“Or Candy,” she added at the end of that.
“Or Candy. Do I make myself clear?”
He didn’t want to, but he gave me a sharp little nod.
“Then get the fuck out of my office, now.”
I watched him scuttle on out, not entirely sure there wasn’t a wet patch on his pants as he did. When he was gone, I walked over to my door and shut it with a decisive click.
“Oh my fucking god,” Candy said in a faint little voice. “Riley, you’re a badass now.”
Chapter 40
I felt like one, right up until I got home. I decided I was going to try and stay at my own place tonight. I’d turned my phone back on, and while there were a bunch of missed calls, voicemails, and texts waiting for me, none came after I’d spoken to Colt. I admit, part of me was disappointed, but the rest? I was sure this was the right way to do things, until I walked up to my front door. There, sprawled across my doorstep, was a massive freaking wolf. I took in the buff-coloured fur tipped heavily with grey and knew exactly who it was.
Fen.
“Well, you can bugger off home,” I said, but his wolf, he just stared back at me with eyes of jade green. “I mean it, Fen. You hang around here, and the pound or the police will turn up.” His lips pulled back from his fangs slightly as a small growl rumbled in his chest. “OK then, your funeral, but you’re not coming inside.”
As much as a wolf could acknowledge my words, Fen did. He got to his feet, the sheer bloody size of him hitting me hard, looking way, way bigger than a natural wolf. But even as he stood there, a picture of feral power, he stepped back and away from my door, letting me unlock it and go through before he took up position by the door again. He whined as he looked through the security screen, but that just made me angry all over again.
What the hell was he doing here? Where was Janine, and how did she feel about her mate lying in wait outside my place? I admit, when I thought about the opposite, of them staking out this mysterious omega’s place, I was nowhere near as cool. My fingers tightened around my mail, shredding the edges of my gas bill, forcing me to take a long, steadying breath until I was able to smooth the paper back into some semblance of order. I stared at my fingers, hearing the sounds of Fen’s whines through the door as my claws receded again, returning to my normal nails.
The problem with being home was it was haunted now, and not just by a bloody massive wolf lolling around on my front step. When I went into the kitchen to grab a drink, I saw the ghost of Blake as he’d moved around the space, using it to perform culinary magic. Something I could do with now, if my stomach’s rumbling was anything to go by. But as I picked up my phone, punching in Sunny’s number to get them to deliver me a pizza, I saw Fen and his investigation of my underwear drawer.
I’d have to pretty much toss it all out now, I thought darkly and then placed the pizza order.
As I walked into the bedroom, I saw the phantoms of Colt and Haze, entering my dreams and my heart, then as I went into the en suite, I felt Blake pressing me up against the wall, telling me exactly how he felt. But I brushed past him and all the ghosts in my heart, and after peeling my new clothes off, then stepped into the shower. I scrubbed away the makeup, the bullshit, the highs and the lows of the day, finally walking back into my bedroom.
My first thought was yoga pants, because they were stretchy enough to cope with whatever was happening with my body, but those were forever tainted now. I ended up squeezing into what used to be a roomy pair of sweatpants, groaning at my now gigantic arse. Initially, I rethought the idea of pizza, but based on what I knew of omega physiology, this was happening no matter what I did. So I threw a T-shirt on over them and walked out into my lounge room, ready to wait for my pizza and just watch some damn TV for a bit, try and recentre myself, when I was faced with yet another problem.
Johnny, my usual delivery boy, carried a big stick torch with him when delivering, just in case the local dogs were feeling frisky, but I imagined him coming up to my gate and being confronted with Fen in wolf form. I let out a long sigh and then walked up to the front door, jerking it open and forcing Fen to scramble to his feet.
“I’ve got pizza on the way,” I said, not even sure wolf-Fen could comprehend what I was saying. It was yet another aspect of alpha physiology we didn’t really understand. “I need food. Like, really need it.” Fen-wolf whined as my stomach growled in response. “Johnny is not going to come down the front path if you’re sitting there, which will deprive me of delicious, delicious pizza-y goodness.” He just blinked at me then. “Aren’t you supposed to want to provide for your mate?”
That was a mistake. His body went stock still, letting out a low-pitched whoo sound in response.
“Fen, I need you to fuck off home and do whatever the hell it is you do there. If I don’t get this pizza—”
“Hey, Riley…” I looked up to see Johnny was already standing there. Sunny always reckoned he could hear when I was hangry and would get the pizza out to me in half the usual time. “Got a new dog?”
“Um, yeah,” I said, then walked over to the gate, Fen following on my heels. I’d paid for the pizza on my card, so he just handed me over the box, eyeing the wolf.
“Good doggy…” he said, reaching out a hand, only to snatch it back when Fen let out a sharp bark. “Not real friendly.”
“And not here for long,” I assured Johnny. “I’m just minding him for a friend.”
“Right, well, enjoy your night.”
I waved goodbye to Johnny before deciding I would do exactly what he said, walking back to the house and opening the front door. Fen danced around slightly then, his nails clicking on the concrete as he eyed the pizza, the door, then me.
“No,” I said firmly to all of it, and he sat back on his heels abruptly at the sound of command in my voice. I’d learned something important through all of this.
The popular image of an omega was a smaller, weaker, seductive creature who ensnared his or her alphas in a web of dense pheromones that none could resist, but that was bullshit.
Eloise was Omega Vanguard. She might tend to focus on the welfare of women and children rather than the big decisions about how things should go forward, but she was still a real power in the town, and not just as an adjunct of the alphas either. She might not have their musculature, their presence, but she could bark orders like the best of them and expect to have them obeyed. I’d seen her throw down with other omegas, fight in bloody battles to maintain her position as ruling omega in the pack or to hold off those who thought they might like to become Omega Vanguard themselves.
I’d been worried about what tapping into my latency would do to me, fearing that one day, I’d become one of those pitiable creatures shown in slides during a lecture on genetics at university. Instead? I set the box down on the coffee table, then popped the lid, grabbing a slice of pizza before switching the TV on. I felt like I’d tapped into a source of hitherto unknown power.