Page 2 of Faking It with the Omega

Jed looks confused. “What?”

“Me being an omega. Because if you’re going to give me some line about how boxing is too aggressive for omegas, or how I should be sticking to light cardio—just save us both the time.”

I brace myself for the reaction—the polite brush-off, the awkward cough, the sudden micro-aggression.

Jed just stares at me for a couple of long seconds. Then he lets out a loud bark of laughter that makes me jump and echoes up to the high ceilings.

“Light cardio?” he grins, grabbing a pair of wraps from behind the counter and handing them to me. “Buddy, if I gave you light cardio, my bosses would fire me for wasting equipment. I don’t give two shits what your dynamic is. You could be a crab for all I care—do you like to hit things?”

“Obviously,” I grunt.

“Great. Put those on and get in the ring. Let’s see what we’re working with.” He turns to the two alphas in the ring. “Dyl, Levi, go do your weird foreplay somewhere else; we’ve got new blood.”

Five minutes later, I’m standing in the center of the canvas, leather wraps tight around my knuckles, staring down Jed. He’s strapped on the focus pads, bouncing lightly on the balls of his feet. He moves with a fluid, erratic grace that I find difficult to look away from.

“Alright, Aiden,” Jed says, popping the pads together with a loud thwack. “Give me a basic one-two. Show me what those four years bought you.”

We spar for nearly fifteen minutes, Jed’s bright blue eyes barely leaving mine, a near-permanent smile plastered on his face. I find myself relaxing into it despite myself, and every time he doles out some praise, it’s like a little shot of motivation. He gives plenty of corrections too, small adjustments to my form that feel good the moment I apply them, and not one of them is like the feedback I’m used to hearing: omegas are built for speed, not power. You’ll bulk up too much if you don’t pull your punches.

Jed just treats me like I’m any other boxer.

“Yes, Aiden, the fucking power behind that right hook is dangerous,” he grins after a particularly strong combination, a wild spark dancing in his eyes that’s irritatingly infectious.

I pull back, catching my breath. “I’ve been told more than once that it’s too much for an omega. Something about it throwing off our center of gravity.”

Jed snorts a laugh. “What a load of bullshit. Whoever told you that is a charlatan. Physically, you’ve got the build of a middleweight like me. Biology doesn’t change physics. You’ll get none of that backwards fuckery from me, I can tell you that.”

For the first time today, I think my smile might match Jed’s.

He steps back towards the ropes, unstrapping the pads with his teeth and tossing them onto the canvas, my eyes lingering a beat too long on the movement before I whip my gaze down to my own hands, concentrating on unwrapping them. When I look back up, his eyes are trained on the flush heating my face, and I swear I can sense his scent flaring warmly, probably out of exertion.

“You’ve got real promise,” he says. “I mean that seriously. I can tell you’re partly self-taught—you’ve picked up some bad habits, but it’s nothing that can’t be drilled out. And we need to loosen you up a bit.”

“Okay,” I nod, already waiting for the catch. The but. The bit where he tells me he doesn’t have any slots, or that there’s some extortionate extra fee for omegas to cover ‘insurance’. “How much do I owe you for the trial?”

“Trial’s free,” Jed says smoothly, dropping down out of the ring and waiting for me to follow, his eyes dancing with that wild spark that’s starting to make me feel less and less on edge. “Membership’s a monthly fee, and you can use the facilities whenever. And I’ve got an opening in my evening schedule, if you’re interested.”

“You do?” I ask.

“Yup,” he says casually, guiding us back to the front desk and tapping out a fast rhythm on one of the plastic protein powder tubs. “Same time Thursday?”

My brain immediately starts running through a list of reasons why I should say no. I haven’t seen any other omegas here, and aside from Jed, there’s no indication that this place is any different from any other gym I’ve been burned by.

And there’s Jed himself: he’s painfully cheerful, annoyingly charismatic, and yeah—he’s attractive. Maybe distractingly so. He’s going to get annoying within two weeks, and then he’s going to realize I’m a sarcastic, self-deprecating mess who doesn’t know how to respond to easy-going alpha banter with anything other than my own uniquely offputting brand of social awkwardness.

“Thursday,” I hear myself say before my brain can catch up. “That works.”

Jed laughs warmly even though I didn’t say anything funny, and I laugh too, because I’m an idiot.

Okay, so maybe gym number five deserves a shot. As I walk back out into the crisp spring air, I tell myself I’d be surprised if I make it more than a month, even if my chest is fizzing with something dangerously close to optimism.

Jed

Six months later

“Jed, turn the music down. Jed. Jed. Jed!”

I turn the music up a notch, my favorite Motown playlist blasting through the gym speakers as I give Max a confused look, mouthing sorry, I can’t hear you. He looks like he’s seconds away from murder.