Page 35 of Gemini Wicked
That whole reaction just makes me more determined to learn.
Totally predictable that Vasili recovers first.
“Dear fuck,” he says into the startled silence. “This is like that moment when you open your express delivery from Balenciaga and realize they’ve sent you Miu Miu instead.”
Racetrack snickers from the sofa. Dez hushes her with a soft murmur.
“Why would you wish to fight, Neo Mercury?” Max sounds so reasonable. “It is my honor to fight for you. As I fight for our sovereign. As I fight for all of you.”
“Yeah, I know.” My shoulders lift in a frustrated shrug. “I just… I want to fight with you. I want to help. I want to defend Zara. Against Messalina and Cleo and whoever else comes after her and tries to steal her crown.”
While everyone else absorbs this newsflash, Ronin pushes up to sit and sweeps back his long hair with an impatient hand.
“Love,” he says to me gently, “you’re already helping. Every day. Just by being you. You’ve got nothing to prove. You don’t need to risk yourself—”
“No. I need to do this.” I don’t like interrupting, but this is way too important. “I’m not, like, some sheltered omega from one of Zara’s books. I don’t need to be sheltered. I want to carry my share of the load.” My face heats with shame and my volume takes a nosedive.
I finish in an embarrassed mutter. “At least let me learn to protect myself.”
Ronin’s brow furrows in consternation. “Bloody hell.”
Zara’s been reading us some of those glossy omegaverse paperbacks I had shipped from her old place. Those are some of my favorite times, curled up in a pile with her and the guys in our big medieval bed on a rainy Sunday morning while she reads to us.
So we all know what an omega is. In her books, they’re like this special protected mate that has to be taken care of by all the alphas in their pack.
And most—but not all—of the omegas are girls.
“Neo, baby,” Zara breathes, because of course she’s in my head, just like I’m in hers. “You’re never a burden. I love being with you. And so do they.”
“Omega,” Max says slowly. His tone deepens to a dragonish rumble in my ear. “In Zara’s books, these omegas… they become pregnant, do they not?”
Vasili rolls his eyes and voices an eloquent snort of disgust.
Max isn’t a natural telepath and he hasn’t bitten me, so we don’t have an actual mating bond. That means I can’t actually read his mind. But I don’t need telepathy to sense the sudden addition of an imaginary omega version of me, capable of getting pregnant, to Max’s mpreg sexual fantasies.
Racetrack groans and scrambles up from the couch. “You guys gotta do this mpreg shit when I’m not around, for real. But Neo’s got a point. He does need to learn how to handle himself in a fistfight.”
“Thank you, Racetrack,” I tell her humbly.
“Yeah.” She shrugs. “Just makes sense. If they won’t teach you, I will.”
Max makes a disgruntled sound, but I glow up at her. I’m beyond grateful to have at least one ally.
My housemate’s beelining for the kitchen with her empty mug when Dez pipes up. “Maybe we should all learn, cobber.”
RT stops in her tracks and pivots to eye her girlfriend. Under her bandage, her hard face scrunches up. Clearly she sees the trap she’s just walked into. “Shit. Dez… that’s… totally different—”
“Except it’s not, though, is it?” Dez sits up straight in her big terrycloth robe and looks determined. “Messalina’s minions, the AIB, Cleopatra and her boo—they’ll all be gunning for Zara—”
At that exact moment, a furtive knock echoes through our domus.
Someone’s knocking at our front door.
From the kitchen, the comforting hum of Lucius’ voice breaks off. A heartbeat later his wary face appears in the doorway.
Wary, but not totally alarmed.
The defensive wards on our domus are linked to him. If someone’s lurking out there who wants to hurt us, I have to hope he’d sense that.