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“Wyatt, what the hell is this all about? Vandercliff is an omega? How is that even possible?”
He was talking softly, but sound can carry long distances at night, so I held a finger up to my lips and nodded. “Lower your voice. Listen…it’s a long story,” I said. “I’ll tell you everything I know, and that’s not much. But first, I have to try to fix this. Get him back to the way he was. I’m just not sure how to do that. If this doesn’t work, then I’m out of ideas. I’ll just have to take him and run.”
“He’d be hard to smuggle out of here, and then what would you do with him?” He shook his head. “No, you should tell the captain. Let him handle things. Take yourself out of the equation.”
“No,” I snarled. Then at the look on my cousin’s face, I relented. “I’m sorry,” I ran a hand through my hair, feeling a little desperate. “He’s mine to take care of, Brandon. Nobody else’s. You know I’ve had my suspicions for a while now. I told you.”
He nodded. “And I didn’t believe you. I should have.”
“I talked myself out of believing it, too, because I never knew any kind of magic potion could change an omega so completely like that. But I’ve been more and more suspicious as time went on and tonight, finally, I decided to just confront him. I found him washing himself by the stream. And then one thing led to another.”
“I see. Did you…?”
“No, but I came damn close. I didn’t expect this, but I think—I think he must be my mate. Why else did I feel like this about him, even before I knew what he was for sure? It took us both by surprise when he went into full heat when I kissed him. Until now, I was the only one who could tell what he really was. I could scent him a little even when he was taking the potion every day.”
“And that’s why you wanted his pack? To try using this potion on him again to stop his heat?”
“Yes, but I don’t know if it will work. I don’t know much of anything for sure. But it’s worth a try. I’m sorry to drag you into this, but I didn’t expect any of this either.”
“Well, what did you expect, Wyatt?”
“I expected him to admit what he was and then I could take him to the captain and get him out of camp. But the second I kissed him, I knew he was my mate.”
“What in the hell are you going to do with him now? Especially if you can’t stop the heat. There isn’t anywhere nearby that you can take him. Not even any inns along the way.”
“I guess I’ll cross that bridge if I come to it. I have to take him back to Morovia, I guess.”
“No. If this potion does work, then you have to send him back to his tent. Make sure he keeps taking the potion and then in a few days, when this is over and we all get back to the fort, you can make some excuse to get him out of there. But you have to stay away from him until we get back off this patrol. Surely you realize that. Once you start with him, you’ll be out of control for a while.”
“I know. All right, I’ll try. That doesn’t mean I can do it. If the potion works—well, you’ll be able to tell more about that than I can. He always smells like an omega to me. He has from the beginning, but I kept telling myself I had to be imagining things.”
Brandon turned toward where Darcy was still sitting by the stream and sniffed the air. When it appeared that nothing happened, he called softly to him. “Vandercliff, can you come over here, please?”
I growled and made a move to get between them, but Brandon grabbed my arm. “Let me try this. I think the potion may have worked.”
I jerked my arm away, unhappy about it, but I nodded. “All right. But if you get carried away, I’ll stop you, Brandon, cousin or no cousin.”
He grinned at me. “Duly noted.”
I turned back to my omega. “Darcy. It’s okay. You can come over here now.”
He got up to run toward us, and I held up a hand to stop him as all my instincts came roaring back. I wanted to scoop him up and take him somewhere to ravish him.
“Slowly, Darcy. Please.”
He stopped and nodded, looking at me so fearfully, with such wide eyes that I had to take a deep breath and then go over to him and take his hand in mine. “It’s okay. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to yell. Just-just walk over to Alpha Brandon nice and slow, okay?”
He nodded and began moving toward Brandon again, but I guess the potion really must have been magic, because this time, it seemed to be working. On Brandon, anyway. He didn’t react in any particular way as Darcy came over to us, only stepping closer to him and sniffing all around him. Then he looked at me and smiled. “Smells like just another beta to me. I guess it worked.”
Relieved, I clapped him on the back. I turned to Darcy again and held him by both shoulders so I could look into his eyes, “It seems to work on other Alphas, but just not on me.”
“I don’t know what to say. The witch who gave it to me said I had to beware of the noble warrior, because he would bring about my fate. I guess she was talking about you.”
“Maybe she was, but I’d never hurt you, Darcy. For now, I’ll protect your secret until we can figure out what to do. Get some clothes out of your pack and get dressed. We’re going to walk you to your tent, and you crawl in and go to sleep. You must be tired. Anders will have questions for you, but just make some excuse. Say that I was giving you a hard time, and that I sent Alpha Brandon to get your pack just to scare you into thinking I was sending you home. Say anything. But do everything else as you normally would, and I’ll figure something out and come talk to you later. Understand?”
“Yes.”
I took his arm once he was dressed, and he’d given Brandon back his shirt. The three of us walked back into camp. We had a few interested looks, but most of the men in this part of the group knew we were trainers, and we had a reputation for being hard on the soldiers. They must have thought we caught Darcy doing something he shouldn’t have been doing. I took him over to his tent and leaned down to speak softly in his ear. I was already having a hard time letting him go.
