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“Leave!”
I found my feet reluctantly carrying me out of the room. Shame choking me, making me weak with uncertainty, furious with myself for not standing up and taking my mate. My mate! The ache was unbearable. But what could… If I stayed, was accused of rape, what would that do to the light in Trix’s eyes? It would go out. She would be denied every joy that the privilege of her birth afforded her. I stopped in the door, took a step forward. I’d not go without speaking to her first. But Mrs Hartwell snarled a word and Smythe with all his stinking smugness dragged me out the door and slammed it in my face.
Hope left me hollow for my heart stayed with the omega I worshiped. I loved her more even as the inches grew, the feet extended until I knew I had taken that step too far and could never return. I was a coward and her parents were right. She deserved better than an alpha who bared his neck at the first hurdle.
“John,” Charles Hartwell’s voice was quiet, what might be called a stage whisper. I clenched my teeth, but stopped on the stair and turned around to look at him. “Take this.”
He held out a densely carved box. The scent told me it was made of sandalwood—likely costing more money than I had to my name. “Take it. Please. I cannot gainsay my alpha. She is very protective of our girls, and Beatrice in particular. But… If anything, anything happens, we shall let you know. Go. Make your fortune. Perhaps my mate will relent. You are not a bad man. Remember that.”
I growled. “You think… You truly believe that your mate won’t poison Trix against me? For a pair who claim such a liberal ideals, you sure have a way to destroy the happiness of two people destined for each other. One of whom you proclaim to love.”
He flinched as if I’d slapped him. He opened his mouth, but I forestalled him by raising a hand. “I don’t want to hear it, Hartwell. You know where to find me.”
A week. I waited a week, some small, pathetic part of me hoping that I’d hear from my mate, that I’d be summoned back. And all the time I waited, I was confined to my room, locked in by my alpha uncle who could see how close to violence I was. How ready to take my mate from the prison her parents had created for her.
At last, however, it was too much. I broke free, climbing out the window and crossing to the New Town. I expected to be denied, but my enemy opened the door before the second knock.
“She is gone,” Mrs Hartwell smirked. “I’ve sent her to where she will never have to see you again. But do not think we are cruel. I’ll give you a way to become worthy of her.”
That cruel twist of her lips told me that was never going to happen, but my young heart wanted any glimmer of hope.
“Go into the army. We shall be happy to sponsor you,” Charles Hartwell sat forward, a genuine look of hope on his face. “Become a hero.”
“Perhaps blood will wash away the stink of Shop that follows you.” Mrs Hartwell sneered.
Present
I shook the memories away. I was not nineteen. I’d faced more terrifying alphas. And the only person I owed anything to was a curvy, redheaded omega who had no reason to accept my excuses, for they were no more than that.
“You lost all my respect the moment I realised you cared more about your precious reputation than you did about your child’s happiness.”
“Baseborn—”
“Your true colours are showing, madam. I bid you goodnight.”
I waved two fingers at the outraged but impotent alpha, then climbed the stairs suddenly too tired to care about anything save my bed. Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow would come, and every soldier knew the benefit of a goodnight’s rest.
Jack
When I’d been shownmy room earlier, I’d been surprised at its grandeur. I couldn’t begin to tally the cost of the furnishings or paintings and odd knickknacks that covered the surfaces. At nineteen, the concept of such wealth would have eluded my wildest fantasies. Yet it had taken an elevation in rank and fortune for me to decide to claim my mate. Had they been right? Had my estate been too meagre and poor to take on the mantle of Beatrice’s alpha and mate?
My head was too fuzzy from Orley’s wine and the stunning revelation that Trix could have improved on perfection and the confrontation with her mother. A night’s rest would reorder my thoughts. I stripped quickly and climbed into the soft bed. I’d never enjoyed the feather mattresses of the Quality. A soldier’s cot was more to my liking… or a nest. I groaned as the image of Beatrice laid out in her nest appeared in my mind. I blew out the candle and reached for my cock but pulled my hand away at the sound of a sharp knock.
“It’s me.”
“Come in, Pax,” I called back resigned to the fact he would want to talk about Beatrice and most likely the little fracas I’d started.
The bed dipped and Paxton lay on his back next to me. “You shouldn’t have issued such a challenge. What if you’d been hurt?”
“More than the black eye?” I sighed. “I’ve never lost a fight I didn’t mean to lose. Pax, ask. Whatever you wish to know…”
He rolled over to look at me. Even in the near dark, I could imagine his face drawn into a scowl. This was an alpha who couldn’t be embarrassed, he didn’t let himself be. So he frowned and snapped instead. “Tell me about her. Your relationship with her.”
“Why haven’t you asked before?”
“I… I’d never seen you with her. You stood so close to her.”
“Her father employed mine to print his books, all of them. They appeared so… ordinary. We got to know them. I was an older brother of sorts to the girls. Hartwell omegas, girls as they were then, don’t know the concept of subtlety. They’d run off, and I’d go find them. In the oddest places. Hippolyta made it to St. Andrea’s University when she was ten. I didn’t appreciate the difference between our estates until I was seventeen. I presented as an alpha at twelve… A year later, Beatrice presented as an omega. I felt protective. Protective again three years later when Polly presented. I was like a brother to them.”
