Page 50 of Generation Omega: Claimed (Originverse #3)

ORY

She’s fidgeting. Why is she fidgeting? She doesn’t fidget like this with her other alphas. What am I missing? I push those questions at Mackenzie, who’s more present than he should be as I start the automobile.

She just left her pack, and you’re making her nervous. She’s never been alone with you—she’s hardly spoken to you.

I can’t decide whether Mackenzie is correct, but I feel the need to remind him that she’s never really been alone with him either. It was a good-sized yacht, but certainly not large enough for anyone to be alone, especially with other alphas always aware of her needs.

Say something comforting.

Okay, I’ve got this. “I look forward to disemboweling our enemies, after impaling their heads on spikes,” I declare forcefully, catching her flinch in my peripheral vision. I said something comforting—why did she flinch?

Ory, she’s not your origin omega, Queen Blood Rites and Mayhem. Try again.

Try again? Fine. “I will keep you safe, Tillie,” I growl. “I mean that.”

Tentatively, she sets her hand on my leg, deriving solace through contact. “It’s not you—it’s everything. I know you’ll keep me safe. Do you mind if I touch you?”

“Of course not,” I bark a bit too loudly for the interior of such a puny vehicle.

But this time, Tillie doesn’t react with concern.

She’s smiling, though it seems like an introductory expression, not the kind she would wear for her precious Mackenzie.

“We haven’t really talked, have we? But I suppose this isn’t a great time.

You’re in heightened combat mode, and I’m nervous as hell. ”

Is she underestimating my abilities? Thinking I’m some simple caveman, who can’t think, talk, and kill at the same time?

But I guess she doesn’t know me well enough to imagine the wealth of my capacity.

I withhold none of my well-earned confidence as I educate her.

“I am certainly capable of conversing with you while maintaining situational awareness and violently slaying any enemy that should seek to trouble us. I will keep my gaze trained on our surroundings though, rather than attending to you as you deserve.”

I hear her small release of breath, almost like a huffy laugh. “That’s probably for the best anyway. Not only are you smoking hot with murder in your eyes, but the way you stare at me is a little intimidating.” She quickly adds, “I get it though—I’m not judging.”

“Judging what ?” We’re moving along a road without much traffic, but it’s over a bridge that feels confining.

Tillie studies the setting, her eyes as grey as the sky above us.

To the window, she explains, “You look at me like you’re searching for her.

Like I said, I get it, but it’s strange.

I mean, our situation is fully bizarre. I’m with Mackenzie, and you’re with your omega who lives inside me, but you and I don’t really fit together, do we? ”

I emit a string of grumbling utterances that aren’t in any language I know, but that accurately represent the complexity of our affiliation. I almost expect her to mock me for my lack of clarity, but she’s grinning when she says, “Exactly.”

The silence stretches until I’m about to drag Mackenzie from the garden again. But then my words just arrive. “Does it bother you?”

The warmth of her hand reaches me, even through the thick jeans. “No. We don’t have to be anything other than packmates. As long as you’re good to Mackenzie, that’s all I care about.”

“He adores you, heart, body, soul. He thinks about you constantly—he’s thinking about you right now. You were the answer to all his questions, and meeting you made him complete for the first time.”

Tillie’s hand moves over my leg, exploring the definition of my muscular thigh. “Do you know everything he thinks about when he’s in his garden?”

I consider that while my body continues to react to her touch. “I probably could, but I don’t focus on him much when he’s away, unless I need his guidance. During the heat, I could barely recall his existence.”

“I bet that was really something, huh? Being with your omega for the first time after so long, and then the heat on top of it.”

Something in her tone sets me on edge, like a battle began and I can’t determine the direction from which my adversary will strike.

“In truth, I scarcely remember it, such is the nature of ruts. The time you gave me with my omega was different, entirely more satisfying.” I scan all directions, my eyes searching for danger, while the sense of peril sits beside me in this vehicle.

“Do you wish…?” She whispers those words but doesn’t complete her question.

“Wish what ?” I push, close to demanding.

When my gaze veers toward her, I catch her nibbling on her lip, worrying it. “That I was more generous, like Mackenzie is?”

“Generous?” I think about that word, attempting to understand the meaning she intends.

Mackenzie, lurking near the surface, is yammering at me, but Tillie asked me this question, not benign, perfect Mackenzie, who always knows the correct responses to all her queries.

I shove him right where he belongs. “Do I wish you gave over your time and life to your omega, so that I could spend more time with her?”

“Yes,” she answers, relieved at my understanding. “I know you were there when Jameson—clearly Gideon too—ordered me to stop letting my omega take over, but I didn’t get the chance to ask how you felt about that.”

“No.” My definitive response surprises her, and her hand grips my leg.

“Do you mind telling me why?”

I dare to turn my focus toward the beautiful woman seated beside me, just for a moment, one I value instantly.

Her compelling mouth is tense but slightly open, as though shock froze it in place—the weight of my powerful attention affects her much like a deer that catches sight of its hunter.

“Let me rephrase your question and perhaps you will better comprehend my thoughts on the matter.”

“Okay.”

“Do I wish the sole omega with the chance to alter the course of a disastrously mismanaged world would generously surrender her body and consciousness so that the long-dead first omega and alpha could… fuck mostly, if we’re being honest—that’s what you’re asking?”

She releases a nervous giggle. “Wow, that sounds really different, doesn’t it?”

“Tillie, Mackenzie is generous, perhaps to a fault, but right now, we both serve distinct purposes in this pack. The same isn’t true for you and your omega.

She has a role to play, ensuring heats occur, but she can’t exist in this time.

It was a grievous offense we suffered, and you were incredibly generous and tolerant about our desires, but more than that would not be appropriate.

It would be a dereliction of the sacred trust placed in you as this generation’s omega. ”

She’s thinking, but I can’t hear her thoughts.

I know they exist, but like static on a phone call, they are concealed, almost like they aren’t meant for me.

When her omega is in control, I certainly know what that sexy, feral beastie wants, but Tillie is not her inner omega.

Mackenzie has been with her for most of the past three days, so I don’t know whether this is a new development.

“Will you tell me what you’re thinking?” It was meant as a request, but it emerged on the more tyrannical side.

Her hand stops moving on my leg. “You don’t know?”

“Apparently not.”

Hopeful bubbles of joy seem to float all around her. “Really? What about Mackenzie?”

“He can only hear your thoughts when he’s at the surface, not when I seal him in the garden—where he is now.”

She claps her hands together, her excitement overflowing. “That’s so cool!”

“Why cool ? It is tactically unwise.”

Tillie delivers an assessing sort of nod.

“That’s probably true, but it’s also your ticket to becoming my favorite alpha—so, there’s that.

” She’s teasing me, and I rather prefer her mirth to her uncertainty.

Mackenzie is rubbing off on me in the worst way, but it’s also possible that my association with Maisie contaminated me with kindness long ago.

“Mackenzie doesn’t experience much privacy, but it doesn’t trouble him because he felt so alone most of his life. Do you not find consolation in your alphas’ constant attention to your needs?”

Seeming unaware that she’s digging her nails into my thigh, Tillie muses, “Sometimes, but other times, I just want to think my thoughts without having to worry how others will react. In fiction, having your lover read your mind is super sexy, but in reality, how do you keep any mystery in your life or even know yourself as you evolve, if you can’t ask yourself questions and give unguarded answers? ”

A veil of darkness—one I’ve felt before—envelops my awareness.

The omega legacy doesn’t need to share its opinion, because I’ve already seen this play and its disastrous conclusion.

“That you are clearly concerned about this—fixating likely—displays a fault line in your bonds. When we can, we must address this.”

Tillie waves that away like it’s a bothersome insect. “We’re still new. We’ll get there. Now, if you want to know what I was thinking, it was about us, you and me.”

“Please explain.” I take a right and then a left, moving closer to our destination.

“Mackenzie told me that you want to get me pregnant. What he actually said was that you want to put a wee bairn in me , and that it’s important to the omegaverse that I get knocked up ASAP.” Tillie delivers that statement like she’s testing me, seeking to evaluate my response.

I present my smugness to her like it’s a diamond ring. “That is correct.”