The Omega's Choice

Chapter 16: Tamsin's POV

It’s funny how moonlight makes everything look softer. Even scars.

The Full Moon Festival is in full swing—lanterns swaying above the courtyard like floating embers, laughter spilling out of every corner, and music thumping in the ground like a second heartbeat.

Everyone looks radiant, glittering, drunk on wine and the illusion that everything’s fine.

Including me.

Lior spins me in the middle of the courtyard, and I laugh—genuinely. Like something in me is still alive.

“You’ve got a good smile,” he says, grinning as he catches me, his hand warm on the small of my back. “You should wear it more.”

“I should punch you for saying something that cheesy,” I mutter.

“Do it. Ruin my night. Although, I know you won’t,” he teases, smug as hell.

I roll my eyes, but the corners of my mouth twitch upward.

Damn him. How has he managed to crawl his way up to my head?

Heck, I still haven't stopped feeling the tug of the severed mating bond between Nox and I. I would say that sometimes, it feels like I'm going half insane.

I wake up in the morning and step out of my room door, and the first scent I'm greeted with is citrus...and alcohol, but mostly citrus.

I smell him everywhere.

However, Lior just knows how to replace him. How to make me feel like I wasn't mated to Nox in the first place.

At first, I wanted to believe that he feels nothing but pity for me, but that doesn't exactly check out. It's genuine, what's going on between him and I.

Don't get ahead of yourself, I haven't named it yet. But there's something.

Let's take tonight for example.

The dress I’m wearing catches the light every time I move—moonlace, as Lior called it.

Whisper-thin and woven with silver thread, the fabric clings to me like second skin. I hadn’t wanted to wear it.

It felt too soft, too special. But Lior insisted. He said I deserved to feel beautiful again.

Imagine that? Words a lady would die to hear. He said them.

And now I’m here. At a festival I once dreamed of attending with the person the moon would chose for me.

I'm dancing under the full moon with someone who isn’t him, in fact. But a polar opposite of him.

His Beta, bestfriend and brother in-law.

Kira sighs in my head, quiet. “You can't possibly be thinking about Nox when you have Lior, Tammy.”

Too late.

My gaze flickers, almost instinctively, toward the pack house. Toward the balcony overlooking the courtyard like a watchtower. And there he is.

Alpha Nox.

He's dressed in black, carved out of shadow and moonlight, standing beside Zara like they were molded for this.

She’s in crimson—of course she is—looking smug and perfect and completely unbothered. Her hand curls around his elbow, her smile wide and performative.

But he doesn't smile back. His mind seems to be elsewhere as his eyes scount the ground. I almost have a heart attack when his eyes land on mine.

It's a bit too dramatic, if I'm to be honest. Think of it as one of those moments on TV when the handsome hero that everyone wants, suddenly finds the eyes of the shy girl everyone hates, but he likes, for some odd reason.

This feels like one of those moments. Except I'm not exactly hated by everyone.

Sure, there are a ton of people in the pack that are a hundred percent loyal to Zara and Selene, who feels like I'm standing in the way to the pack's greatness... doesn't make sense, I know.

But there are also people that still don't see me any different. Lior, Silas...a few others that I can't really remember. Few, but hey, it's something.

Kira stirs. “Nox is watching. He hasn’t stopped watching.”

Lior must feel it too, because he leans in and says low in my ear, “Wanna leave? We could go to the river. Skip the whole parade-of-the-powerful part of the night.”

I want to say yes. To leave the intensity of Nox's gaze, but then my spine straightens and I meet Nox’s gaze across the space.

“No,” I whisper to Lior, smiling just a little too wide. “Let’s dance.”

If I’m going to drown, I might as well do it in style.

"Your call," Lior chuckles and he takes me in his arms again.

We dance in perfect symphony, his arms just perfectly fit for my body. In the moment, it feels like perhaps the moon goddess made a mistake and Lior was supposed to be mine in the initial.

He says something I don't quite catch, but his facial expression becomes the joke for me because I laugh, and this time it’s loud enough to carry.

I think Zara notices because when my eyes glide up to the balcony, I see her eyes cold enough to turn me to ice.

Nox has never taken his eyes off me though, which explains why Zara would be glaring ice at me.

Her hand tightens on Nox’s arm and another fake smile plasters on to her lips.

Then—like it’s nothing—she leans in and kisses him on his lips.

I don't want to falter or freeze, but it hurts either way. It feels like I suddenly stepped on nails, except my heart was in my feet.

Lior notices the change in my mood and traces my line of sight up to the balcony. Nox has now welcomed Zara's kiss and he's clinging to her like his life depends on it.

My body and wolf reacts because the bond isn't completely severed, and it's only natural to feel it.

However, I quickly regain myself. Goddess, I'm done being so pathetic. He's manipulating my emotions, showing me that he still is yet to regret his choices...even though he's shown me once that he feels like s**t.

If I recall encounter with him on the hallway.

Anyway, I just grab Lior’s hand and twirl myself around like I’m the happiest girl on earth.

I’m not. But tonight, if he's going to pretend, then I'm going to pretend. It takes two to play this game.

If Nox can parade around with the woman he chose over me, I can at least fake it with the man who’s trying to help me feel whole again.

Still, that doesn't mean that my chest isn't on fire, because it is.

The moment the music shifts to something slower, Lior slows with it, but he doesn’t pull me in close like the other lovers and mates around do.

He just looks down at me and says quietly, “You wanna sit?”

I nod.

We walk off the dance floor and settle near the edge of the garden, just far enough to escape the noise.

The lanterns cast golden circles over the grass, and the scent of wine and moonfruit hangs heavy in the air.

"You know something Tamsin?" He asks after we're settled.

He's not looking at me. His eyes are up to the balcony. Staring at Nox dead in the eye.

"Know what?"

"He hates me, but he can't bring himself to say the reason why he hates me. So he tolerates me," he admits.

"Of course he can't say anything about it. It shouldn't matter to him."

He looks at me now and smiles. "Yeah, it shouldn't. But we're not anything, are we?"

My heart skips at that and I toy with the right answer.

"Just throw yourself at him already," Kira purs. "One way to full recovery can be another brand of wolf. Especially his Beta, if you're up to revenge."

I shake my head like it'll get rid of Kira and smile back at him. "We're friends, and that's something."

His smile filters for a brief second, but then it's back again. "Yeah, friends."

"Oh my gods. Tamsin... you f*****g–"

"Touch grass, Kira."

"He said there's a curse," Lior suddenly blurts out.

"I'm sorry?"

"Nox," he specifies. "The reason he rejected you. I don't think he's told you, but he said there's a curse if omegas mate with Alphas. Said it's what killed his grandfather and his father."

A curse? Is this what Selene meant when she said...

"Yes, Einstein." Kira says. "Yes, it's obviously what she meant.

"A curse?" I repeat.

"It supposedly kills the Alpha that mates with the omega. It's something his mother believes happened to her mate and his grandfather too."

"So...why didn't he tell me? Why did he say that I wasn't fit to be Luna?"

I feel the anger rising in my bones before I can even put a name on the emotion. f**k this, but if it was bad, then the moon wouldn't have mated us.

"You know Nox. He's an alpha. And if there's one thing I know about Alphas, it's their pride. He'd rather make it seem like you're the problem, rather than admit that he's scared to brace fate so he doesn't die young," Lior shrugs.

The tears burn in the back of my eyes and I don't hold them back.

"But why?" I croak out. "Why make me feel less? Why not tell the truth for what it really is?"

Lior's hands wrap tentatively around mine. "It's just the way he is, Tamsin. Don't let it ruin your night."

"You don't understand," I pull my hand away from his. "I spent sleepless nights wondering what was in Zara that he couldn't find in me. I spent nights trying to make myself appear a little more Luna material just so he'd look my way again and maybe see that he's made a mistake. I lost my friends to this rejection and it's all because he's scared?"

Something flashes in Lior's eyes and he sighs, running a hand through his hair. "I shouldn't have told you. I'm sorry."

"I need to get some fresh air," I mutter and rise to my feet, stepping away from him.

"We're outside Tamsin," Kira mumbles. "All air is fresh air."