Page 25 of Rugged Hearts: Part One

Our omega. That rings in my head. I hate how a part of me loves hearing it. They don’t even know me and I don’t want to be anyone’s omega. That future isn’t for me anymore. I feel better knowing he didn’t tell them. Maybe they should know. I don’t want to be dishonest about what’s going on and he did say it’d be impossible to go through my heat on my own. I have scent matches. I can’t ignore that as much as I’d want to. I’ll just tell them I can’t do anything romantic right now.

I just mumble an okay in response to Liam and continue into the house. There’s so much natural light filling the space. Off the entryway to the right is a small lounge with a fireplace. I’m not sure what’s in the room to the left. The stairs are straight ahead, and just behind them there’s a long hallway that seems to stretch from one end of the house to the other, from left to right. I know from yesterday if we keep going straight we’d end up in the living room. Liam guides me to the right hallway with an almost immediate left into the kitchen where chaos is reigning and I can’t help but laugh, causing all of them to freeze and look at me.

Keelan is holding a plate of something in the air so Eli can’t get it even though he was jumping and trying to reach it. Ben is cooking at the stove like none of this is going on. Parker has headphones on, likely to block out all the noise while working on a laptop at the kitchen island. Jake was yelling at Eli and Keelan to stop and helping Ben carry in the food. He has three big plates of food in his hands that are balancing precariously. I’m full-on belly laughing at the scene in front of me, and soon I hear the rest of them start to laugh as well.

After a minute it dies down. Parker hops off the bar stool and pushes his headphones down as he approaches, being the first togreet me. Suddenly I’m engulfed in a hug. I didn’t expect that. After a few seconds of awkwardness, on my part, I wrap my arms around him and return his hug. It does feel good. His sweet peach scent is surrounding me and I may or may not nuzzle closer into him. All the guys are at least six feet tall if not taller, Parker included. He bends so his face is in the crook of my neck, taking in my scent. I don’t notice how silent it got until we pull away. Everyone is looking at us, while Parker seems unbothered.

“I’m so glad you’re here. It’s going to be the best day.” He smiles, eyes twinkling. He’s just so happy it rubs off on me and I return his smile. He links our hands and brings me into a room off the kitchen—their dining room. There’s windows everywhere along the two exterior walls, as well as two glass doors that seem to lead to a deck. Micah is already seated at the table reading something. Parker directs me to a middle seat on the opposite side of Micah. Parker doesn’t sit next to me. Instead, he goes to sit across from me. Odd.

The rest of the guys slowly trickle in, setting the table, and I feel like I should be doing something. As Jake brings in more plates for the table, I move to get up and help him set it. He doesn’t say anything, just gives me a barely-there smile. His dark beard nearly hides it. But I catch it, his eyes give it away. They’re a deep blue but it’s like happiness radiates from them, lighting them up from within.

Once the table is set, I return to my apparently designated seat. Jake and Eli end up being the ones sitting on either side of me. Did they plan who sat where? There are so many plates of food. There’s toast, bacon, scrambled eggs, even French toast, and—I let out a slight gasp—chocolate chip pancakes. My favorite. Eli is looking at me with a smirk as he grabs the plate and begins adding a stack of them to my plate. I smile widely. I haven’t had them in so long.

“This is amazing. Do you guys cook like this every day?” I say as I begin cutting into my food.

There’s a few chuckles before Ben answers, “Not for breakfast,but we try to have pack dinner every night together during the week or as often as possible. Today is special so we may have gone a little overboard.” He’s sitting next to Parker across from me. Micah is at the farthest end of the table to the right, with Keelan next to him. Liam is on Eli’s other side. The table is big enough to fit all eight of us comfortably. They all talk so easily. It’s interesting to see how a pack interacts. Growing up with my beta parents, I never really knew what pack life was like. Connor’s parents were my first glimpse at it beyond social media and movie portrayals. Connor was so sure we had a pack waiting out there somewhere. I guess he was right. He should be here for this. What am I thinking? I’m not part of their pack and likely won’t be.

Eli elbows me catching my attention. “You okay?”

“Mhm? Yeah why?”

“Your scent changed, and you stopped eating.”

Sometimes I hate how much our scent shows our emotions. I shrug and go back to eating, taking a deep breath of both Eli and Jake’s scents. Joy and peace. The tension melts away the more I focus on their scents. The conversations overall are light and easy. I should probably be trying to get to know them more too. I told them the heaviest parts of my own history already.

“How long have you all been a pack?” I ask no one in particular, as I continue eating.

Eli answers, “We officially became a pack in college. The twins here—” He gestures to Keelan and Parker. Wait, twins? I thought they were related as there’s some resemblance but twins is surprising. They must be fraternal. “—grew up with Ben and Liam. The four of them were planning to be pack when they went to college and happened to end up in a six-person dorm with the best duo ever.” He looks at me expectantly.

There’s him, Jake, and Micah left so I decide to mess with him a little. “Jake and Micah?”

The guys burst out laughing and Eli’s face falls before a playful pout replaces it. He boops my nose with his finger andsays, “Close, Sunshine, but no—Micah and yours truly.” He places an arm around me drawing me in as he continues his story. “We all clicked right away, for the most part. Fast forward two years, Ben, Micah, and I meet Jake in one of our business classes and as they say, the rest is history.”

“It’s a little more complicated than that. I didn’t officially join the pack until about three years ago,” Jake elaborates.

Micah is the one who responds to that. “You were part of our pack long before that. You just lived somewhere else until three years ago. So, in short we’ve all been together as a pack for nearly ten years, some of us knowing each other longer.” That seems to be the end of that now that he’s spoken. I know the least about him. We really didn’t meet until yesterday. His scent, the feeling it evokes reminds me of Connor. He has to be my scent match if that’s the case.

“How did you meet Connor?” Parker asks softly. I see Keelan not so subtly elbow him but Parker ignores it. It might be nice to talk about the good times with Connor, well before the stalking started. “You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to,” Ben adds.

“No, no, it’s fine. The past year I’ve been trying my hardest to not think about Connor as much as possible. Somehow with everything that happened since, I forget we had eight years together before the stalking started. They were the best years of my life. We met at the beginning of junior year of college at a party. My roommates dragged me along to get me out for once. I’m not really a party person, even now.” I laugh awkwardly. “I was hugging a wall reading a book on my phone and he came up to me, made a stupid joke to break the ice, and as you said the rest was history,” I finish, looking at Eli then Parker.

“What was he like?” Parker asks.

“Don’t answer that, we don’t need to bring up topics you’re uncomfortable with,” Keelan says this time.

I look between them wondering if I should take the out Keelan is giving me. The wound has already been opened after yesterday,what could it hurt to talk about him now. “It’s okay. He was funny. One of his favorite things to do was sail. We got his boat for his twenty-fifth birthday. His parents helped a lot but I saved for years planning for it. He actually cried when we showed it to him. He’d probably be mad I told you all that.” Some of the guys let out a light laugh. “He loved the outdoors but other than that he was kind of a homebody like me. Playing video games was his way to relax like reading or drawing is for me. That was our typical night during the week after work and dinner, us both together on the couch doing our own thing but spending time together. It was nice to just exist together like that…” I trail off, thinking about how those nights often ended with us cuddling or making love in my nest.

“He sounds like he would’ve fit right in with us,” Ben says, a sad smile crossing his face.

“Maybe, I still don’t know you all that well,” I say honestly. “Connor was so sure we were meant to have a pack. He held off bonding because of it.” The room is suddenly silent. I didn’t mean to say the last part out loud.

“You didn’t bond?” Micah asks as if he already knows the answer. I squirm a little in my seat. For some reason having his full attention on me is unnerving. Especially since we literally haven’t had one conversation together before today. He didn’t say anything yesterday.

“No, it was actually one of the few things we ever argued about. When the stalker got more intense, he agreed to bond. We planned a trip to North Carolina but he died two weeks before we were set to go,” I say sullenly.

What Micah says next stuns me. “Probably better you didn’t bond, now you’re free and clear no effects from his death.”

What. The. Fuck. “No effects from his death. What, like I’m not impacted by what happened? Why would you ever think that losing my alpha, who I was with for nearly a decade of my life, would leave no effect on me?” I’m yelling by the end and I can’t help the shaking in my hands. I have no idea how the others arereacting. My focus is on this asshole who looks wholly unbothered.