Page 130 of The Other Omega

“None of you could spare ten minutes to explain what was happening?” I turned to Caius. “Especially you.”

“My love⁠—”

“You're leaving on deployment, Caius. You could get hurt. Something could happen to you while you're there, and I didn't even know you were leaving.”

That was the bit I couldn’t get over.

I folded my arms around myself and started pacing.

“I understand that you can't tell me everything about your work. Fine. I don't like it, but I understand it. I'm not asking you to tell me where Caius is going or what he's doing there. But somebody could have told me he was leaving.”

Nobody interrupted me.

“Instead, I woke up, Caius is leaving, our home is being dismantled, the two of you are on call indefinitely”—I gestured towards Lucien and Alaric—“there's an entire security team moving nearby, and nobody thought perhaps I should know any of this until it was already happening. And not even from your own mouths, mind you.”

I turned back to them.

“I don't want to have to fight for explanations. I don't want information spoon-fed to me in tiny pieces because I happened to ask the right question. You need to communicate with me.”

Then I looked at Caius.

“You especially. You could have come into my nest this morning, or picked up your pad and messaged, ‘I'm being deployed. I don't know when I'll be home.’ That's all I needed to know.”

“I would have liked to say goodbye.”

My eyes filled before I could stop them.

Caius was in front of me almost immediately. He pulled me into his arms, and I wrapped mine around him just as tightly, burying my face against his chest.

“Please,” I whispered. “Don't do that again. I want to say goodbye to you every time.”

His arms tightened around me.

“You will, my love.”

I held on to him. “Even if you get called away in the middle of the night.”

“Yes.”

“Even if you only have five minutes.”

“I will come to you.”

His hand moved slowly over my back. “I am sorry, my love.”

“Don't be sorry. Just don't do it again.”

“I will not.”

I stayed against him until I trusted myself enough to lift my head.

“There is something else you should know, sweetheart,” Leon said.

“I have purchased the six residences adjoining our own. Three on either side.”

“I know you did, Leon. For security reasons.”

“Not solely,” Darius said.