Page 3 of Tawny Omega
“I’m fantastic. Made croissant sourdough loaves. They sold out in one hour. All twenty.”
My mouth watered at the thought of what a croissant loaf entailed. “Damn! That’s great, Laura. Raking that money in.”
She didn’t need it. As mean as her husband had been, he’d left her oodles of life insurance and no debt. He’d been good about saving for retirement then passed unexpectedly. But her skills gave her so much more than money.
Reaching over, she pulled out a loaf, wrapped in parchment and tied with a string. “I saved one for you!”
“You are the best. How about a trade? Pick a plant.”
She got out and was scanned my offerings then turned her attention to me. “You should sell some of your fresh vegetables as well. Those would make a killing. They are much better than the market carries. I end up buying frozen most of the time.”
I had thought about selling my vegetables at the farmstand but ended up canning or dehydrating them for storage. We had enough stored for years.
“Do you really think so? I picked a ton of cherries and peaches yesterday. They are all on my counter, waiting for me to do something with them.”
“Would you consider a trade of peaches for the loaf of bread? My porch is already overrun with plants, thanks to you.”
“Yes! Give me two minutes.”
Laura didn’t come to my house. I went to hers the few times we cooked together. She said she respected the pack’s boundaries, but we hadn’t really put up any. Perhaps something left over from her husband’s rules. I didn’t ask.
I gave Laura a basketful of peaches and cherries, and she promised me a cherry clafouti since one loaf wasn’t a fair exchange. Her words, not mine.
When I got back to the house, I found Craven coming out of his bedroom and Flint lurking, nursing a huge vat of coffee.
“Everything okay?” Craven asked, ruffling his hair.
“Yeah. Laura suggested selling some of my fruits and vegetables from the garden at the stand. I’m thinking about it. Why are you still up?”
Craven sighed. “I tossed and turned entirely too much. Decided to get up and let the wolf run. He’s on edge.”
“And you?” I pointed my question at Flint. Usually, he was still asleep or in his office by now.
“It was a third-cup-of-coffee kind of day.”
“Fair enough.”
My wolf had been more antsy lately as well, but I let him out daily to curb his nerves. The real reason all of us were stagnant and our wolves needed to run more, lay unspoken.
We were an incomplete pack without an omega. A center. She would ground us and our animals, and our lives would revolve around her.
We were planets with no star to orbit.
Fate would find a way. I had to believe that.
Chapter Three
Tawny
I arrived in town with nothing.
Literally.
People talk about having only the clothes on your back, but I would have given a lot to have anything on my back besides fur. Not that I lacked gratitude for my wolf’s rescuing me from a fate I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. But when I’d asked her where we should go, and she said anywhere, she didn’t have the worry of being arrested by humans for public nudity.
And yet I had nothing but gratitude for her courage. She didn’t completely understand how my world worked, but she’d done everything she could to save me from a horror even I barely could believe could happen.
We traveled cross-country and emerged in a field outside a town I’d never seen before—a good thing. Even the name, Pleasant, rang no bells. And still, she trotted along, finally coming to a stop in an alley, where she curled up and went to sleep. Not ideal, probably, but we were both exhausted.
