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I emergedfrom my heat feeling weak, irritable, and needing both food and a hot bath. A maid was quick to provide both, and I was grateful, perhaps more than I ever had been, I had access to this luxury. Omegas would always be the most pampered dynamic. But with the exhaustion of a heat and the stink of sweat and sex? I’d take every luxury society thought I was owed. I pulled on a fresh nightgown and placed a Norwich silk wrap over my shoulders, checking that it fell in such a way to hide my mate mark.
“Oh, goddess!” The events leading up to my heat flashed across my memory. I’d shot an alpha. He couldn't be dead? Surely not. But then again one never knew. I tugged on my lip… I’d go to Mama.
I located her in her bedroom, preparing to go to some dinner or other. She looked magnificent in her evening wear of a burnt orange silk cut rather high under the bust following the newest fashions. She’d placed a turban on her head, and I envied her ability to pull off such a look. I’d not worn dresses for ten years and in the hazy aftermath of my heat, longed to return to a more feminine appearance.
“You look lovely,” I told her and crossed the room to better help secure the string of black pearls about her neck. I hedged my bets since she hadn’t chastised me when I first walked into the room. “How long was my heat?”
“Six days. That alpha sent round a note. It is on my dressing table. My dear… I’m afraid you went too far this time.”
“I didn’t mean to shoot him.”
“No, I mean the paintings. It is all over town. Henry Doyne was here asking for the rights to create etchings to sell. I told him no. Bea…” She took my hand in hers and kissed my knuckles as she had when I was a child. “There is a great deal of interest. Your name is now on the lips of every person in London and soon the news will spread of the audacity of an omega to submit her work to the Academy. Thank the Goddess I was able to quash the rumour that you went into heat and were chased… It would have been impossible to save your reputation if you’d been raped. You should be grateful to the alpha you shot. As it is, your virtue is unquestioned.”
“My virtue?” I choked on the word. “The majority will not care! As if betas, or most alphas and omegas, give a thought to what takes place here in Town. I’m eight and twenty, Mama. Who cares for a spinster?”
“Too many. I still have hopes you will make a match and give up this ridiculous obstinance. A mate would do you a world of good.” She paused as if expecting me to talk back with her. But the argument was an old one, and I’d long since learnt to pick my battles with her. “In a week’s time, I go to Paris hoping to establish diplomatic relations with those barbaric revolutionaries. As if the guillotine will do anything to right injustices. I am glad your papa is not here to see this… So many of our friends, gone.”
Her eyes were filled with a bitterness I rarely saw, but she shook the melancholy off and fixed me with a steely glare. “You will come with me to Paris and remove any temptation you might have to kick up another scandal.”
“No!” I cried. “Banishment? Send me to Hertfordshire. But banishment?”
“And how is Paris worse than Hertfordshire? I’d need you to stay with an alpha I can trust to keep you in line. We both know there is none.”
“I won’t leave.” I looked away, afraid that even in the candlelight she would see the tears sparkling in my eyes. “Because of the distance. You know how hard it was while he was on the continent. We are in the same country now… The same city.”
“Don’t be so romantic,” she snapped. “I do not mean to be hard on you… But that is not how… That isn’t how a mate bond works… Enough. We shall speak tomorrow. Eat something and sleep. You’re in need of the rest. I dine with Arthur Wellesley tonight, quite an ambitious fellow. Don’t expect me at breakfast tomorrow.”
I clenched my teeth at the easy way she dismissed all my worries and managed my life… As if I were a mere omega. It rankled when I’d been encouraged to pursue my own desires for so many years. Perhaps my spinster status had changed her perception of me? Was I nothing but a hostess for her dinners and manager of the house and estates she would otherwise give no thought to?
“Here, the note.” She handed me a letter, the seal unbroken, and left the room without a backwards glance.
I sat at her dressing table and broke the seal.
Dear Miss Hartwell,
On the occasion of our first meeting, I was not able to introduce myself to you. My name is Lord Paxton.
I cursed. Lord Paxton?TheLord Paxton, who owned one of the greatest art collections in the country? Oh, how I would love to see it. Despite our less than ideal first meeting, surely Mama could wrangle a viewing? Perhaps on the pretence of an apology?
I realise my proposal was not amenable considering the circumstances, but I was sincere in my desire to purchase your series, Omega’s Gambit. While you will never be accepted into the Royal Academy, I believe that your work has value. I did not lie when I said your paintings are beautiful. Only your beauty surpasses their glory.
Lord Paxton went from being an alpha whose collection I longed to see, to a man and alpha who belonged in the Tower.
“This is too much!” I might have kicked the chair too hard for my toe hurt, and it wasn’t nearly as satisfying for a chair to land on a carpet with a soft thump. “Oh, if I were an alpha, I would run him through half a dozen times. Shoot and not miss my mark!”
I looked about, blindly hoping to find some way to assuage my anger. A plan formed. I’d beard the lion in his den. Still feverish from my heat, I dressed as quickly as possible. His address was not far. I could walk there in a few minutes. It did not matter if he was still in his sickbed. I would disabuse him of the notion that Beatrice Hartwell or her work was for sale; that a price could be put upon my name.
“Please inform Lord Paxton that Beatrice Hartwell desires to speak with him,” I instructed the butler, who’d looked at me askance when he’d opened the door. Like as not he could smell my heat on me, and I half expected him to turn me away. But I pushed past. I’d not be deterred.
“No need,” came the voice, so much deeper than I remembered. Lord Paxton stood at the top of the stairs wearing a heavily brocaded dressing gown. Underneath, his fine cotton shirt hung open and his silver hair fell about his shoulders. A week ago, I’d found him beautiful, but in the shadows with only a candle to light his face, his attractions were deadly.
“What are you doing here?” He lifted the candle higher, and I noticed for the first time that one of his arms was in a sling. A deep, unnatural satisfaction filled me at the sight of his injury. Not just any omega could take down an alpha and live to tell the tale, but I had. And now to take him down a peg or two for the presumptuous letter he’d dared write.
“I received your insulting letter and came to—”
“To shoot me again?” He seemed to lean forward in anticipation of a fight.
“If necessary.” I smiled as sweetly as the twins when they’d been caught doing something naughty. Regrettably, I’d forgotten to arm myself when I slipped out of the house. “In the other arm, of course.”
