Claiming My Omega: Blackwater Pack Book Two

by Liam Kingsley

  My heart folded in two. “What?!”

  “Oh, yeah. He’s definitely coming over here right now.”

  “Don’t invite him!” I begged, keeping my face turned away. If Vaughn really was walking in our direction, seeing him make his approach would not settle my beating heart. Neither would hearing his footsteps. Were those his footsteps I could hear…?

  “I’m not,” said Lukas. I could hear the satisfied smile on his face. “He’s just doing it by himself.”

  I could feel blood rushing to my face. Had he caught me staring? He was probably coming over to ask that I stop. At least the embarrassment might kill my crush on him once and for all — if it didn’t kill me first.

  “Hey, Lukas and friend.”

  His voice was low and charming, resonating in a register that made my knees weak. I forced myself to smile even as I felt the heat of his eyes on me, lifting my own eyes from the floor to the window-ledge, and then up again to…

  Wow.

  I couldn’t help myself. I swallowed, head tipped up slightly to drink in the sight of his handsome, wood-carved face and easy, teasing smile. Up close, I had more than his good looks to deal with. From this distance, his scent was surrounding me — all musky and oaky. He’d matched his cologne to it nicely, too; the combination of his natural scent and the amber and sandalwood of the synthetic one was carrying my imagination away.

  What would it feel like to be wrapped up in his bedsheets…?

  I could already feel my cheeks burning red.

  “Hi, V,” said Lukas, sounding warm as ever. “I’m surprised you two haven’t met before. This is Finley King, who works with me at school. Fin, I’m sure you’ve heard of Vaughn Bennett.”

  A small strangled sound emanated from the back of my throat.

  Cordially, both Lukas and Vaughn acted like nothing had happened.

  “The rumors are all true,” said Vaughn, holding a hand out to me. “Especially the bad ones.”

  I took his hand out of polite habit alone, and tried not to think about the sensation of his skin warm against mine.

  My eyes drifted over the veins on the back of his hand.

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you,” he said. “Pleasure to meet anyone who’s neither pregnant nor trying to be, frankly.” His eyes darted to Lukas, playfully sharp.

  “This is my party, and I will throw you out,” said Lukas. “Or my alpha will kick your ass.”

  Vaughn laughed — and as he did, any strength remaining in my knees completely gave out. I gripped my beer tighter as I leaned against the windowsill, heart pounding at the sound that echoed through my head. He had a husk-and-velvet laugh. The kind of laugh that would pull you closer, hands rough-skinned but gentle, and pin you to the wall with its eyes.

  Oh, man. I was already in way too deep.

  “You look amazing, by the way,” Vaughn added, still talking to Lukas. “I thought you were supposed to be heavily pregnant and very stressed?”

  “Flatterer and liar,” said Lukas, “but I’ll take it. I-”

  He cut himself off, eyes caught by movement across the room. Judging by the way they glowed and warmed, it was Owen he was looking at. He exhaled, breath soft and happy, and looked between us.

  “Sorry,” he said. “Cupid just shot me all over again. I’ll let you guys talk?”

  ‘Cause I’ve been doing such an awesome job of that so far.

  “Listen,” said Vaughn. It was completely unnecessary. Anybody with a lick of sense and a working pair of ears already would be, with a voice like that — but what was so attractive about him was that he didn’t act like he knew that. If he knew he was blessing me with his presence, he was doing a hell of a job not showing it. Either way, I didn’t have to force myself to focus on his next words. “That buffet is getting busier by the minute. You want to make one last pass of it before the celebrating masses wreck it like a bunch of canine locusts?”

  “Um… uh-huh.”

  Humiliating, but it was a start. Far worse was the smile that had spread across my whole face at the thought of going anywhere and doing anything with this hand-carved sculpture of an alpha. He probably didn’t even want me tagging along behind him, but was too polite to just disappear and pick up snacks for himself.

  Very polite, in fact. Even though I still hadn’t managed to utter anything which the dictionary would consider a word yet, he still kept turning back over his shoulder to smile at me, leading me along the buffet like a captivated cub. It was only when we reached the end of the line that I realized I had taken exactly the same things as Vaughn had, and quickly scooped up a couple of beet-based hors d'oeuvres to cover it up.

  “Okay,” Vaughn said, as we moved away from the buffet. “I love them, and I am happy for them, and I love babies as much as the next guy, but...” he gestured at the room around him. “This is a little much, don’t you think?”

  I nodded, pleased to hear that we shared the same opinion about this. Shamefully, I knew I would have agreed with him anyway. At least I could tell the truth, if I ever actually managed to speak up.

  I realized after a beat that I should probably force myself to do that.

  “Yeah,” I said, hating the creaky weakness in my voice. I cleared my throat, giving him a sheepish smile. “Sorry. Yeah, it is. Kind of. I don’t think I even, um… know this many people.”

  Vaughn glanced around us, coming to a stop at a small table for two. Once he’d taken a good look, he slipped into one of the chairs with all the grace of a catwalk model. I scrambled to sit across from him, much less composed. “I do,” he admitted, then lowered his voice to a conspiratorial hum. “Whether I like this many people…”

  I tried to shape my laughter into something cool and collected, but it still came out like a spellbound omega giggle. I might have blushed again if my cheeks had even faded from the first moment he’d walked over.

  “That’s terrible,” I said. “It’s mostly pack here, isn’t it?”

  “The pack is fine,” he agreed, giving me a smooth smile as he picked at the finger food on his plate. “But that human lady in the floral maxi dress?”

  “She works at school with us,” I piped up, pleased to have something to contribute.

  “I’m sure,” he said, eyes catching the light like a just-lit campfire. “But I know I heard her use the word ‘werewolf’ as I walked past her.” He mispronounced it like she had — wee-are-wolf, with a convincing wrinkle of the nose to accompany it.

  My heart skipped, and another laugh slipped out. He had me, now; however I reacted, it was out of my hands. “She’s really sweet, I promise.”

  “Takes sweet to know sweet, I guess.”

  My heart stuttered. For the first time, he didn’t pretend not to notice; I saw a smirk curling up one corner of his lips, pleased and playful, and curled my hands into desperate fists under the table. God, he was incredible.

  “You’re kind,” I managed, after a much-too-long pause. “And a liar, just like Lukas said.”

  “I wasn’t wrong about Lukas,” he insisted, tipping back the rest of his water. “I’m not wrong about you, either.”

  He might as well have pulled me closer to him with a thread around my heart. It was much, much too early to be basking in his attention like this. I knew I ought to ground myself — to remember that he was only going to be talking to me for the next fifteen minutes, and then never again. Why would he? He’d never noticed me before now.

  Of course, that wouldn’t stop the romantic bug in my brain trying to tell me otherwise - particularly when a lithe and pretty omega I didn’t recognize swarmed up to the table.

  “Vaughn!” he said, eyes bright and bold. “It’s been a while.”

  “Sure has,” said Vaughn. His fingers drummed against the glass, but his body didn’t turn to face this beautiful newcomer — just his head. “Glad to see you’re well.”

  The omega’s smile was still pinned wide, but some energy had faded out of it. To his credit, he took this subtle rejection w
ell, and wiggled his fingers in a playful wave as he walked on by. “You too!”

  I watched him head across the room, a total ray of light. How did they know each other, exactly? But when I turned back to Vaughn, he was still looking right at me.

  His smile widened. His attention was burning like a spotlight, and I couldn’t sit still — shoulders wriggling a little, and my own smile widening to mirror his.

  “So, you’re pretty shy, huh?”

  I ducked my head, nodding through the embarrassment. “Sorry. I know it seems unfriendly. It’s not that. It’s just-”

  “I get it,” he assured me. “I don’t think you’re unfriendly. You’re just… on edge. Tightly wound. I can see that. I’ve met enough omegas to diagnose that problem.”

  “I bet you have,” I said, eyes darting back after that pretty stranger before I could stop myself. My face fell, and I lifted my hand to my mouth. “I did not mean to imply-”

  “Wow,” said Vaughn, smirking bright like a beacon. “You think I’m some kind of whore alpha. Got it.”

  “No, I don’t! I swear!”

  He laughed into his glass of water. “Like I said, Fin. Very on edge.”

  “You’re teasing me,” I realized, feeling stupid — not least because my ears were ringing at the sound of my name in his voice. “Right.”

  “People do call you Fin, right? You don’t prefer Finley?”

  He lingered enough on the syllables of my name that I realized he was still teasing me — that he’d seen the way I reacted when he said it just now. He met my eyes with easy confidence, warm and wicked over the lip of his glass.

  No wonder omegas followed him around like cans tied to a bumper. Shit.

  “You’re really good for my ego,” Vaughn said eventually, putting the bottle down. “Or really bad for my ego, depending on which way you look at it.”

  “I’m pretty embarrassing.”

  Vaughn shook his head. “You’d know about it if you were. I’d have already made my excuses.”

  He clearly wasn’t an unkind person, but I believed him anyway. He had charisma in spades; he would absolutely have been able to find a way to extricate himself from my company if he didn’t want to be here.

  I swallowed at the implication. He did want to be here. With me.

  “I think you’re cute,” he pressed. “Just… putting my cards on the table there.”

  I wrinkled my nose.

  “Listen, I can take a ‘no’ if it’s not reciprocated,” he said. “I’m a big boy.”

  “It’s definitely not that.” I rushed to clarify, realizing a few seconds too late exactly how revealing this was. Well — apparently my cards were on the table now, too. “But you could, um. Hang out with anybody in this room, pretty much.” Never mind just that first omega that approached. I glanced around us at all the other well-dressed and confident omegas flitting from group to group. There were a couple wearing tight-fitting shirts in patterns that I’d barely dare try on at the store, let alone leave the house in. Others went for simpler cuts and colors, but paired it all with one sparkling earring, or some other bold style choice I’d never make. It’d probably be too much if not for the quiet confidence it took to carry it all off — their hands brushing up against alphas’ arms like it didn’t faze them at all. Technically they were my competition, in a biological sense, but I couldn’t bring myself to see them that way. I just admired them. Perceived them as a league above me — a crowd of glamorous and appealing partners just waiting to meet their perfect matches.

  And Vaughn Bennett was sitting with me? Not likely.

  “We need to work on your confidence,” said Vaughn, drumming the tabletop with his fingertips. “You really don’t see why I’d want to talk to you?”

  I struggled to find a joke answer, but the couple of ideas I had withered on the vine before I could get them out. I opened and closed my mouth a few times, then settled for a weak smile. “I guess not. You never have before.”

  “Ah,” said Vaughn, tapping the table in front of me. “There’s your trouble, right there.”

  I blinked, shaking my head.

  “Talking to you and wanting to talk to you are two different things,” he continued, smooth as butter. “You’re right. I’ve never approached you before, but… you think I don’t remember you from Ryker and Austin’s? That I didn’t notice you?”

  I felt like I was sitting somewhere else entirely — underwater, maybe, or fifty feet away from everyone around us. Why wouldn’t Vaughn approach me? This couldn’t be true. “You do…?”

  “For what it’s worth, I like this even better in the light,” he added. “Where I can get a good look at you. And in a place like this, you can actually hear what I’m saying, so…”

  I didn’t know what to say. Didn’t know what to do, in fact, but breathe. All this time I’d been feeling sorry for myself, lamenting that nobody like him would ever be interested in me, not knowing that I’d already caught his eye.

  My head was spinning.

  “Listen,” Vaughn said. He started speaking like that so often that it was already embedded it in my mind. I knew I’d hear that conversational tic in my dreams and over my shoulder for days. Maybe longer. I leaned closer by a fraction, barely conscious of having done so, as he continued. “I’ve got to get out of here soon. I’ve got an early start at work tomorrow, and I still have to make the whole drive back, but I really wish I had more time for you. So… can I see you, next time I’m this side of the river?”

  This all still felt surreal. I felt like I hadn’t spoken more than five words at any one time. Why should Vaughn have even the faintest interest in me? Of course, I wasn’t going to look a gift wolf in the mouth. I nodded, struck silent once again. “Um. Uh-huh.”

  He grinned, holding my eye contact as he slipped his phone out of his pocket. A beat later he was handing it to me, his fingertips brushing against mine.

  “Give me your number?” he suggested. “You can take mine. We’ll set something up.”

  I keyed in my name and my number, searching for something to say. It felt like he was about to change his mind and send me packing any moment — so much so that I jumped a little at the sound of his laugh.

  “Wow,” he said, chin resting on one hand. “Am I really that scary?”

  “No,” I lied. I handed his phone back, somehow both shrinking and flourishing under the force of his eyes on me. “I’m just… you know. This.”

  “You’re just this,” he teased, finishing the last two hors d'oeuvres on his plate. “Got it.”

  I couldn’t help but crack a smile, watching him tap out a quick text. My phone vibrated in my pocket. I fought the urge to check it. I’d already shown myself up quite enough for one evening. Even if I couldn’t really believe that Vaughn Bennett wanted to text me, it would probably be best not to take a look until he was gone.

  Wait. That’s right. He was leaving.

  He stood up from the table. I followed suit, leaving behind an almost-untouched plate of buffet food. I winced, hoping Lukas didn’t catch sight of that before I came back to finish it off — but was soon distracted by how close Vaughn was, and the striking thought that his shoulder would be the perfect height to rest my head.

  “Glad I finally bumped into you at last,” he said, offering his hand again. When I took it, his grip was lingering and warm. He squeezed my hand, and I imagined a spark of electricity jumping between us. A red thread of fate tied between our fingertips.

  My mouth was dry.

  “You too,” I said, then corrected myself quickly. “I mean… uh. Me too. Glad we met. Glad I met you.”

  His eyes and his smile kept hold of me even once he let go. I watched him leave the room. Even when he turned away, I couldn’t stop looking — felt a flush of excited panic as he caught me with one last playful grin.

  I sank back into my chair, silent as the room celebrated around me. My heart was beating harder than it ever had before. This didn’t mean anything, of course. I didn�
��t think he was a whore, like he’d teased me — but I did know he traveled a lot. That he’d been connected to a bunch of different omegas. That he had never settled down. He wasn’t going to start now. He probably wouldn’t even text me back.

  I slipped my phone out of my pocket with still-tingling hands, and swallowed as I opened up the text.

  You have no idea how cute you are. —V

  I locked my phone and let it slide to the surface of the table, reaching instead for the bottle of beer. It was about time I finished the rest of this, and got the next one started.

  After the past thirty minutes, I’d earned it.

  3

  Vaughn

  When the phone rang one week later, I knew it wasn’t Finley. Sure, we’d been texting back and forth ever since the baby shower, but we hadn’t progressed to actually talking on the phone just yet. I had a feeling his poor, undersized ego would need a little more time to settle into that.

  In any case, I wasn’t too excited as I reached across my desk to pick it up, pausing lazily to finish off my coffee before I bothered. That was a marked change from the way I responded to Fin’s texts — but as I picked up and heard the excited voice on the other end of the line, I remembered with sheepish shame that Finley was not the only wolf in Blackwater I should have been expecting to hear from.

  “She’s here,” Owen blurted, his voice a sparkling rush of unmitigated joy. Normally, that kind of unchecked happiness would merit a little playful mockery, but not today. Today, I felt the same warmth flood through my chest.

  “Owen, that’s fantastic!”

  “Her name is Kylie Marie. Daddy and baby are both happy and healthy.”

  I grinned, shifting back from my desk and closing my eyes to savor the moment. Even in a pack with so many births and mates and milestones, hearing those words still filled me with gold and honey. Maybe my own life wasn’t entirely together yet, and maybe this happiness would never be my happiness, but I was so thrilled that Owen and Lukas could have it.

  “Owen, I’m so happy for you both. Congratulations. I can’t wait to meet her.”