Page 27 of Omega’s Fold

I look at her. I look hard.

She looks back, not blinking.

“Donna.”

“Wyatt.”

I can feel the color going up my neck. I can feel, too, with a slow dull drop in my stomach, that she can smell me from three feet away. She knows what an omega smells like when his body is turning over. She has known me since I was twelve.

Her face does not change. Her eyes go a little kinder, which is worse.

“Let’s get inside,” she says. “It’s not going to be that bad, Wyatt. I promise.”

The meeting is a blur.

I sit where she puts me in the second row with Julian beside me on my right. She takes the seat to my left.

The Linden Group people are up front. They have a slide projector set up. They start talking about jobs and tax base and a phased approach.

I pick up maybe one word in three.

I hear Julian breathing beside me. I hear the small shift of his trousers when he crosses his legs.

I feel the warmth of his arm through my sleeve where our shoulders are, not touching, but nearly touching. It’s an inch, maybe. I could close the inch without moving my body, just by breathing in deep.

I do not breathe in deep.

I do not look at him.

The heat in my belly has gone from a gathering to a settled burn. I have sweat at my hairline and a slow, steady wet at the base of my spine.

Donna asks three questions during the Q and A. She asks them well. I hear her voice and I hear the Linden woman’s voice answering and the words move past me.

Someone asks my opinion. I don’t know who. I hear my name. I hear Donna say, easy as anything, “Wyatt’ll back me up on the easement issue, won’t you, Wyatt,” and I manage a single word that sounds like yes, and she takes it from there, and the meeting moves on.

I do not embarrass myself. That is what I will tell myself later. I did not embarrass myself.

The meeting ends. People stand. There is coffee at the back and handshakes at the front. Donna gets up, and I get up, and Julian gets up, and before Donna can reach him I put a hand on her elbow.

“A minute,” I say, low.

She comes with me out into the corridor. I put my back to the wall. She looks up at me and waits.

“I need space,” I say.

It has been our phrase for years. It means I am going under and I need the boys out of the house.

She nods once.

“When?”

“Tonight. Tomorrow. Maybe.” I swallow. “Soon.”

“I’ll come back tonight and the boys can pick up their things.”

“Thank you.” I close my eyes. “Can you take him too?”

I open my eyes. She is looking at me steadily.