That evening, after Ma and I had packed up my most important possessions, she and I and Da met up with my Alpha and the Alpha from Mercy Hills in a conference room in the municipal building.

The Mercy Hills Alpha was big—he would have dwarfed his Mate if Holland hadn't been so tall.

There were two other strangers there as well, but for the life of me, I couldn't figure out which one was the alpha and which one was the omega, though I knew there was one of each. One of them had scars on his face and never showed his left hand, which I took to mean there was something wrong there too. He looked a bit like the Mercy Hills Alpha—maybe they were related?

"That's the fastest I've ever had paperwork go through," my Alpha was saying as we walked in the room. He looked up, startled, then stood and pulled out a chair for me. "Sit, Salem. You look tired."

Thanks. "I haven't been to bed yet," I admitted. I sat heavily and glanced around the table. "I'm packed, but I don't know how much I can bring?"

"Can we get an SUV down by your place?" the Mercy Hills Alpha asked.

"Easily," his Mate answered for me. He was curled around his mate's arm, looking like he was working one of the public houses and worth twice a blue bracelet. I tried not be jealous and was mostly successful.

"Well," said my Alpha. "Paperwork's all done. We'll miss you here, Salem. As will your clients."

I saw the Mate twitch and I thanked the Lady that I wouldn't actually be living under his supervision. "Thank you, sir. I can't promise that I'll be back, but for now, this is the best thing for me. I don't want to become soured on the work, and the past few months have been harder than I'd expected." It was difficult to admit, but then as soon as I’d said it, there was a certain sense of relief, like I didn't have to put on that mask anymore.

"We should get your things," the Mercy Hills Alpha told me. "We have reservations for dinner in the city and if we miss them, I'll be in trouble." He smiled at his Mate then, the slightest curve of lips but it changed his face utterly. The Mate was obviously smitten by him, particularly when his smile made the hunting wolf in his expression fade into the background.

Or maybe that was just the omega bond.

Who cares? I was tired of trying to figure out what was me and what wasn’t. And since I was omega, the omega bond was also me, which meant that those feelings were also legitimate. I put them out of my mind as unimportant, at least for now.

They were reordering my life so fast I thought my head would start spinning for real soon. I’d only been sitting for five minutes and now here we were. More moving. And walking and lifting and carrying. I felt the edges of my temper start to fray and patted them back into place as Da helped me to my feet.

Everyone else stood up and that was when I discovered that it was the taller of the two unnamed strangers who was the omega, because he had a baby belly easily the size of mine. Though I thought he maybe carried it better, especially given his size. Or maybe because of it.

I wondered if he'd had trouble finding a mate, being so tall, but the scarred man beside him was so protective that I thought maybe not. They seemed very much in love.

It didn’t take long to fill up the back of the SUV—it was funny to watch the scarred alpha—a younger brother to the Mercy Hills Alpha—snap at his mate and order him to sit in the back of the vehicle while the rest of them loaded it. Even funnier to watch the omega smile and lean in to kiss him, then go right back to carrying things out of Ma’s apartment like the alpha hadn’t said a word.

He winked at me as he walked by with a bag of my baby clothes and I stifled a juvenile giggle.

I ended up picking and choosing a few things to leave behind. Ma offered to have them mailed to me, which made my heart stop, but the Mate chimed in about what a good idea that would be and that if she wanted to send it to him, he’d make sure I’d get it. I guessed this was his way of keeping tabs on me.

Then we were ushered into the SUV and the Alpha pointed us toward the gate, and a whole new life for me.