Page 77 of Pack Choice

I can’t play all these games.

I pretend I can. I pretend I’m as good as the alphas at it all. But I’m not. They pretend like they want me, then when they’ve had me, they drop me like a rotten apple. Like the spicy little omega I am.

I can’t keep taking it over and over again. Pretending it doesn’t matter, that it doesn’t hurt. Not when my heart already hurts so badly every day. Not when it’s so hard to keep going. To pretend like everything’s okay. Like I don’t miss her oh so very very much.

Tears roll down my cheeks and I swipe them away, marching into the elevator as the doors swing open and turning to meet Ford’s eyes. Blurring with my watery vision. I see the pain and the hurt that’s crashing through my chest mirrored in his eyes and I don’t know what it means. But then the doors are closing and I’m descending. Descending alone.

When I reach the lobby, it’s empty. Colten’s right, everyone’s already left for the weekend, including Miss Snooty Receptionist.

I should wait for Ford. Wait for him to catch me up and take me home. After all, we were only knocked into on the road yesterday.

But I can’t do it. I can’t stand here waiting, with the pain in my heart cracking my ribs, and the pressure in my head straining against my skull and my lungs burning for oxygen.

I hook my heel on my foot and stroll towards the exit, straight through the doors and into the late-afternoon sunshine. I close my eyes, feeling the rays on my face, and inhale. The air of the city hits my nose, salty and dirty and smelling like gasoline.

Gasoline?

My eyes spring open.

“Hey there, little one.”

“River!” He’s leaning against the side of the building, his golden hair all ruffled about his head, his hands deep in the pockets of his jeans, one foot crossed over the other at the ankles.

A small crowd of people stand on the sidewalk staring at him, taking photos with their phones and sniggering to one another. They are most mostly women, apart from two men in dark suits holding them all back. River seems to be ignoring them all.

“What are you doing here?” I ask.

“Waiting for you,” he says, casually.

“Me?” I say, sniffing and attempting to pat my face dry with the sleeve of my dress.

“Hey,” he says, losing the laid back posture, and straightening, taking a step towards me. “Is everything okay, little one?”

I peer at our crowd of onlookers. “Just fine,” I say, picking up my feet and starting to walk along the sidewalk. I have no idea where I’m going. I need to get home. I need to prepare for my date with Pack Sensible. I don’t need to be rambling around the city with River Caspian on my heels and a pack of his fans chasing after him.

“Was it Colt?” River asks gently, from alongside me. I don’t answer him. “I know he can be an asshole but whatever he did–”

“You two are friends? Like brothers?”

“Yeah.”

I stop and face him and he stops too, the crowd of onlookers halting too, several paces away from us.

“Then tell me the truth, does Colten Turner have a girlfriend … or a boyfriend … or a partner of any description?”

“Why are you asking me this?” he asks with a hint of amusement.

“Is that a yes?”

“It is not a yes. It is a no. But I’m curious why you think he does? I thought my friend had made his interest in you clear.”

“He wanted to take me to a hotel and not to his house. In fact, he was pretty adamant about not going back to his house and that doesn’t seem right to me. It sets off all my omega tingly senses.”

“Argh,” River says, ruffling his hand through his golden curls in a way that has the crowd of fans swooning. “Ahhhh.”

“River?”

“It’s his business, not mine to tell.” I frown. “But it isn’t another woman, omega, or another man. As much as it kills me to admit it, the man only appears to have eyes for you.”