Page 82 of Omega's Formula

Sara’s answer is immediate. “I don’t know. I don’t have access to his medical records, but I can tell you that he quit his job a few days ago and he hasn’t been seen at the hospital since.”

“Find him.”

I end the call and stand there in my empty penthouse.

I was wrong.

The thought is almost too big to contain. I was wrong about the recording. I was probably wrong about the research. Which means I was wrong about Nolan.

And if he’s pregnant...

If he’s carrying my child and I’ve spent the last month treating him like a criminal, throwing him out of his home, cutting him off from everything.

I sink onto the sofa and bury my face in my hands.

What have I done?

The penthouse has never felt this empty. All this space, all this expensive silence, and the only thing I can think about is a cramped cohabitation apartment. The way he’d curl up on the sofa with his laptop, frowning at the screen. The way he looked in the mornings, soft with sleep, before he remembered to put his armor back on.

I loved him.

The thought surfaces clear and undeniable, stripped of all the defenses I’ve been building against it.

I was falling in love with him, and instead of trusting that instinct, I let my own fear of being played override everything my gut was telling me.

And now he’s gone, and he might be carrying my child, and I don’t know how to fix any of it.

Somehow, I don’t think he will forgive me.

21. Nolan

I step off the bus into grey morning light, my duffel bag cutting into my shoulder, and take my first real breath in what feels like months. The air is clean. Cool. It doesn’t carry any trace of expensive cologne or alpha pheromones or the particular scent that’s been haunting my dreams since I left.

The bus station is smaller than I expected. A handful of other passengers disperse into the drizzle, heads down, moving with the kind of purposeful speed that suggests they know where they are going. I don’t. I have an address scribbled on a piece of paper and four months of savings and a baby the size of a lima bean growing inside me.

No big deal.

I find a bench under an awning and pull out my phone to check the directions to the house share. The battery is at twelve percent. The bus didn’t have any charging ports and I don’t own a battery pack.

At least I have somewhere to go.

The walk takes forty minutes. By the time I arrive, my jacket is damp and my feet ache and I’m pretty sure I look like a drowned rat. The house is a narrow Victorian painted an optimistic shade of yellow, wedged between two similarly narrow Victorians in shades of blue and green. A porch swing creaks in the breeze. Someone has planted marigolds in window boxes, bright spots of orange against the grey.

I knock.

The door opens to reveal a young woman with purple-streaked hair and suspicious eyes. She’s wearing an oversized sweater that says PORTLAND STATE UNIVERSITY and holding a mug of something that smells like chamomile.

“You’re the new guy?” She looks me up and down. “Nolan?”

“That’s me.”

“Huh.” She steps back to let me in, still assessing. “I’m Mich. I’m the one who posted the listing. You okay? You look exhausted.”

“I just got off an overnight bus.”

“Fair enough.” She leads me through a narrow hallway cluttered with shoes and jackets. The house smells like old wood and coffee and something baking. “Your room’s upstairs, second on the left. Bathroom’s at the end of the hall. Kitchen’s through there. House rules are on the fridge. Rent’s due on the first. Any questions?”

A thousand. None I can ask right now.