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WYATT
It was easy to see that he still didn’t have her trust, that she wasn’t sure what to make of him, and yet Wyatt returned to Izzy’s room as often as he could.
It wasn’t easy. If he’d gone too often it would have caught the attention of his packmates. But someone had to bring her dinner each night, and no one was particularly eager to take on the job, so as the days wore on, Wyatt was able to ease his way into the role. “I’m going upstairs to get my book,” he’d say after dinner. “Should I run Izzy’s plate up?” And Robert would give him a nod, only half paying attention.
After about a week and a half, there was no more conversation to be had about it. It had become assumed that Wyatt would be the one to take Izzy’s food to her each night. To help squash any suspicions the others might have that he cared more for her than he ought to, he had stopped talking about her the rest of the time. He joined in the many conversations that sprung up about the impending Omega Games, but he was careful to keep his participation in those conversations minimal. He would speculate as to what the games might consist of, but he would never share his intent to enter and win so that he could keep Izzy safe.
Because of the way everyone tended to scatter after leaving the dinner table, Wyatt had discovered that he could stay up in Izzy’s room for a substantial length of time without his absence being noticed. He shoved a deck of cards in his pocket one night and brought it up with him. “Do you want a game of Rummy?” he asked.
Izzy didn’t answer—she almost never spoke—but she scooted out of the corner where she usually cowered to indicate her willingness to play. Wyatt handed her the plate with her dinner as he dealt the cards. He’d saved the mashed potatoes from his own dinner to bring to her. Although they were a little cold, they were well flavored. He pulled a spoon from his shirt pocket and handed it over, and she began to eat.
The game commenced in silence. Izzy finished her food quickly and pushed her plate to the side. Wyatt had noticed that she always ate quickly. “Are you getting enough food?” he asked.
She nodded.
“Because your health is important to everyone. If you feel like you’re not getting enough, you can let me know. I could tell them you need more to stay healthy.”
She shook her head. Wyatt wondered whether she was afraid to ask for more than she was getting. If she was, it didn’t seem likely that he would penetrate her defenses anytime soon. She might have relaxed enough to take the food he offered and to play games with him, but she didn’t trust him, and he didn’t think she considered him a friend or an ally. Of course, she doesn’t, he thought. I’m being polite to her, that’s all. She’s still locked up in a room by herself all the time. How is she supposed to trust me?
“How old are you?” he asked her.
“Twenty-four.” Her voice was raspy and raw.
“So young,” Wyatt murmured. He thought back to when he had been twenty-four. He’d been living on his own then, working as a bartender, attending parties with his coworkers and drinking heavily. His life had been easy, and he had been spoiled and lazy. He had been nothing like this alert, sensitive young woman. She seemed years older than he had felt when he was twenty-four. Was it a consequence of everything she’d been through in her life? Had her experiences made her harder?
What had happened to her?
She was staring at him. “It’s your turn,” she said finally.
It was the first time she’d spoken to him unprompted, and Wyatt was jerked out of his thoughts. He put down his cards. “Can we talk?”
“About what?”
“I don’t know. I’d like to get to know you better, that’s all.”
She hesitated, then shook her head. Wyatt supposed he could understand that, but he was still disappointed. Every day he felt as if maybe this would be the day he finally broke through the barriers she had up and got close to her, but it never seemed to happen. “I’d like us to be friends,” he said.
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“Why not?”
“We don’t have anything in common.”
“How do you know?” he asked.
“Well. You’re a lot older than me, to start with. And I’m an omega, and you aren’t. I’m a prisoner here and you can leave any time you want. What do you imagine we have to talk about?”
It was the most she’d ever said to him at once, and she looked slightly surprised at her own boldness. Wyatt was surprised too. Izzy seemed to regret having let go of herself. She moved away from him, back toward her corner, and he could see the fear taking up residence on her face again.
“I’d like to get to know someone who’s different from me,” Wyatt said.
“You know what’s going to happen to me, don’t you?” Izzy asked.
Wyatt hesitated. He hadn’t been ordered by Robert not to tell her about the Omega Games. There was no alpha command standing in his way. But if she knew what was coming, it would be easy for everyone else to figure out who had told her. That could result in all kinds of problems. Wyatt might even be banned from playing in the games. I’m too close to her, he thought. Robert wouldn’t like it. I’m not supposed to be connecting with the omega before she’s claimed and mated. And here I am, trying to get even closer.
Izzy was still waiting for an answer. “I’m not supposed to talk about that,” he said finally.
“But you know.”
He nodded. “I do.”
“So how do you expect me to be friends with you?” she asked. “What kind of friendship is it when you know what they’re going to do to me, and you won’t tell me about it?”
Wyatt’s heart sank. Still, he tried to defend himself. “It wouldn’t change anything,” he said. “My talking about it wouldn’t make a difference. It’s going to happen regardless.”
“It would give me a chance to prepare myself,” Izzy said. “Besides, I want to know. This is my life you’re talking about. I didn’t choose to come here to this pack. I had a life before this, and I was captured and brought here against my will.”
Wyatt rubbed a hand over his face. “I know you were. I know.”
“And you don’t think I have the right to know why?”
“Of course, you do,” he said. “But Izzy...”
“You can’t tell me anything.”
“I can’t. I really can’t.” His stomach knotted with guilt. He could tell her if he wanted to, he knew. He could override the practical wisdom that was keeping him from sharing the truth he knew. He could ask her not to tell the others that he’d told her anything.
He could put a little trust in her.
And in that moment, Wyatt realized that he didn’t fully trust Izzy yet either.
It was easier for him to befriend her without trust, because she didn’t have any power to hurt him. But if he had trusted her completely, the way he was asking her to trust him, he wouldn’t have had any problem telling her the truth about the Omega Games and preparing her for what was to come.
“You’re right,” he said.
That caught her off guard. “I am? About what?”
“You’re right that you deserve to know what’s coming. You’re right that if I want you to trust me, I should tell you the truth.”
“And?”
“And I still can’t do it.”
She looked at him for a long moment. “Then go,” she said. “Don’t pretend you’re my friend if you’re not.”
“Izzy...”
“Don’t make me feel like you’re on my side when you’re on their side.”
“It’s not like that. Come on. We don’t have to be on different sides.”
“They locked me in a room, Wyatt. They took me from my life and locked me up away from the rest of the world.” Her voice broke. Wyatt realized she was on the verge of tears. “I didn’t have much before this, but I was happy. I had a job, a place to live...and they took that all away from me.”
“I’m sorry,” Wyatt whispered. “You didn’t deserve that.”
“Didn’t I?” she asked. “I’m an omega. Is this what’s supposed to happen to us?”
“What do you mean?”
“My mother always told me I would have to spend my life on the run. But I stopped running. I thought I had found a safe place, a place where I could stay forever. And that’s when they caught me. Maybe I deserved it. Maybe I should have known there was no way for an omega to be a part of the world.”
“I don’t think that’s true,” Wyatt said. “You’re a person.”
“And what your pack has planned for me? Is it something a person deserves?”
“It might not be that bad,” Wyatt said. If I win. If I can claim her, I can protect her from anyone who might hurt her. I wouldn’t force her to mate with me. I’d let her go. She could go back to her home and her job, or she could go on the run. And she could be happy again.
“I want you to go,” she said. “I don’t want you to visit me here anymore.”
“Don’t say that.”
She shook her head. “I can’t stand it,” she said. “I can’t stand hoping that every day will be the day you decide you care more for me than you do for that pack. You’re never going to save me from what’s coming, so don’t give me hope. It hurts too much to be let down.”
***
WYATT WANTED TO RETURN to Izzy’s room the next night. He hadn’t been able to put her from his mind all day. He kept thinking of little things he might do for her, things that would improve her life or put a smile on her face. I should bring her a soda, he thought as he went to the fridge for one of his own. I should bring her a change of clothes. I doubt anybody would notice.
But she had asked him not to return. The least he could do was to honor her request.
He would have to find another way to help her. He would still compete in the Omega Games, of course, and he would do all he could to win. But he’d come to realize that if the Omega Games were played today, his winning wouldn’t reassure Izzy at all. She feared and mistrusted him nearly as much as she did every other member of the pack. In her eyes, he wasn’t much better than Gunner.
I didn’t lock her up, he argued to himself. I’m not the one who put her in that room.
But I didn’t set her free either. Every night I walk out, I leave her behind.
He found Robert outside the house, preparing for a hike into the forest. “Can I join you?”
“I’m going out in human form,” Robert said.
“That’s okay,” Wyatt said. “I was hoping to talk, anyway.” There was a bond that emerged between pack members when they shifted together, a camaraderie two humans couldn’t hope to replicate, and Wyatt enjoyed spending time with his packmates as a wolf and feeling that closeness. But there were some things wolves just couldn’t do, and conversation was one of them.
He followed Robert down a trail that led away from the house and toward the river. It was an easy run for wolves, but a moderately difficult hike for humans, and they walked in silence for a while. It was Robert who spoke first. “What’s on your mind?”
For a moment Wyatt was reluctant to speak. “Izzy,” he said finally, apologetically.
“The omega?”
Did they know another Izzy? “Yes.”
“What about her? It’s your intention to compete in the Omega Games, right?”
“It is,” Wyatt admitted. He had made no secret of that. Enough of his packmates were planning to compete that he knew his interest in the competition wasn’t something that would arouse suspicion.
“So, you’ll have your chance to win her just like everyone else,” Robert said. “Don’t think you’re going to convince me to give her to you outright. I’ve made my decision. Everyone should be in with a fighting chance.”
“I wasn’t going to argue for that,” Wyatt said.
“What is it, then?”
“It’s the way she’s been sequestered,” Wyatt said. “I know you’re worried she’ll run, and I know some of the others are worried about her ability to integrate with the pack. But if we kept watch on her...if we made sure she was never on her own...”
“You want me to let her out,” Robert said. “I thought you and I had settled this, Wyatt.”
“It’s just that it’s an archaic tradition, keeping omegas locked away until they’re mated,” Wyatt said.
“Who told you that?”
“Nobody told me.”
“You came to us knowing almost nothing about pack dynamics. What gives you the idea that this isn’t normal?”
“I just...” Wyatt paused. If he was honest with himself, he wasn’t sure where the belief came from. “It just seems as if it can’t be normal,” he said finally. “It was something she said to me when I brought her dinner up a couple of nights ago.”
“Which I’ve noticed you aren’t doing anymore.”
“No. She asked me not to. I think she doesn’t like me.”
“Maybe you should take yourself out of the running for the Omega Games, then.”
“I thought you said what she wanted wasn’t a priority.”
“I thought you said it should be.”
Wyatt was momentarily silenced.
“What did she say to you?” Robert asked. “What did she say that made you think we were treating her too harshly? Did she beg for release?”
“No,” Wyatt said. “It was the opposite, actually. She said this was what she’d always expected. She said the world wasn’t safe for an omega and maybe she didn’t deserve anything better, that maybe she’d been inviting trouble by daring to have a life of her own.”
“Maybe that’s true,” Robert said.
Of course, it isn’t true. “I just think she’s breaking down emotionally,” Wyatt said. “And that’s not something any of us want from the mother of our new generation. She needs more socialization. She needs more freedom. She needs to feel like it isn’t her against the rest of the pack. She’s one of us. We need to let her be one of us.”
“Let her be one of us,” Robert mused. He stopped and took a seat on a fallen log. Wyatt sat beside him, holding his breath. “You feel strongly about this, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want her? Is that what it’s about?”
“Of course not,” Wyatt said. “I’m much too old for her.”
“Not according to pack law. Any man can claim an omega.”
“It should be a younger man, though,” Wyatt said. “Not me.”
“Then why are you entering the Omega Games?” Robert asked.
Wyatt hesitated. He couldn’t trust Robert with his true plan. Robert might stop him from competing if he knew Wyatt intended to set their omega free. “It’s a pack event,” he said. “If I’m going to be the pack beta, I should be involved as deeply as I can. Besides, we both know I’m not going to win. I’m too old, and I’m not as physically fit as some of the others.” He felt the hopelessness of the situation as he said it. He would fight hard for Izzy, but in all likelihood, he knew, he would lose.
“Then, why?” Robert asked. “Why are you so determined to see her integrate herself into the pack, if it’s not about a personal interest in her?”
“It’s about my vision for the pack,” Wyatt said. It wasn’t the whole truth. But it was true, as true as his feelings for Izzy. “I want us to be the kind of pack that includes and respects our omega. I want us to let her be a part of designing the games that will determine her mate. I want her to love us and want to have pups for us, not be a prisoner and feel forced. Don’t you think that would be better?”
Robert looked thoughtful. “A happy omega might be better for the pack,” he admitted.
“Of course, she would,” Wyatt said. “And she’d be a better mother to the pups, too, raising them to be members of a pack she loved instead of a pack she hated and feared. Think about it. You don’t want the mother of the next generation of Hell’s Wolves to give them the impression that this pack is something to be afraid of, do you?”
“You know I don’t.”
“Let her find her place among us,” Wyatt said. “Let her learn to love us. It’s the best thing you can do for everyone involved.”
Robert sighed. “I’ll have to think about it,” he said. “It would be a dramatic shift in policy. But I have to admit, a lot of what you’re saying is making sense to me. Maybe letting the omega get to know the rest of the pack before the Games begin wouldn’t be a bad idea. And having someone to help me plan the challenges might be kind of fun.” He stood and clapped Wyatt on the shoulder. “I appreciate the input. You’re shaping up to be a great beta. I knew I made the right choice when I brought you in.”
“I’m glad you think so,” Wyatt said, fervently hoping that Robert’s approval of him would be enough to get Izzy her freedom.
