Page 66 of Dragon's Surprise

“Thank you.” Oliver took another deep breath. He refused to get too far off track. “As I was saying…”

Delton sighed. “How did you know?”

“I didn’t figure it out until yesterday when you offered to help Adar, and I put two and two together.”

“It was never my intention to hurt you.”

“I’m not hurt. Why would I be? My guess is you were in love with him before I showed up.”

Delton hung his head. “From the moment I met him. It’s stupid, but…”

Things clicked. “You thought he was your fated mate.”

“Clearly, I was wrong.”

Was he, though? This only reinforced how little sense all this made. “Adar and I are mates. Don’t ask me to explain it, but I know deep down we are.”

Delton slowly nodded. “I don’t doubt that. That’s why I said I must’ve been mistaken about him and me.”

All the beta’s usual quiet confidence had evaporated, and Oliver could barely resist the urge to hug him—and he was not a hugger. He took Delton’s hand, and the beta jerked his head up. Hell, Oliver was probably even more surprised by his move than Delton had been. “I’m not sure you’re wrong.”

“What?”

“You know we can both be right.”

“Are you saying you think we’re a triad?”

“It’s a possibility.”

Delton shook his head. “Adar would know by now, wouldn’t he? He doesn’t feel anything for me.”

“He likes you.”

“As a friend, maybe. If even that.”

“Don’t give up hope yet.” Oliver squeezed Delton’s hand.

“As much as I want to believe you, it seems cruel to harbor hope. All this time, I thought he’d come to realize the truth as I had. That time was all we needed, but I was deluding myself.”

Something tickled at the back of Oliver’s mind. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but his gut told him he was on the right track and that Delton was wrong. “What was it like for you, seeing Adar and me together during my heat? That must’ve been brutal.”

Delton hesitated. “Not as awful as I had expected.”

The gut feeling grew stronger. “No?”

“Maybe because I had prepared myself for the worst, but you so obviously needed him, and it was… I felt sorry for you that you were suffering, and seeing Adar take away some of that was good.”

“You said no when I begged you to…” Oliver made a vague gesture, not knowing what to call it himself.

“I would never take advantage of an omega in heat like that. You weren’t yourself. If I had gone along with your suggestion, I wouldn’t have been able to look at myself in the mirror.”

He was a good man. Oliver had never realized so profoundly how decent Delton was, how strong his moral fiber was. “Thank you. I don’t think I ever told you that, but thank you.”

“Please don’t thank me for something that should be normal. I didn’t do anything special.”

Oh, but he had, and with the knowledge Oliver now had, he saw that in a different light too. “You watched the man you love have sex with someone else. Don’t tell me that’s not special.”

“I’m not… I don’t think I’m in love with Adar. It’s more that I thought we’d end up together, that we were mates. We’d barely exchanged any words before you joined the pack.”