Page 55 of His Omega Bear

Leanne had kept this secret, just like Rhys had. Just like Jayson had for as long as we’d been friends.

She had known about the possibility, about the world I was now thrust into. I felt a surge of anger mixed with confusion. How could she keep something so significant from me? How could Rhys?

Had he thought about the damage a secret like that could do? Okay, so he didn’t tell me immediately, but I looked back at our early moments through new eyes. It had eaten him up inside.

So you could love him anyway, you mean… and wasn’t that manipulative?

“Fuck!” I pushed my hand through my hair and growled.

Rhys wasn’t manipulative, a voice whispered. This one was all me.

And beneath the anger, there was also a glimmer of understanding. Leanne had loved Jayson, and she must have understood the risks and accepted them. I wasn’t sure how I would have reacted if Jay had ever told me about himself. And to my shame, that made feel like an ass. The man had saved my life more times than I could count.

Leanne must have thought I could handle this… and understand. That I could come to terms with this hidden reality. Just like she had.

She hadn’t foreseen Rhys, though. I tried to imagine my life without him for the last few months. He’d made everything better in every single way.

I looked over at Emilia, finally asleep on the bed, her little chest rising and falling with each breath. The anger and confusion I’d been feeling melted away, replaced by a fierce protectiveness. She was my niece, my family, and I had to make sense of this for her sake. And yours. I had to figure out how to move forward, even if it meant facing fears I never knew I had.

As I lay there, staring at the ceiling, the weight of my realization settled in. My life had changed irrevocably, but it wasn’t over. I had to find a way to understand this new world, to protect Emilia and the baby Rhys was carrying. I had to find a way to reconcile my love for Rhys with the fear and betrayal I felt.

Did he even betray me, though?

I glanced at the crib again. If Rhys was a monster, that meant Jayson was. And so would Emilia. Those were words I’d never associate with my best friend… my daughter and the love of my life?

I thought of Rhys' face when I’d called him that, not to mention pointed a gun at him.

Fuck!

A bear! A really large bear!

Rhys!

“Fuck!”

He would forgive me for pointing a gun at him, right?

Did I want him to?

I groaned. I hated not having an answer because the road ahead felt so uncertain. I hated all of this. All these questions and doubts. But for Emilia, for my family, I had to try to get past it. So I took a deep breath. We needed to go home. And I needed to talk to Rhys.

Chapter 24

Rhys

Even though I asked them not to, my brothers chased after me, their shouts echoing through the forest. I knew why they were chasing me. They were afraid that in my mental state, I’d go feral. That I’d forget my human side and give in to my bear’s instincts, going completely animal.

And honestly, that’s all I wanted—to forget.

Who wouldn’t? I just wanted to block it out for as long as I could.

I understood their concern. But the pain was just too much to bear. A part of me prayed for every human memory to be erased, to forget the part of my life where I was happy, where all my dreams had come true. I wanted to erase the existence of that life entirely.

Do you though? I ignored the sane, rational part. I didn’t want to hear what it had to say right now unless it had a way to fix the shitstorm that my life had turned into.

Unless there was a magical way to make it so my mate hadn’t taken our kid and fled like, well, a bear was chasing him. Then I didn’t want to think or feel.

My brothers were good hunters, but I was very good at escaping, hiding, and going unnoticed. And I used each of those talents to elude them. I knew the forest better than they did, knew the secret paths and the places where the underbrush grew thick enough to hide me.