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“It’s not?” My hand flies to my chest.
I pretend to pout at her, but I’m too excited to keep up the act for very long. “Have you read it yet?”
“Who do you think I am? Of course, I’ve read it,” she teases, getting that faraway, dreamy look in her eyes she always does when she’s read something that she claims has changed her life. “It’s amazing. I may be a spinster, but if I could get my hands on a pack like that, I’d dig in my fingernails and never let go.”
“You’re not a spinster.” I scoff. “You’re barely in your thirties.”
“In my thirties and without so much as a single bond. I’m a spinster, darling, but I’m okay with it. As long as I have my books, I’m never alone. Besides, if I bonded, it would likely mean kissing this job goodbye, and I’d miss it too much.”
She sits back, running a finger over a clothbound tome she’s repairing in her spare time, watching as I carefully slide the new Riley North book into my satchel. When I look up again, she waves a hand at her desk. “Now, about that essay of yours.”
“Which one?”
She chuckles. “The one you gave me to read last month about Omega obedience?”
“Oh, that one.”
My heart speeds up as I wait for her feedback. I scoot to the edge of my chair, wincing at the lengthy silence. “Was it that bad?”
“Your essays are never terrible. I have to say this one surprised me. At first glance, it’s a truly gushing account of a system I happen to know you don’t agree with.”
“The sarcasm wasn’t obvious?”
She laughs. “It was to me, but to any outsider, it definitely wouldn’t look like satire. They’d take it as gospel and crown you a queen. Or they’d give you a job here as an instructor in Omega Etiquette Studies.”
My nose wrinkles.
“Hard pass. I don’t need a crown or a job brainwashing the next generation.”
Her pale-blue eyes light up as she laughs and shakes her head. “Is that what you think I’m doing, brainwashing the next generation?”
“No, but you teach Literature. Omega Etiquette Studies, though? One of those things is not like the other.”
“Well, at least it would be a job,” she says gently. “Have you thought about what comes next, Maddie? You’re almost 21, in your final year, yet, every time I ask, you change the subject.”
I exhale through my nostrils, closing my eyes for a moment and trying to center myself as the icy fingers of panic wrap around my heart. I tell Ms. Frampton everything. She’s one of my favorite people of all time and my only real friend here, but I can’t tell her the truth about this.
“I don’t know,” I hedge, aware of the fact she won’t let me change the topic again now that she’s put me on the spot. “I used to think I might like to continue my studies in either journalism or literature at a postgraduate level.”
“Used to?”
“Well, that was before I realized it’s not possible, is it?”
Because I would need to be bonded into a pack to be able to attend on my own, but there’s also the problem of money…”Getting a scholarship for an undergraduate degree wasn’t so difficult, but—”
“Most would disagree with you on that.”
I roll my eyes. “Fine, it was difficult, but I managed. Being awarded a scholarship at postgraduate level is next to impossible. It would also mean I wouldn’t be earning an income for a few more years and…”
I can’t bring myself to finish the sentence, but Ms. Frampton doesn’t need me to. She understands. As my closest confidante these last couple of years, she knows exactly what struggles I’m facing.
She considers me for a moment, then she nods. “What about the Mating Trials?”
I frown. “What about them?”
“You’re an eligible Omega, Maddie. For all you know, you could be the Omega who is selected from Cambridge tomorrow.”
I’ve never been particularly ladylike, but the snort that escapes me isn’t only unladylike, it’s barbaric. “That’s never going to happen.”
