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Chapter Seventeen

Emma

I put my cell down on the kitchen counter and went through the motions of wiping down already clean surfaces.

It was a mess after the Dawn Agency stomped all through here, drawers opened, contents removed from cupboards and tossed all over the place.

Jude and Jewels had helped me to straighten most of it out, but it still felt dirty.

Jewels had called me, asking if I wanted her to come over. She was worried about me. Given how many messages I’d received from Jude, I knew he was concerned too. Today was the day of my graduation ceremony, and it was going nothing like I’d expected.

When I was little, I’d never thought that far ahead, and then my parents were gone and when I did, I’d always imagined Sloane being there.

It was funny how I’d spent so much time wanting her to be my sister again, yet it was only now that I thought about it, I realized she’d never stopped being my sister. She was just something more as well.

Since I’d returned to the apartment, I’d existed in a strangely depressed state, which hit me anew every time I moved around the space. There was no Sloane, so it was quiet, not that she was particularly noisy, but when you cohabitate with someone, they just had a presence.

I’d caught up with my collage friends earlier today, who’d all raved about the party in Desparion. Most wanted to go back to the alpha zone again, as did I, but not for the same reasons.

Either way, it wasn’t like I could simply stay there.

I could apply for a working visa, I supposed, but then what?

With no job there, I’d be a dead weight on my sister and her alpha, abandoning a career I’d spent three years working on all so I could explore a relationship that might be far bigger on my side than his.

Whatever was happening between Ryder and me was all too new.

Better if I returned to my life and took it slowly, sounded it out, and saw where it went.

Besides, I worried that he would always feel like he was missing out on a soul deep connection with an omega.

It all sounded very mystical in my mind whenever I thought about it, maybe a little romantic.

When I saw Jace and my sister, I witnessed how they instinctively turned to one another.

While I could never know the true depth of the bond, I understood, at least from an outside perspective, a hint of something both animalistic and beautiful.

Try as I might, I couldn’t shake myself out of the dark place I was wallowing in. Of course, I’d realized at some point Sloane and I would move apart, have relationships, maybe even marry and have kids. We’d want and need our own space, but we would still see each other regularly.

I’d never suspected that a night out could set in motion such life-changing events, which would, in turn, separate us completely.

I’d thought something had always been missing from Sloane’s life, so maybe this was it?

I had presumed that an omega revealed much younger, but what did I know?

I’d never met an omega. Nobody did, unless you happened to have a close relative or a friend.

Even so, you didn’t know them as a happy omega.

Instead, your only experience was that terrible, horrible writhing creature suffering a world of pain.

Like I had, they probably thought whatever the Dawn Agency did was a kindness because it eased their suffering.

Even as they ripped loved ones from your grasp, they were telling you it was necessary, how they would take care of them, but with that slight lip curl of distaste, as though an omega were already less than human in their eyes.

But you wanted to believe them so badly, because it was the government and if you couldn’t trust them, then we were all screwed.

If I hadn’t met Ryder, if I hadn’t had a contact in Desparion, I would have probably convinced myself it was for the best because her suffering had been truly terrifying.

Now I knew the other side, the corruption, how omegas were traded off and experimented on. I felt sick to the core, thinking of that happening to my sister or any woman. What happened to the alphas was equally heinous.

I wanted to help them, to pull the curtain back and show everyone what was happening, but how?

I wondered about the world, about many things.

It was like there was a sickness creeping over the landscape—one we were all blind to, existing in our happy, ignorant bubble, not realizing what was going on.

I was sure some people who’d lost alphas or omegas put up a fight, yet many others greeted the development with a sneer for lesser beings, a subcaste we must purge, telling ourselves that tossing them behind a wall of mesh and letting them fight it out was the humane option.

My heart broke, imagining Ryder being tossed into the zone as a young man, beaten by the other alphas and left to die. What kind of society would condone such an act?

I guessed alphas, like betas, came in a great variety of both good and bad.

I needed to make a decision, I realized, to work out what the hell to do with my life.

There was a job offer waiting for me. If this hadn’t happened, I’d be so excited about it.

Now I’d left my preferred company awaiting my answer, citing a family emergency.

Polite beta etiquette dictated they accept my request, but if they suspected my sister had revealed as an omega, likely they would have retracted the job offer and had my family name blacklisted with every recruitment agency in the sector.

Such was the fear within our community of falling prey to our animal side.

No one wanted to be associated with ravaging alphas or weak emotional omegas.

I snorted out a humorless laugh. Nothing could be further from the truth, but the press, the government, and whomever else might be pulling the strings, they were all keeping the two parts of humanity forever apart.

I would give them my answer after graduation.

It bought me two days. That was as much as I could hope for.

I had gotten the apartment back and there was a small nest egg of money our parents had left, but I wanted to live off my own earnings.

I needed to get a job. I could downsize the apartment and find somewhere smaller.

Thankfully, I’d written my speech a long time ago, so it was all ready for this afternoon.

Certainly, I was in no frame of mind to formulate one now.

I needed to knock myself out of this melancholic state.

Sloane had a new life now, which didn’t easily include me.

She was having a baby. How would I be there for her?

Once a week when they opened up to visitors?

I didn’t want to be apart from her, but my turmoil wasn’t only about Sloane.

It was about Ryder and our three wild days of passion.

I kept telling myself that a relationship needed a hell of a lot more than that.

Was it stupid that I felt a connection to him?

It sounded so fanciful to be convincing myself that he was the one, that I was falling for him when I barely knew him, yet I liked what I saw and wished to learn more about this complex man.

Then I reminded myself that he owned a bar in Desparion, and what the heck would I do? I had a mind with wants and needs that went beyond tussling in the sheets.

I tossed the cloth I’d been using to wipe the kitchen down before switching the dishwasher on.

It was odd not having Sloane here. No one was checking up on me to see if I’d replied to this email or completed that.

The world didn’t offer up what you desired ever, as far as I could see. Instead, it gave you some strange, twisted version that wasn’t quite in line with your expectations, and at others, a wild deviation.

Finished with my tidying, I showered and got changed into a classic black dress. People went to graduation ceremonies in all kinds of things, but Sloane would have expected me to wear something like this.

Today, I wore it gladly without a thought of complaint.

Opening my jewelry box, I took out the pearl choker that had belonged to my mother, along with the matching earrings and bracelet.

Putting them on felt symbolic, like I was casting off the wild events beyond the chain-link fence and returning to the sensible beta state, one carefully placed piece of jewelry at a time.

Picking up my small purse, I slipped my cell phone inside. My makeup was light with a dash of cherry red lipstick.

My cell rang.

“We’re outside,” Jewels said. “Are you ready? Or do you want us to come up?”

“I’m ready. See you in a few.” Slipping my cell back in my purse, I checked myself in the mirror, thinking Sloane would be proud of me. Scratch that, I knew she would be.

I was going to give myself today and tomorrow to work out what I was going to do with the rest of my life.

As I exited the apartment, I found Jude waiting in a smart suit, leaning against the side of a sleek BMW. Derick had let him loose in his baby, it seemed.

“Look at you!” I said, smiling.

“How are you feeling, love?” he asked.

“I’m good,” I replied, plastering on a bright smile. “I really am.”

“Okay, lots of photos. You wouldn’t believe the list of instructions Sloane sent me.”

I burst out laughing. Yep, that would be Sloane.

“I’m armed and ready to accept the challenge.” Jude waggled his eyebrows at me and swung the door wide open, then I graciously climbed in.

* * *

The graduation was everything I’d expected it to be—noisy, crowded, and full of happy faces. We met up with the rest of my design class, and Jude took lots of photos. I chatted to Sloane on the video, Jace hovering in the distance. I admit, I’d been distracted, wondering if Ryder was also there.

But why would he? I’d walked out without giving him any indication I was interested in more.

And neither had he.