Page 22 of Bewitched

L ayla slept deep and hard, wrapped up in Jaxon’s arms, but even then, the living world crept in, tickling her eyelids. Her whole body ached as she extracted herself from his arms and tiptoed to the bathroom. The mirror was covered with a towel, and she didn’t dare pull it back to look. She felt strangely numb and tingly down to her fingers. Maybe she was still asleep. Maybe she was still in a dream.

She dressed in the clothes she found on the floor and wandered into the living room. She turned on the television, flipping it to the cartoon channel. The screen had a crack along the top right corner. She touched the webbed cracks that turned the pixels a flickering yellow and green. She’d done that. Well, Jaxon and Axel had done that, but she was responsible.

She wondered if she’d still feel that shameful ache years from now.

There was a thump from the bedroom and a sharp curse. Jaxon was through the hall in an instant, his sweatpants half on and carrying his shoes. He stopped abruptly and stared at her. He dropped his shoes without a word and pulled his pants the rest of the way up.

She stared at him, at the pattern of scars that crisscrossed his face.

She wondered if her father had ever fought over an omega. If he and Perida Iverson ever came to blows over an omega. Over Summer. Layla didn’t think he would. “My dad wasn’t tricked by a homewrecking omega.”

Jaxon stared at her a moment, blinking. “No,” he said slowly.

Layla continued to stare at him. No one else had ever bothered to tell her the truth, harsh and painful as it was. Her chest was heavy with lies, and it made her so tired. “He cheated on my mom. On purpose. With another alpha.”

He ducked his head. “Seems like.”

“What does that mean?”

He looked around the room as if waiting for his own rescuer. Eventually, he said, “I don’t know.”

“Everything went so bad so fast,” she said quietly. It all just fell apart in one conversation. “It was all because of me.”

Jaxon grimaced. “No. It wasn’t fast, and it wasn’t you. Everyone could see that trainwreck coming. Your sister saw it. It was already rotted, just painted over pretty so they could keep it standing, lying to anyone looking in.”

Her chest ached. “Am I rotted? I feel rotted. I’m apples.”

“No,” he said. “You’re a lemon tree.”

She scowled. “Lemon trees rot.”

He growled lowly. “I just woke up. Give me a minute. I’m trying very hard with this metaphor shit.” He grunted and rubbed his face. “You’re alive. You’re a tree. You’re still growing.”

“But I’m broken,” she said sadly. There was no picking up what she had shattered inside her. Like the broken dogs in his cabinet, there was no glue for her.

“And?” his voice turned harsh and angry. “Who’s not? Did you see those people down there? Your family? All of them are fucking destroyed. But they’ll get up, and they’ll keep going. Or they won’t.”

Layla shuddered, but she wasn’t cold. She was numb. “I’m supposed to be perfect.”

“How’s that going for you?”

Tears stung her eyes, but they didn’t fall. His anger curled in her chest, choking. “I was! I was perfect! I was everything my mom wanted me to be! I was a good girl. I got good grades. I charmed everyone. People liked me. I took her side every time. I—I wasn’t a whore. I wasn’t bad. I was a good beta girl. Then I wasn’t. And now you want… you want this perfect omega. Submissive and sweet and easy—”

“Stop,” he said.

“—she’ll stay in your house just waiting for you to come home. Everything will belong to you, even her, and she’ll never complain because she’s an omega. She’d not allowed—”

“Stop it!” Jaxon said louder.

She screamed. “I don’t know what you want from me.”

He stomped toward her, and she took an involuntary step back, bumping into the television. “You’re right, you don’t know shit. So stop putting words in my mouth. Holy hell, what is going on in your head? I thought we were fine. You wanted to stay!”

Tears spilled over her cheeks, and she tried to push her hair behind her ears. Her hands shook. “I don’t know.”

Jaxon looked like he’d been slapped.

She cleared her throat. She didn’t know what she was thinking. It was a noisy jumbling that sounded more like screaming. “I’m so confused. You’re not the one who had their life ripped apart. I just—my dad has been cheating on my mom since forever. And my mom, oh gods, she didn’t listen to me once down there. Not once. And it’s all about her image and just her . She called me a… And my dad… and Roan. What the fuck did they do to Roan? And then Damian is going to put my face out there as the poster child of a temptress whore because my suppressants failed, just so they can, I don’t know, make money? I don’t understand any of this. And I’m freaking out, and you’re just being a complete asshole.”

Jaxon gripped the back of the couch hard enough to make the wood framing creak. “You think it’s just you? I killed my brother! He was a shit, but he was mine. Now, we’ll never fix it because he’s meat. And your mother! She called me a bloody rapist! More than once. Right to my face,” he yelled. “And no one in that fucking room disagreed.”

Layla stared at her alpha, fear etched behind his eyes. She had known Jaxon Harlow for years. She had never seen him weak or worried or anything except strong and in complete control of everything around him. She couldn’t imagine him stripped of so much confidence.

“Kaiser disagreed. I did, too,” she said. “It wasn’t like that.”

“Kaiser’s an idiot,” he grumbled.

She pouted. “Am I an idiot too?”

“Yes,” he snapped.

She scowled.

He ran his hand over his beard and then through his hair, twitching and uncomfortable. “What my brother did to omegas… mate them, terrorize them, break their bonds, and then start all over on the next one. Axel would lure them in with his charm. They’d be in heat, or they wouldn’t be in heat. It didn’t matter. All that mattered was that he owned them for a little while. He would violate them, and they would love him for it because they didn’t have a choice. He didn’t let them have a choice. Then he cut them loose, broke their bonds. He was a monster.” He stared at her, a desperate sadness in his eyes. “Now, what the fuck did I do?”

Layla stared at him. He stared back, hollow, begging for absolution. She didn’t know why. It was her fault. It was her suppressants. It was her heat. “I made you—”

Jaxon banged his fist against the couch and bowed his head. “Shut up, girl, just stop talking,” he said desperately. “You’re so fucking twisted up, you can’t even hate me like you should.”

“I want to go home.” She desperately wanted to go home. Under her bed in the dark.

He flinched. “Okay.”

“But every time I think about home, I imagine my childhood bed in a house that doesn’t exist anymore. I can’t think of anywhere else I want to be. So what if I just… wasn’t?”

Jaxon had gone still. He was pale under the pink of his scars. “Layla…”

“Oh. That wasn’t a good thing to say, was it?” She should have just stayed in her dorm room. An omega happy to be trapped in her cage where she was safe. She sniffled.

“I’m going to call Warren,” he said.

She grimaced. “I just wanted to be happy. I tried so hard to happy, and it’s not working. Tell me how I’m supposed to be happy.”

He shook his head and reached for her. She let him take her hand and slowly sat her on the couch next to him. He took her wrist in his hand, rubbing his thumb over her scent gland before pulling her in the rest of the way, sitting her on his lap. She buried her face under his neck, taking in the heavy scent there.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“Shh, enough of that,” he said. “We’re both sorry enough as it is.”

She relaxed against him in the relative quiet, only the television playing in the background. He curled his arms around her, squeezing her tight. It wasn’t the nest under her bed, but it could be the second-best place she wanted to be.

Layla covered her ears as he called Warren, so she could pretend she didn’t hear him talking about her. She could pretend he didn’t say things like ‘I don’t think her head’s on straight,’ ‘she’s not making sense,’ and ‘she’s going to hurt herself unless you do something.’

She rocked fitfully, and Jaxon moved with her until he hung up with a frustrated growl.

“He’ll be here soon,” Jaxon said. “He said not to leave you alone.”

She nodded. The college had a seminar for freshmen omegas about mental health and living alone for the first time. They went over signs of depression and anxiety and how to use campus resources. She hadn’t paid attention. She wasn’t an omega. She’d never struggle like they would. Until now.

“Is he going to take me away?”

Jaxon took a long time to answer. “Only if you want.” He nuzzled the top of her head, his breath hot on her scalp. “I thought you had gone—earlier when I ran in here. Came to your senses and fled.”

She grimaced. His hands were hard on her, gripping like she would slip away, turn to smoke, and drift away. “Where would I go?”

“Anywhere. Not here,” he said.

She sighed. “I didn’t think of it. What happens now?”

“Warren will come. We’ll do what he says then.”

“Not that.” She stared at the ceiling. Everything in her head was so bad. It could only get worse when Damian sued the Wayland Corporation. The news would want to know everything about what happened, like they did with Roan and Holden. That attention had almost destroyed her, and she wasn’t even at the center of the scandal. She had stayed in her room, under her bed with her stuffed toys and pillows, while journalists knocked on the door and peeked in the windows. She missed her nest under the bed.

Not again. “I don’t want to be the face of this lawsuit. I can’t do it. I… I’m not strong enough. I can’t. Please, I don’t want the attention. I can’t stand to see my picture on the television. I don’t want to be out there — not for this, not for anything. I just want to be left alone.”

Jaxon nodded and brushed away the gathering tears from her eyes. “I’ll tell Damian. He’ll be an ass, but he’ll get over it.”

Her mouth was sticky and wet, hard to move. “I don’t want this to happen to other omegas either. Am I bad for… not wanting to?”

He shook his head and leaned in close, kissing her cheek. “Warren said he found more people, didn’t he? Some of them have to be mad enough to go against the Waylands. At the very least, there’s still Summer’s story. No life to ruin there.” He stared at her for a moment and grimaced at his word choice. “Bryson won’t let that get buried now.”

There was only one glaring problem: the problem who wouldn’t listen to her even if she begged. “My mom isn’t going to let this go.”

“Fuck your mother,” he snarled, baring his teeth.

She cringed, filled with the dual ache of anger and sadness. Layla wasn’t sure if she would ever be free from the need to please her. “She’s my mom.”

Jaxon pinched her chin and made her look at him. His eyes were dark and angry. “Stop. Fuck your mother and what she wants,” he ground out. “Fuck your brother. Fuck me. Do this for you. Or don’t do it for you. You want to flaunt this travesty the world over? That’s your decision. You don’t? Fine. Don’t let her threaten you with what she might do. Don’t you crawl back to her like she holds your leash. Hold your own leash, for fucks sake.”

She pulled her face from his grasp, tucking herself into his chest, where he couldn’t see her. He smelled like cinnamon and sweat. Sour anger with a tinge of fear.

Mina would tell her to let it all burn. Roan would say the same. Her father would say nothing at all. He’d just let the world pass by as he always did. Aslin didn’t make choices; he let choices happen to him.

Maybe that’s why everything was broken, because he wouldn’t reach for what he wanted, and now Layla didn’t know how. She was almost too tired to try. Almost.

She took Jaxon’s wrist in her hands, pressing her fingers into the scent gland until a fine sheen of oil covered his wrist. She swiped up the oily mix of pheromones and licked her fingers clean.

The flavor burned her tongue, buzzing her brain like too-sweet alcohol.

Jaxon purred louder. “Watch yourself, omega. I wouldn’t do that before we get visitors.”

Her lips twitched up. “I want you, I think. I just don’t want it to be because of hormones and chemicals and stupidity.”

He huffed. “All we are is chemicals and hormones,” he said. “And stupidity. A lot of that.”

She chuckled, and the numbing sadness ached. She rubbed her cheek against his chest, leaving behind a smear of her scent. “I want to love you. I want you, and I need you, and I don’t think we’ll ever be free of each other now, but I don’t… Please don’t be mad. I don’t know you. Not really. We’re not friends. We don’t hang out. We have nothing in common. You don’t like me—”

Jaxon squeezed her tighter against him. “I like you just fine.”

“You don’t. You just want to fuck me.”

His expression darkened. “Just because I don’t like the stupid beta decisions you make doesn’t mean I don’t like you.”

Layla squeezed her eyes closed. “I’ve never been an omega before. I wasn’t allowed. Do you understand that now? How it was all taken away and put on a box and put on a shelf that I couldn’t reach. Now, I think I’m missing most of the pieces. And it’s not… I can blame my mom, but it doesn’t matter. Nothing can fix who I am now.”

He cocked his head. “There’s nothing wrong with you. You have shitty instincts. You’re not the first omega to get their signals crossed. You’ll figure it out. You’re a smart girl. A little slow, but you get there.”

She snorted. It might have offended her before, but the feeling in her chest was fond. “I think I used to dream of you. I’d dream of sleeping in a nest, a nice one with pink curtains and bright green pillows. This alpha would sneak into my nest and curl around me like those pictures of a mommy cat and her babies.”

Jaxon nodded, staring at her.

“I thought the alpha in my dream was Dad or Bryson or someone I knew. Someone who was nice to me. But the dream didn’t smell like Dad or Bryson or Holden or anyone else. It smelled like you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Layla shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe Warren was right and that we were meant to be together.”

An annoyed growl took up the place of his purr. “Fate? I don’t believe in any of that shit.”

Layla hummed. She wasn’t sure she did either. Not since she was a little girl. “The big grumpy alpha doesn’t like soulmate romance. Noted.”

He jerked back and cocked his head in confusion.

She grinned. “Am I wrong?”

Jaxon sat back against the couch, still scowling, but he didn’t seem angry. “The beta-wannabe has jokes now.”

Layla sniffed and turned up her nose. “I’m very funny. Mina laughs at me constantly.”

He glanced at her again, the corner of his lips twitching up in spite of himself. “She’s a fucking piece of work.”

“I know! Did you know she has a big whiteboard in her room with a tally of how many people she’s stabbed?”

“Aye. I gave her the whiteboard.”

Layla giggled and leaned into him. She relaxed, comfortable and content, her head under his chin. His stubbled beard scratched her forehead as he nuzzled at the top of her head.

She wondered if they could stay like that forever, curled up and purring like in her dreams. She reached for his hand and twined their fingers together, his big palm dwarfing hers easily. She played with the rough skin of his knuckles, rubbing over bone.

Eventually, there was a knock on the door, and Warren came in at Jaxon’s shout, Nora following behind.

The omega doctor crouched down in front of her, and Layla felt like a fool for bothering him again. “You ready to take a little trip?”

She clung tighter to Jaxon’s hand. “Where? I don’t—”

“He’ll come too,” Warren said. “We’re just going to talk to some people better at this than I am. Alright?”

“A hospital?” she whispered.

“Of a sort,” he said.

She glanced at Jaxon. He was frowning but nodded. “Okay.”

Layla took Nora’s hand, and they waited for Jaxon to gather a bag of clothes and a few other things. He took her wrist in his hand and then slid his fingers down to twine between her own. He held her hand as they left the apartment and all the way into the car, waiting for them. He didn’t let her go when they reached the hospital or were sent to a room to wait. Layla didn’t let go of him, either, and she hoped she could keep holding on.