The Widowed Alpha's Omega

Chapter 2

I was still sitting on the dining room floor, rubbing my thumb over the silver crescent like it was a stain I could scrub off, when the door creaked.

I didn't have to look up. I knew who it was just from the scent. He always smelled like lavender. I never knew why.

I didn't have the energy to look up at him, and I couldn't bring myself to try. But Cade didn't need me to. He picked me up off the floor, bridal style, and carried me to his room without a word. He set me gently on the bed, which smelled just like him, then walked out, only to return moments later with a towel and some bandages. He locked the door behind him and sat down beside me on the bed.

"You're cut," he said.

I hadn't noticed. A sliver of broken glass was stuck in my palm. I tried my best to sit up at his request. He pulled the sliver out so gently I barely felt it, then cleaned the wound and wrapped the bandage around my hand. His hands were big and careful, a warrior's hands.

"I'm fine," I said, and then my voice cracked straight down the middle and I was not fine at all.

He pulled me in. Just like that. One arm around my back, the other hand cupped behind my head, the way you'd hold something you were afraid would break. My face landed in his shirt. I cried. Ugly crying, the kind that makes noise and ruins your nose. With every tear, I could feel my heart breaking all over again. I relived the pain, the empty look in his eyes, his harsh words.

I knew I was unwanted, but it was a completely different thing to know something and to be told it.

Cade didn't say anything. He just let me cry into his shirt.

"Listen to me," he said into my hair, once I had stopped bawling. "You're beautiful, Tilly. You've been beautiful since we were kids, and I was too much of a coward to say it out loud. He's a fool. The Moon Goddess handed him a gift and he threw it on the floor. The Alpha is a fool, and I'd tell him to his face."

"You would not," I mumbled into his chest.

"I would." A pause. "Maybe not to his face."

I laughed, a wet hiccup of a laugh, and pulled back to look at him. Big mistake. He was closer than I'd planned. Dark curly hair fell over his forehead, and his brown eyes weren't looking anywhere but at me. For twelve years he had looked past me, over me, around me. Now he wasn't looking past anything.

"Why do you never—" I started.

"I know." His thumb brushed a tear off my cheek. "I know. I'm sorry."

His forehead came down against mine. I could feel his breath. My stomach turned over, and it wasn't like the Alpha's touch, which had hit me like a storm. This was warm and slow and asked for nothing. It felt like being safe. I hadn't felt safe in that house since I was ten years old. His mouth was an inch from mine.

"Cade," I whispered. "Dara." I was reminding him of his mate.

"I know," he said again. He didn't move.

"We believe that a mate bond is the strongest bond there is, Tilly. But when I look at you..." He ran his hand through my thick brown hair. "I'm tempted to believe there are stronger things in the world."

His words were soft, tempting, enchanting, everything I could possibly want to hear, except for the one thing I couldn't believe: that they were true.

His thumb brushed my cheek again before tilting my jaw closer to him, our breathing ragged and heavy, and then—

Two heavy knocks on the door interrupted us, or snapped me out of my deluded dream.

Cade let go of me so fast I almost fell off the bed.

"Who is it?"

"Open the door, Cade. Have you seen Tilly? She must have hidden somewhere, as she should. When I get my hands on her, she'll be sorry—" Warrick said from the other side of the door, sounding furious.

"She's not here," Cade said smoothly, almost like he had practiced it. I heard Warrick grunt and then stomp away. I let out a breath, but my relief was short-lived, because seconds later someone else knocked.

"Cade? Baby?" Dara's voice came through the door, soft and sweet. "The Alpha's gone. Can you walk me home?" She tried the handle, but it was locked.

Cade turned to look at me, his face expressionless. "Stay here," he said, then walked to the door and slipped through it in a way that wouldn't make it seem like he was hiding someone in his room.

I waited a few minutes, trying to collect myself and my thoughts, before sneaking out of the room with what was left of my dignity.

I wasn't stupid. I knew Cade could never be with someone like me. He had a strong and beautiful mate. Why would he give that up for me? It wasn't possible. If anything, he was just looking for a cheap mistress, and I wasn't going to give him the satisfaction.

But even as furious as I was, I couldn't help smiling a little at his words.

I was almost at my room when a hand grabbed me by my shirt and slammed me against the wall. I groaned in pain as strong hands pressed my shoulders into the wall.

"What were you thinking?" Bram yelled at me. Even with eyes identical to Cade's, his never carried the same softness.

"Bram—"

"No. You listen." He laughed, short and ugly. "Did you really think, for one second, that the Alpha of Blackridge, who buried the strongest Luna this pack has ever seen, would look at you and see anything but a mistake? You're foolish, Tilly. You're so far over your head you can't see the surface. He could have thrown you out of the territory tonight, and I had to beg, beg, to save this family from the shame."

"I didn't do anything—"

"Exactly. You never do anything. You just stand there and make us look bad."

The sound of someone walking into the hallway made him stop yelling.

He turned his head. "What are you doing here? I thought you were walking Dara home," he said to Cade, who stood awkwardly in the middle of the hallway.

I looked at Cade. Everything in me looked at Cade. *Say it,* I thought. *Say something. Say you held me. Say it was my fault, say it was yours, I don't care. Just say a word.*

"She's walking with Selene," Cade said casually.

His eyes were on the wall. They stayed there.

Something tore in me then, quieter than the Alpha's rejection and, in some ways, worse. The Alpha had hurt me with his words, in the open, honestly. Cade had held me for five minutes and then looked past me like I was nothing.

"Clean up the mess you left," Bram said, letting go of me. "Then go to your room. You'll be scrubbing the table at dawn."

I got up. My knees shook as I walked toward the dining room. As I passed Cade, his hand brushed mine for almost a second before dropping back to his side, as if it had been an error.

What were these mind games?