walks into the kitchen.
