Those eyes…

  I hold my hand over my chest, pressing my fingers into it to somehow relieve the mounting pressure and make it stop hurting deep inside.

  Can’t stop thinking about his eyes.

  Chapter 7

  Wren

  It has all become crystal clear. The discomfort, the goddamn headache, my stupid, scattered thoughts…it all makes sense. I pace between the aisles in the store, back and forth, my fingers digging into my hair until it hurts. Rut. It’s my fucking rut.

  I try to settle my breathing, but everything inside me is coiling and threatening to burst. It was supposed to come in more than a week, but it’s happening now. I can feel it.

  By tomorrow, or even tonight, those horrible sensations will fill my body. I’ll get tight and heavy in my skin, hot, and I’ll have only one thing on my mind, pushing me and nudging me and making me go crazy, no matter how hard I ignore it. All those emotions I don’t want to feel and things I don’t want to experience taking over and consuming everything. Here.

  Of all places, it had to be here.

  I can barely handle my rut anywhere else. I can barely handle the feeling of it coming before I dose myself with suppressants to try to erase it, but now I’m so close to the place where it all happened and I—

  “Fuck…”

  I stop pacing, my hand pressed into my chest. I’m trembling again. There were no suppressants in that medicine cabinet. Of course there weren’t. They don’t believe in that sort of thing around here. She certainly didn’t.

  For a moment, frustration over the entire situation surges through me with such intensity I kick the bag of potatoes lying on the bottom of one of the shelves. Grunting, I cover my face with my hands. I feel my breath hot against my fingers.

  What the fuck am I going to do?

  I can’t deal with this. Not now. Not like this.

  Not without help.

  My eyes are drawn to the cabinet. The cabinet that could provide the remedy for my suffering. It’s right there. Those pretty little pills could make this bearable. Could make me forget about the anxious response my body has to the state I’m about to be in and let me sleep through it like I usually do.

  I walk to it, staring at it blankly. This is the only way I’ll be able to deal with this shit. The rut is the final drop in the sea of pain and temptation my life has been recently. Felix, relapsing, my mother dying, getting stuck in here… I can’t survive all of this without it. How could I? How could I be fucking expected to handle it alone?!

  Dex’s devastated expression comes up in my mind, from when I came home from a two-day bender, but…it doesn’t matter.

  All that really matters is in that cabinet.

  I could break into it, I think. The metal and the lock look sturdy, but there are plenty of tools around here I could use. Of course, Russell would notice that. He’d know.

  So that’s a no. Too messy. Too difficult.

  I could try to get the key. Simple. The only problem…it’s always on his neck.

  It’s incredible how efficiently my mind works when it needs to come up with a way to get high. It’s like I could achieve anything. I could find the means to go back in time to be the first man to step on the Moon if I had to. So much energy buzzes through my body, all the way into the tips of my fingers, and my brain runs through the options like a state-of-the-art supercomputer.

  I can’t fight him for the key. He could snap my arm without even blinking if he wanted to. He probably wouldn’t even break a sweat. Not to mention we’re stuck here together for the next few days, so I cannot let him find out about this. Any of this.

  Which leaves me with only one option. I’ve done stuff like this before, after all…

  He’s lonely. I can tell. I sense it in those lingering glances.

  All I have to do is seduce him, pull that necklace off while undressing him, and screw him so hard he passes out. Then, I sneak downstairs and take the pills. He won’t check the contents of the boxes. He’s going to have no idea anything is missing until long after I’m gone. And I’ll become nothing but an ugly memory.

  A wave of nausea washes over me.

  I look down at my hands and release an unsteady exhale, my insides twisting and my throat so dry it hurts to swallow.

  What are you doing, Wren? What are you thinking?

  I shake my head, stepping away from the cabinet, but there is no escape. Just like there is no other fucking way! So why is my mind doing this to me? Why torture me with guilt and regret over what I’m going to do when there’s no alternative? Why can’t my conscience shut the fuck up like it has done so many times before?!

  You know you can’t handle this. You’re weak.

  If you try to push through without the drugs, you know what will happen.

  It will crush you—the weight of every dark thought and memory clanging inside your head—and then what?

  I suck in my lip, biting down on it.

  Dex will know I relapsed. She always knows. By now she can just tell. How many chances has she given me? How many times have I promised and sworn and then broken those promises over and over again? Will she actually kick me out this time when she finds out I used? Is she finally going to give up on me?

  The cabinet is like a blazing fire, and I’m nothing but a dumb bug mindlessly, helplessly drawn to it. All I want is the warmth. I don’t even care about the smell of my wings burning.

  Dex will have to understand, won’t she?

  She knew it when she tried to convince me not to come here. And when I tell her about having my rut early on top of all that, she will…she will get it. The voice inside my head finally convinces me she will, and I’m glad it does.

  It’ll all be okay. There’s no reason to worry. No reason to stop wanting this.

  Because wanting this feels so effortless and right.

  I nearly forget to grab the nut mix I used as an excuse before returning upstairs. I don’t feel like eating anymore, anyway. It’s the last thing on my mind. My entire being is set on that singular task, and I can’t focus on anything else.

  When I open the door, I find Rus all the way across the room. He sits on his bed, leaning over the half-open box with the bird on his lap, speaking to the animal softly with one hand inside.

  He notices me and looks up.

  Forcing the most believable smile I can muster, I put the pack of nuts on the table—the porridge in my bowl is all crusty and disgusting now, anyway—and walk to him. The tenderness in his voice translates into his expression, and for a moment it makes me angry because I don’t deserve it. To even be in his presence.

  I stand by his side, watching him gently stroke the bird. He’s a good person.

  My heart aches knowing that. Knowing I’m going to use him.

  “It’s very…calm,” I note quietly. Blizzard or not, it’s still a wild animal. I’d expect it to be flopping around in panic. “Is that normal?”

  Rus gently brushes his folded finger over the bird’s back before drawing his hand away. He doesn’t close the box right away, and yet the bird doesn’t attempt to fly out. “I think it’s just exhausted. Who knows how long it’s been caught in that storm? Magpies are smart. It must understand we’re helping.”

  I’m not sure about that, but I nod, not wanting to argue.

  “The wing doesn’t look broken,” he says, pointing at it. The bird is tucking it to the side with no obvious discomfort. “I’m thinking it might have gotten thrown against the house by the strong winds earlier.”

  A part of me wants to melt over his concern and interest in tending to this poor creature. Seeing this intimidating piece of a man look after a fragile little thing does something to me.

  Another part wants him to shut up so I can get on with it. It doesn’t care about this bird or anything else that’s not what I need. What I want from him so badly.

  But I can’t just pounce on him. There’s enough here—enough chemistry between us, the subtle looks and touches and coyness—but not enough for me to simply proposition him. I can tell he’s not someone who would just jump at the opportunity like that.

  As if you know him.

  I have to be careful about it. I’ve seduced people before. I’m good at it when I have the motivation. I simply use my strengths, study his signals, and strike with all my charm at the right moment.

  ‘You’re disgusting,’ another voice echoes somewhere deep within me. I swallow and bite the inside of my cheek, ignoring it. ‘You deserve everything that’s coming, and all that’s ever happened to you.’

  “Let’s not play any music from now on. I don’t want to frighten it.”

  My heart constricts painfully. Of course he doesn’t. That’s how soft his heart is.

  “Okay.”

  Rus turns to me, raising his brows slightly. “You alright?”

  I force the mask on. A mask of normality, of friendliness, of a human being that isn’t a disgusting, pathetic, desperate junkie about to do something horrible. “Yeah. My head keeps hurting, though. I’m going to take more of those painkillers. Sorry for not finishing the breakfast, it sort of—”

  “Don’t worry about it,” he says lightly, his face brightening up with a smile. “It wasn’t very good. Too dry. I…don’t make porridge often, as you can probably tell. It’s hard to mess up somethin’ so simple, but I managed, somehow.”

  I laugh, noticing the intrigue behind his eyes as I do.

  He places the box on the ground, moving slowly. The bird still doesn’t panic like I expect it to. Instead, it bobs its head in a quick, sharp movement, studying us with interest.

  “I’m going to lie down for a bit, I think.”

  “Sure,” Rus says, glancing at me briefly before looking away, his voice low and calm. Just like when he speaks to the magpie. Once again, guilt lashes at me—he doesn’t deserve to be a means to an end—but it’s dulled by the overwhelming need.

  If only I were better.

  If only I weren’t a pathetic piece of shit, then maybe this could be genuine. Maybe then I could open up to another person. Maybe then Felix wouldn’t have cheated…

  I nod and go grab the pills. They won’t help me, not really, but they dull the discomfort a tiny bit.

  I lie in bed after, staring at the wooden beams framing the ceiling, while Rus goes to put away the dishes and clean the kitchen.

  When he starts tending the fire, I turn my back to it, closing my eyes. He doesn’t push or linger. For a while, he’s downstairs, returning with more firewood, despite the fact that there already seems to be more than enough.

  He sits down with a book after, and at some point, I fall asleep.

  I always feel horribly fatigued right before my rut begins, but it’s not like the sleep I get is any help. It is a strange, nightmarish state where my mind races, coming up with feverish, nonsensical scenarios, and my muscles involuntarily tense up so much it hurts. Even though I’m unconscious, I wake up drained and feeling worse.

  Rus must have taken a shower while I was out, because the room smells of the same bergamot and shea butter soap I’ve used in there.

  I slowly roll onto my back and see him in the kitchen. He’s singing again, a different song this time, his voice low but still perfectly on key. As I look around, I freeze at the sight of the bird perched at the top of the footboard’s rail leg.

  Got free rein of the whole house now, huh?

  As I move and pull myself up to sit, the magpie startles and flies away to perch on the mantel of the fireplace instead. It looks at me, shits on the floor underneath, and glides down to the box that’s now placed on its side so that it can just walk in, with the water and seed bowls laid out in front of it.

  Rus clearly heard the movements, because when I turn to him, his gaze already fixates on me. “Feelin’ better?” he asks.

  I rub my face. No. I’m only going to feel worse and worse until…

  I draw in a deep breath and force a smile. “A bit. What time is it?” My phone sits on the couch, but I don’t want to touch it, so I don’t waste the little charge I have left.

  “Three…something.”

  Damn. I slept that long? It feels like I closed my eyes only for a minute.

  “Oh.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m cooking some late lunch—basically dinner. Rabbit and carrot stew. My mother used to make it. It’s divine,” he says and turns his back to me again, stirring something in a large pot on the stove. “At least I hope it’s goin’ to be.”

  I ignore the pinch of guilt and get up.

  “It looks to be flying just fine.”

  Rus hums in confusion before glancing at me and realizing I’m talking about our new companion. “Yeah, it’s gettin’ more lively. Was chirping a bit ago. When it flew out, it looked like the wing was a little sore, but hopefully, I’ll be able to release it back out when the storm’s over.”

  I wonder whether the bird is male or female. Looking at it, I can’t tell. I was never good at noticing these things, and as far as I know, it isn’t super obvious in magpies, anyway.

  “If it ever ends,” I say quietly, almost to myself, as I look out of the window. The snowfall is relentless. I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s so much that it completely swallows up the entire house. It honestly feels like it might.

  All at once, the hair on my arms prickles. I feel like I’ve been run into a corner. An uneasy shiver whispers through me.

  “You’re feelin’ it, huh? Cabin fever. I’m sorry. And I’m sorry you got stuck in here with me when you wanted to leave.”

  My stomach clenches at the genuine regret in his voice. Then it cramps even more at the realization that Rus can tell how miserable I am, and that might make it harder to get close. I have to stir up more than pity in him for my plan to work.

  I approach him in the kitchen. “Do you need help with anything?”

  Build rapport.

  He looks a little surprised but nods and lets me cut the carrots. “You’re free to keep singing, by the way. It’s…nice,” I say without looking at him. I feel his gaze on me for a moment before he starts humming the melody again.

  It’s not like I’m lying. I do enjoy his voice.

  I’m not doing anything wrong at all…

  Russell was right. The stew is divine. Rich, creamy, and satisfying.

  If only the anxiety over my approaching rut weren’t ruining each bite I take and haunting my every thought.

  In all my serious relationships, my focus would always be on my partner. They’d become more important than me and my problems. An unintended, pleasant distraction. Most of the time, I welcomed that. Other times, it only caused more issues.

  It took me a while to open up, but Felix was the first to help me actually enjoy my ruts. When it came, we’d fuck, and I would be his alpha and he my omega—the right way, the only way it’s supposed to be. But even that is ruined forever because of what he did. Because I couldn’t be good enough to prevent it from happening.

  Now I’m alone, and I’m here in this place, and…

  “So…you don’t have anyone close?” I blurt out. Stupid fucking question. I’m getting impatient. Messy. Rus looks up at me from his empty bowl, a curious gleam in his brown eyes. “I-I mean, back when I still lived here, I remember everyone always got paired up straight away. Folks would match kids together before they even got old enough to care. Always found it weird,” I say, hoping to somehow save it.

  He smiles softly and glances down. More of a faint smirk, really.

  “Most people here believe an omega needs an alpha—as much as an alpha needs an omega—to be fulfilled. I reckon it makes sense with how hard life up on the mountain can be. To have someone by your side. But I’ve never… I just… I dunno.”

  My heart flutters at the way his firm voice dips and goes uneasy at the end. He doesn’t look at me, only plays around with his spoon, running it against the rim of the bowl.

  I hate how easy he’s making it for me by being this vulnerable and honest.

  I hate myself, but I can’t stop.

  Because I have to do this. I need these horrible feelings to go away, and this is the only way.

  “Do you ever get…lonely?”

  With his complexion, I can see the blush that appears on his cheeks and his neck, even down to his muscular shoulders and bulging traps, before they get hidden by his t-shirt. His hand stops moving, and I hear him swallow.

  “Everybody gets lonely,” he says, the tender words nearly a whisper. His pheromones, no doubt released subconsciously, flow toward me, sweet and alluring.

  “Have you had an alpha before?” I continue with my risky, direct questioning. Seems to be working so far. “I mean, how did you deal with your heats in the army?”

  I think that the idea that my risque questions come from curiosity gives Rus back some confidence. He shifts in the seat and glances up at me, his cheeks still a little flushed. “You’re required to be on suppressants while you serve. It kind of messes up your body, but it’s the only way they allow venusfolk. It prevents, um…complications.”

  “Oh. I didn’t know that,” I mutter.

  It’s not like we’re animals who can’t control themselves. But betas are the majority of the population, so they can make whatever rules they want.

  “I just focused on myself and the work I was given when I was in the service and… Well, anyway, most alphas have always been kind of intimidated by me, so…”

  “That’s a shame,” I say, stretching out my leg under the table until it touches his. Rus quickly meets my fixed gaze and doesn’t move away, even though I can tell he’s conflicted about it. “I don’t see why they would be.”

  I’m telling the truth. Maybe not for the best reasons, but I am.

  Rus might not be what one imagines a regular omega to be, but that doesn’t matter. Everything about him is perfect in an unconventionally balanced way. His voice, his wide shoulders, his large hands, and his height—it all somehow fits with the softness that is inside. Nothing about him is performative; not a single thing he does exaggerated or insincere. I see it in those sweet, rich brown eyes, and that’s what makes him so attractive.