Page 1 of Omega Forged (Hartlock Omegas #2)

Tully

“Your parents’ sacrifice will always be remembered.” A beta dressed in black dabbed their glossy eyeline.

I didn’t know their name, but they knew mine. I was a mirror to reflect their righteous grief. They tossed a woeful look at the framed photo of my parents. A border of wreathed flowers added softness to their determined expressions.

It was taken a week before their death. I was in the background, my shoulders hunched over, much like now. Forever trying to blend into the background.

“Excuse me, I need a moment.”

I didn’t wait for them to reply before I showed my back and weaved through the crowd. My parents were being honored by Starhaven and given a statue to memorialize them. All I could think about was myself. The frayed rope of my insides and how utterly adrift I felt.

I pushed outside, where the shadows caught me in their cold embrace. The stars twinkled behind gauzy clouds, and I tracked them until the tight knot in my throat loosened.

“Fuck you,” I whispered to the stars.

My nose itched with more tears, and an unwieldy rage that had nowhere to go but my insides. Nobody at the funeral inside would understand why I cursed my heroic parents.

“Excuse me.” A voice interrupted me.

I looked over my shoulder, and a curse stabbed at my tongue.

Walden Baylark.

His nose twitched as if he sought my omega scent. I used scent wipes, knowing I would need a barrier to get through today. Normally, it was thick and sweet. I’d never gotten used to the way it made people treat me differently. The chemical residue the wipes left chafed my skin.

Walden’s crisp eucalyptus washed over me. One lungful of his scent and the heaviness in my body melted. Like ice sloughed away by the frigid sun. Cold, but still capable.

Walden Baylark was bone-deep elegance. I’d never seen him out of a custom suit, which molded around his towering form. He was twenty-six going on fifty, and at eight years older than me, a lifetime.

“W-what are you doing here?”

“I know our parents had a falling out years ago, but I had to attend. My parents send their condolences.”

The last time I’d seen Walden, I was twelve, and a newly presented omega.

I widened my eyes and almost swallowed my tongue.

In what world did Walden and I belong in the same sentence?

We both had prestigious surnames, but he wore his well.

His dark hair was immaculate, and rarely did his icy mask show cracks.

He never stepped outside the house without a set of cufflinks or a matching pocket square.

He’d awed me as a child, and even now, I couldn’t look at him for too long, or my cheeks would have flooded with color.

“I’m sorry for your loss, Tully.”

He took a step toward me, and I flinched onto the stone balcony.

I didn’t want his pity, that fell too close to the condescension I knew him for.

I twisted the bracelet on my wrist. A gift he’d given me years ago.

My stomach clenched as Walden’s gaze dropped, and I fought the urge to tuck it behind my back.

“You kept it.” Walden nodded to it.

I ran my fingers over the inscription. WWED. What Would Esta Do ?

Esta Hartlock, my ancestor. The last Hartlock omega, who paved a new way for Designated to live in packs, like we were supposed to.

She wouldn’t fall apart at the seams like I was close to doing.

I didn’t tell Walden that this was the first time I’d worn it.

My parents hated his family and everything they stood for.

An ostentatious gold bracelet appealed to my omega instincts.

I was all alone, and the gift had meant something once, years ago.

A last shot attempt to heal a widening rift between two legacy pack families.

“I think about that conversation we had a lot.”

When I was twelve and my omega Designation became obvious, Walden had ushered me into his office to stop me from overhearing an argument our parents were having about me.

I was the first omega born since Esta Hartlock, and that was a big deal, apparently.

He’d looked at my hands like I might smear germs on his pristine office.

I’d tried to hold my hot tears back until my eyes felt puffy.

We talked about Esta Hartlock and what it meant to be someone with a legacy pack name like ours.

Hartlock and Baylark. They couldn’t just exist, they had to leave a mark. It had upset my stomach at twelve. Now I nursed a similar queasy tumult.

“You were just a kid. I wanted to cheer you up,” Walden sighed.

Kid. It wasn’t wrong, but the word burned my throat with a bitter memory. I’d been off balance with the revelation of my scent. Honey and fig, too rich for my parents’ taste. I wonder if Walden would like my scent? He was a sharp, cool anchor, tying me to the ground.

“Did you bring another trinket, another useless pep talk?”

He winced. “Our families have a long history together, and the legacy of Starhaven lives on with your parents’ sacrifice.”

My shoulders rose to meet my ears. The word legacy was too large a word for my mouth and my tongue rolled around the weight of it. The implications frightened me. Sacrifice was another one. I’d heard it a thousand times tonight, and it made my ribs tighten around my chest and my stomach flip.

People reacted when they heard my name. Their eyebrows shot up, and their mouths dropped open.

“They saved the city.” The words chipped my teeth like stones.

“They will be missed. Don’t feel you have to be strong in front of me.” Walden’s tone turned soft, and I wanted to rip it from his mouth. I knew condescension, however well packaged. Who did he think he was?

“Thanks for your permission,” I snapped, but my chin wobbled.

Walden looked out over the bay, moonlit, as if the sight of my cracking composure moved him.

“I want you to know you don’t have to do everything on your own. The Baylarks are always here for you.”

I nodded while my stomach sank. Knowing how hard I tried every day to live up to my parents' unreasonable expectations. Until my forehead thumped, muscles ached, and tongue tangled. I wrung every bit of effort from my mind and body, and it still wasn’t enough.

“I don’t want anything from you.”

“Maybe one day you’ll change your mind. We don’t need to have any of our parents' enmity between us.” He waved his hand.

Heat crawled up my neck. The way he said it twisted deep and jagged into my chest. Heat stung unwelcome at the corners of my eyes. The tears I tried to suppress dripped down my cheeks.

The wind blew against me, bloated with scents, and the mix of them turned my stomach. Among them, crisp eucalypt, the only one that cut through the mess. I pinched my nose, not allowing Walden Baylark to comfort me, even in scent.

“You come here, knowing my parents hated your family. The great Walden Baylark offering his gilded protection, and you expect me to… what? Thank you for the privilege?”

Walden put his hands up, his jaw tight. “Offending you was the last thing I wanted, Tully.”

How many years had I stared at Walden like he was a lighthouse?

A pillar of all the things I wanted to be, and all the things I craved.

So handsome, responsible, and intelligent.

My heart thumped against my ribs, and it bruised.

When he called me a kid and the simple words devastated me.

I still wore his bracelet, because I wanted to be like Esta.

Not because I wanted anything to do with him.

“Fuck you, Walden.” I glared at Walden through hot, narrow slits. “How dare you come here when my parent’s bodies are barely cold? Trying to claw back the prestige your pack wanted from the Hartlock name. Some things never change, do they?”

I repeated words that weren’t my own. Wanting to leave a mark that matched the hurt I carried.

Walden took a step back, his hands palm up. “That’s not—”

“You’re not welcome here. Leave.” My voice rose high, suspiciously like a whine.

I wanted to pour the anger in my veins on him like lava. To burn off his composure and drag him into the throbbing mess I drowned in.

Walden’s exhale was loud with withheld judgment. I couldn’t look at him. I let myself be petulant. Everyone in the funeral behind us would find me lacking, if they didn’t already. My eulogy had been littered with choking stutters. I couldn’t honor my parents, only shame them.

Walden was just like them, only better at hiding it.

“Tully, if you need anything…” Walden whispered.

“ Leave .” My beg brought a lungful of his eucalyptus scent and calmed me despite how I fought it.

The tears cascaded as Walden left. I let them take me over. What did it matter? I was a mess. Best to embrace it. A soft white tissue shook in the corner of my gaze.

“Here, looks like you might need this.”

I took the tissue and looked at its owner. He was the opposite of Walden, who was elegant and untouchable. This man’s smile was wide with teeth. His whiskey eyes rolled heat through my shivering limbs.

“Thank you.” I sniffled.

“My name is Chase.”