Page 73 of Omega Hunted

He didn’t answer straight away.

Instead, he took my hand, turning it over until our fingers fitted together as though they’d always belonged there, and the warmth returned. It wasn’t stronger; it was… calmer. As if whatever had reached for me before had found what it had been searching for.

I sucked in a quiet breath. “Did you feel that?”

Cassian nodded once, never taking his eyes off our joined hands. “I did.”

“What is it?” I whispered.

Cassian let out a slow breath, but it caught halfway, and for several seconds he didn’t answer. His thumb kept moving across my knuckles, back and forth, as though that tiny movement was the only thing keeping him grounded.

“I don’t think…” He stopped and shook his head. “No. I mean…” His brow furrowed. “This isn’t supposed to happen.”

“What isn’t?”

He looked at me, then away again, and that scared me more than if he’d given me an answer. Cassian always seemed certain. Even when he was angry or worried, there was something solid about him. Now he looked lost.

“Cassian?”

“I spent years trying to understand what happened after Raff died.” His voice was rough. “Not why he died. I knew why. I wanted to understand what happened to me. To my wolf. What losing a fated mate was supposed to do to an alpha.”

I didn’t move.

“I read everything I could find. Medical research. Pack histories. Studies on broken bonds. Old journals that contradicted each other from one page to the next.” His mouth twisted. “Most of it said the same thing. A fated bond happens once. You lose it, you live with the absence.”

Grief hit hard—I’d never have that bond with Cassian, and it hurt so badly.

His fingers tightened around mine. “But there were other things.”

“What things?”

“Stories, mostly. Old pack records. A few research papers that referenced cases nobody could prove.” He hesitated. “Alphas and omegas who lost their fated mates and then, years later, started showing signs of another connection.”

My heart gave one hard beat. “What kind of connection?”

“That was the problem. Nobody agreed.” He finally looked at me. “Some called it a second bond. Some said grief attached itself to someone new. Others said it was an instinctive response to vulnerability, especially when an omega or a child was involved. A few claimed the original bond had to have been weak for another one to form.” His expression hardened at that. “Raff and I weren’t weak.”

“I know.”

“I stopped reading after that.” His voice dropped. “Because every explanation felt like it reduced what I had with him into something that could be measured against whatever came afterward. And there wasn’t going to be an afterward. I knew that.”

Except his hand was still holding mine and I glanced down at our fingers. “And now?” I asked.

He went very still.

“My wolf knows where you are all the time.” The admission seemed dragged from him. “I wake up and listen for you before I’m even fully conscious. When you’re frightened, I feel it before you tell me. When you talk about leaving…” His jaw flexed. “Everything in me reacts before I can think.”

A shiver ran through me. “That could be because I’m an omega.”

“Yes.”

“Because I’m pregnant.”

“Yes.”

“Because your alpha instinct is to protect.”

“Yes.” He swallowed. “That’s what I’ve been telling myself.”