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Fucker.
Pounding footsteps echoed down the stairs and my daughter bursts through the door. "Mama! Mama! All my stuffed animals are in the net. I'm gonna play basketball. It was fun."
It takes me a minute to follow her thought process. "That sounds great, darling. I'll look into teams when you start school in a couple weeks."
"What should I do next?" Lexie asks.
Her presence helps soothe my bad mood, her happy chatter banishing the rest of my irritation.
"Let's see. Have you made your bed?"
She nods so hard she almost falls over. "I did that first."
"Okay, what about the rest of your toys? Have you put them away in the trunk at the foot of your bed yet?"
Her little nose wrinkles. "Nope."
I hold back a chuckle. "Then that's your next job."
"Okay. Can I throw them to practice making baskets?"
My eyes widen in alarm. "Uh, nope. The rest of your toys are made out of things that will break if you do that."
"Aww, man."
I bite the inside of my cheeks to hide my amusement. “How about this? You get your room looking pretty and get everything put away, and I'll look into getting you a basketball hoop for outside."
She raises a little fist in triumph. "Deal!"
I grin and shake my head as she races back upstairs, her feet pounding up each step. She's taken to the new place and the new town really well. It's been a relief. We've spent so much time moving around as I worked job after job to save money, I was glad to find this place available. Lexie starts school soon and I want her to have some stability as I work to finally settle down.
This is our new home and I have to make it work.
Even if it means playing nice with a wannabe alpha.
No matter how rude or arrogant he is.
It wouldn't be the first time.
The beta and his delicious scent of cinnamon and vanilla fades from my mind as I get back to work, setting up my kiln in the back, getting my paints and glazes shelved by color, scattering different pots and figurines and mugs throughout the room for people to paint or glaze. I went a little overboard on the canvases, with no idea what to do with them yet, so I lean them by size against the wall for now.
Bit by bit, the studio is coming together, turning into what I've always dreamed.
Not for the first time, I find myself grateful that Lexie’s father wanted nothing to do with me or her once I got pregnant, that he decided to focus on the omega he and our other alpha lover were searching for, ruining my dreams of them accepting me into the pack once they found an omega. I'd just been someone to pass time with.
I'd gotten so caught up in them, in two alphas paying me such close attention, spoiling me, that I'd given up on a lot of my dreams, ceding way too much control to them. I was so young and so foolish and actually believed they'd choose me, a beta, instead of finding themselves the perfect omega as soon as the Fureign Exchange arrived in town.
But once I'd fled town, pregnant and scared and alone, I got pissed off. And I started working and saving and going to school, determined never to depend on anyone, especially an alpha, ever again.
And this is the result -—a new business I'm excited about, the most precious daughter that ever existed, and a new home and town that had been nothing but lovely and welcoming.
Other than my landlord.
I refuse to let him be the burr in my heel in our new life.
If he hates arts and crafts so much, there should be no reason we end up around each other anymore.
