Chapter Seventeen
Ronan had seen plans go awry before. He’d seen them go just about as wrong as wrong could be. But yet all that seemed to pale in comparison to watching Noah’s reaction to Kitty’s oil. It wasn’t the oil, he was sure of that. He’d put some on himself first, to test it, and noticed nothing strange except for the scent of roses. Noah’s terror told him that the omega expected something very different. He recalled Kitty’s tale of experiments to rid omegas of scarring and wondered if someone hadn’t gotten the same idea about Noah. When he tried to talk to him about it, another issue sprang to the surface.
“The shifter who scarred me, he was a wolf.”
Noah seemed almost surprised he’d said it, his eyes going wide before he huddled in on himself.
Ronan forced himself to keep calm, waiting a moment before talking.
“I’m so sorry, Noah. You were really brave to come lie next to me in the training room.”
“I like lying in the sun when I’m a fox,” the omega answered, a little shyly. “And I like you. I’m not… I’m not scared of you.”
Given the omega was practically curled up into a ball on the bed meant Ronan was having his doubts about that. He decided to test it, getting up from the chair and sitting next to Noah on the bed. The omega uncurled and pushed closer, accepting Ronan’s arm around his shoulders.
“It’s okay if you’re a little scared. Wolves can be scary. People don’t see them too often, and we have a bit of a reputation.”
“There aren’t any in our pack,” Noah confided. “But we have like, three boars. And two lynx. And a skunk.”
Ronan blinked and then snickered. “A skunk?”
“Uh-huh. It gets worse. His best friend is from a pack just a few miles down the road. Guess what he is?”
“I don’t know. What is he?”
“A badger.”
“Do they dress in monotone, too?”
It was Noah’s turn to laugh. “They went through a phase, but they grew out of it.”
Ronan broached the subject they were both dancing around. “Who burned you, Noah?”
The omega dropped his chin, clenching his eyes closed. “It was our healer. He’s not really a doctor, he had some training looking after animals on a farm. The first time they tried, I was just a kid. The second time, I was a teenager, close to being of mating age, and Gregory found this alpha willing to pay good money to mate me. It took six of them to hold me down. And it didn’t work, of course. Gregory has hated me ever since.”
Ronan tugged Noah closer. “I’m sorry that happened to you. And you’re right, removing the scars doesn’t work, it’s been tried before. The scar tissue just grows back.”
Noah turned curious eyes up toward him. “Then what were you trying to do?”
Ronan heaved a sigh and pulled the bottle from his pocket. “Kitty gave this to me. A long time ago, she worked with a doctor who was trying to heal omegas who’d been scarred. Most of them were runaways from the training houses. She said that one of the things they tried that seemed to help was a mixture of flower and plant oils. I thought it was worth a try. What harm could it do? If I’d realized, I would never have done what I did, not without talking to you first, at least.”
Noah took the bottle of oil from his hands, tipping it upside down and then righting it, watching the liquid glide around inside it.
“It smelled like roses.”
“That’s right, there’s rose oil in there.”
“And this could help us be able to mate?”
“That’s the idea.”
The omega cautiously pulled out the stopper and sniffed.
“You can try some on me if you like,” Ronan offered. It might be a good way to show Noah that it wouldn’t harm him. It also gave the omega a measure of control, something it sounded like he sorely lacked in his own pack.
“Now?”
“Now’s as good a time as any. Here.” He turned and lay on his stomach, bending his head forward to give Noah access to his neck.
“Are you sure?” the omega asked.
“I am.”
There was a long pause before he felt the touch of tentative fingers against his skin, the barest trace of oil on them.
“I’ve already tried it on myself,” Ronan added. “So you don’t have to worry.”
When Noah tried again, his fingers were slick with the oil. The omega still felt tense, Ronan could sense it through Noah’s knee which was pressed against his side. But when he showed no signs of discomfort, Noah seemed happy to keep going, his fingers gliding across the nape of Ronan’s neck. He lingered over Ronan’s scars and traced the lines of his tattoos, over and over.
“It doesn’t hurt?” the omega checked.
“Feels pretty good, actually.”
“Why not hide your scars with the tattoos?” the omega wondered. Ronan knew what he was asking. The lines and patterns of his ink actually did the opposite, incorporating his scars into their design, making them a part of him.
“Because I had two choices. Hide them and pretend that they hadn’t happened. Or accept them and what they mean, make them mine. They make my ink stronger, just like my experiences make me stronger. They’re a part of me.”
Noah stretched out on the bed next to him. “I wish my scars were gone. They make me feel… damaged or broken. Like there’s a piece of me missing that can’t be replaced.”
Ronan felt a pulse of sadness at the long, lonely childhood Noah must have experienced to be carrying those heavy emotions with him still.
“You are whole. You are complete. And I’m going to prove that to you.”
They were face-to-face, Noah’s eyes watching him intently as if trying to decide if he was telling the truth or not. Ronan knew he’d passed the test when Noah held out the bottle of oil toward him.
“Then, let’s get started.”
Ronan tried to argue.
“Twenty minutes ago, you were freaking out because I put this on you. I think we should take a break, wait a few days, and try again.”
“But what if we don’t have those few days to waste? You said the oil takes time to work and that Griffin has us on a deadline. I don’t think we can delay just because I got the wrong idea.”
Ronan almost grinned. He was starting to see a stubborn streak in the omega.
“Okay, have it your way. Lie down.”
Noah did so with a huff, folding his arms and resting his head on them, his face turned toward Ronan.
Keeping his hands in the omega’s line of sight, he opened the bottle and poured a small amount onto his palm. Noah’s breathing sped up a little, but he stayed put. It was only when Ronan shifted closer that he grew uncertain. “It’s not something that just affects omegas, is it? Like, it was fine on you, but, on me, it’s like holy water on a vampire?”
Ronan stared bemusedly down at him. “No. It’s just oil. Diluted oil at that. And you just had it all over your fingers. Here.”
He put a dollop on the back of Noah’s hand and they both held their breath, watching and waiting; Ronan anticipating Noah going into panic mode and Noah still half-expecting it to burn.
“Well?”
“No burn,” Noah said, reaching over with his other hand to smear the drop of oil across his skin. “I like the scent of roses.”
“Yeah?” It wasn’t Ronan’s favorite, but it was hardly a reason to complain. “Are you okay if I keep going?”
“Yep. In for a penny, in for a pound.”
It was an old saying that Ronan hadn’t heard in a while. “That’s the spirit.”
He straddled Noah, the omega letting out a little squeak of surprise at that.
“I’m not used to anyone being so hands-on,” the omega said apologetically. “Or legs-on as the case may be.”
Ronan snorted, leaning over to start smoothing a layer of oil across the omega’s skin. Noah was tense, the way he always was when Ronan got close to his scars. But he didn’t pull away or voice any discomfort so Ronan kept going. He drew lazy circles across the nape of Noah’s neck, the oil shiny across the damaged skin. They were claw marks, definitely. And now he knew they were wolf claws. That was something he should have noticed, should have asked. But if he’d known days ago, would they be where they were now? He suspected not. He wouldn’t have believed that was something Noah could get past. Yet the omega seemed oddly determined about how he felt.
“Better this time?” he wondered.
“You mean now that I’m not frantically pawing at my neck to get rid of this stuff? Yeah, much better.”
“Good.” He moved his hands away, overcome with the need to lie down and keep as much contact with Noah’s body as possible. Noah seemed to be of the same mind, rolling onto his side and reaching for him. At some point, they’d have to get up, if only to get some food. For right then, Ronan was happy to stay exactly where he was.