Lights, Camera, Omega (Hollywood Omegas #1)

He holds both hands up in the air, then casts his attention downward once more—toward the sandwich.

The anger is like a flame inside me. It licks up around my edges—climbing higher, threatening to consume me whole.

I round the counter, getting right up into Magnus’ personal space. I bare my teeth; I shrug off my relaxed slouch and stand at my full height.

“If you leave tomorrow, Magnus, I’m gonna—,” I begin to growl, but Magnus interrupts.

“You’re gonna what?” He nearly barks back at me—moving in a blur of speed and surprising strength. He has me pinned against the fridge in the blink of an eye.

“Are you going to lower your asking price dear Cosmo?” He’s breathing hard, his face flooded with anger to mask his fear.

“Are you going to recant your new demands so that I don’t have to sell my artistic soul to Ed Mammut? Or am I still going to have to figure out how to become Rumplestiltskin—to spin yet more bullshit into gold to be able to meet these new demands?”

I see Sol and Julian eyeing me over Magnus’ shoulder, and feel a pang of guilt for my expensive secret. Or should I say, secrets.

There will be time to explain—I have always wanted to tell them, for there to be openness and honesty… But with things as they are right now, suddenly courting and possibly bonding Daphne; it seems like there is simultaneously never a right time—and I feel an urgency to tell everyone everything as soon as possible.

We are pack, after all. Hopefully Daphne too, soon.

I want to quench the fires of this argument that I’ve started, and I don’t know how. Like so many times before, my temper has gotten the best of me and I haven’t thought things through. My propensity for burnt bridges has left me stranded more times than I can count. The desperation to cross the gulf of misunderstanding threatens to crush me when a soft whimpering noise catches everyone’s attention.

Daphne stands at the foot of the stairway, only her shiny, wet face visible in the cocoon of white sheets she’s wrapped herself in; crying softly.

“What’s going on?” She sniffles, her whole body shaking softly.

“I-I woke up and everyone was gone, and I was in the bed alone.” She gulps down a breath of air between her sobs

Sol rushes to her, holding her body against him as she wails, “I woke up and none of you were there.”

“Shhhhh, just a bunch of testosterone and pheromone neanderthals making loud grunting noises at each other because you’ve got us all in a one upmanship contest right now, Sunshine.”

“It’s my fault, Daphne, darling,” Julian coos, joining Sol in holding her.

“I should have stayed in the nest with you, even if the others decided they needed a break for a snack and some dick measuring.”

My stomach turns. How much did Daphne hear of Magnus’ and I’s little exchange?

I hate this game of half truths and lies by omission. As soon as Daphne’s heat is over, before we bond her—I’m going to tell my ‘secrets’.

About the money, about the long weekend trips, about my life before Magnus Wagner.

All of it.

When I emerge into the fuzzy half-waking from my slumber, I can tell that Cosmo is no longer bound to me by his knot, secreted inside my body and curved around me in the muzzy warmth of sleep.

Without opening my eyes I reach for Julian, who had been tending me with sweet kisses, gentle squeezes and hair stroking as I drifted to sleep—exhausted from taking Cosmo’s knot after the drama of the high evening. I stretch my fingers into the splayed blankets and sheets—still warm from where Julian once lay.

My insides churn. I know I should feed myself, that my body needs sustenance, energy. I should probably slug down some water and find something to eat, but it’s not hunger for food or drink that drives me most at the moment. I am ravenous and there is no delicacy that can satisfy, no libation that can slake this particular thirst.

I need my alphas.

I need a knot.

“Cosmo?” I mewl.

There’s no response.

“Sol?” I try again, slightly louder this time, but still there’s nothing.