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One
SIX YEARSAGO
QUINN
My chest is so tight, it’s as though someone has taken a knife and carved a jagged line across my flesh, splitting me open and allowing pain to burrow deep inside of me until it’s impossible to tell the difference between the agony and myself.
It’s a strange way to feel during a celebration of love. Even stranger is the smile pasted on my face, fake as plastic but just real enough to fool everyone. My mom and my new stepdads are chatting with a couple of their friends. Glowing with love.
I should be happy for her. And I am. But it doesn’t erase the fucked-up circumstances that brought us here.
When I was ten, my dads—a pack of alphas—stumbled upon their scent match. Their fated mate. With the population of the world exploding past the billions, the chances of scent matches crossing paths is so low that most never find each other. Not to mention, alpha and beta chromosomes are more dominant than omega ones. During the biggest population increase over a hundred years ago, omega birth rates declined.
Omegas and alphas are natural mates—their bodies and hormones are meant for each other—but scarcity changedthe way mates and packs work. Instead of monogamy, an omega with one alpha, when a match happens, it’s usually one omega with a pack. Though sometimes there are two omegas in a pack. Almost like nature is trying to over correct. And then there’s the pack bonds. Another thing prompted by the population explosion. Driven together by some event—sometimes traumatic, sometimes adrenaline, or even simply spending time together—a group of alphas and betas can bond. Forming familial like ties. Once the pack bonds, they’ll search for their mate.
With the way the world changed, my dads, like most other packs, decided to settle down and start a life without their scent match. They were happy. My mom might not have been an omega, but they grew to love her, and I thought they loved me.
That is, until they mether.
The omega who smelled too good to be true. Their fated mate. You might think my dads would pick their family over their scent match. Spoiler alert—they chose their fated mate, leaving me and Mom in a wake of heartache, tears, and silent screams into pillows. All the therapy Mom insisted I go to could never quite erase the agony of their absence. My dads already had a family.
My mom was a beta, sure, but they had loved her. How could they justleave? In the end, love wasn’t enough to keep our family together, and neither was I—their child. I’m not even worthy of a phone call on my birthday now. And while I’m ecstatic Mom has overcome her own pain and depression, love still terrifies me.
How can something that makes you feel so good also leave you utterly destroyed?
“Ten bucks says they boned in the coat closet,” a rasping, rich voice says near my ear.
Biting my cheek to keep from squeaking in surprise, I cut my gaze to where Dylan stands. Black hair swept to the side, almost carelessly so, and shimmering with an aura ofno fucks left to give, my new stepbrother settles against the wall I’m leaning against. Kick standing one leg, he shoves his hands into his pockets.
He’s wearing a tux, but instead of buttoned up and clean, he’s left several buttons undone, and a silk scrap of material hangs loose around his neck, a mere suggestion of what should be a bowtie. His eyes, blue as the moonlit sea, with creamy slashes of white throughout the irises, take me in, lingering on the short cut of my dress. Those irises are a little glossy, like he’s already had a drink or two, but he doesn’t waver. A heady amber scent, full of temptation and chaos, coils around my ankles, slithers up my leg, wraps around my middle, and settles around my neck.
Perfect.
Mine.
My stomach flutters, something it shouldn’t be doing. How cruel is it that fate would not only see my dads finding their scent match and leaving me and Mom, but also make it so that my own were just out of reach?
“Don’t be disgusting,” I mutter.
“Sex is natural between mates, Quinn,” he drawls, dropping his head against the wall and side-eyeing me.
Heat crawls up my neck, though it’s not related to the thought of my mom and her new mates. The epicenter of my filthy thoughts revolves around the alpha I can’t have...and maybe his older brothers.
When Mom first started dating, she kept it out of our house until things got serious. I met my stepdads a few times before they finally asked my mom to join their pack. And once she said yes, I was finally introduced to my stepbrothers. . . that was months ago. Now, every time I’m around them it’s torture.
Their scents are tempting, the embodiment of sin, and match to my own, though they don’t know that. The industrial-strength descenting lotion and scent-wicking underwear eliminate all traces of my scent. It’s a good thing I wear it religiously, otherwise who knows the drama it would have created the day we met. But, I’m the only one who knows the truth.
A dirty little secret I’ll keep until the day I die.
They’re mine. They’re all beautiful in an enigmatic way, and they’re so close to one another, it’s hard not to feel like an outsider. I’ve never ached to belong more than I do when they’re around.
“They definitely fucked before this. Look at your mom.”
I clench my jaw and glance away. “Gross. They’re our parents.”
“Which means you’re mine, now,” he says softly.
My heart skips a beat, then starts to race.His?Whipping my head around, I search Dylan’s face. I wet my lips. “What did you say?”
