SURPRISE DOUBLE UPDATEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!

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OMEGA READERS ARE EATING GOODDDDD!!!!!!! I HOPE YOU ALL ENJOY!!!!!!!

IF YOU DO – REMEMBER TO COMMENTTTTTTTTT 🩵

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Julian’s POV

“Here’s what I’m thinking.”

I lift my head just as Aiden stalks into our hotel bedroom with a grin already plastered across his face.

“There’s an aquarium thirty minutes away from here, and there are forty-five minutes left of happy hour at the bar across the street. If we leave right now, mix every drink we get with the moonshine in my bag—”

“My Goddess,” I groan, but he’s not done.

“Once we’re drunk, we then go to the aquarium in Peter’s honour, and see where the night takes us from there.” Aiden lets his hands fall at his sides while his eyes shimmer with his excitement. “Great plan, right?”

I blink at him, just the once, before I lift my phone, showing him the text I’ve been staring at since it came through.

His shoulders drop just like his excitement.

“He’s fine, Julian,” he sighs, but I’m already shaking my head. “He said ‘avocado.’”

“I know, I know,” I promise as I hold his gaze, “but Aiden, read this without the avocado being there.”

“Julian—”

“‘Mateo invited some of the crew to spend a week in his place in Chile with Julieta?’” I glance up at him. “Why on Earth would Mateo wait until the day they were flying home to invite them, and Peter was supposed to already be on his second flight when this came through— so, what? Did he not tell us until he was there, or was he already boarding and decided to turn around? Peter wouldn’t do that.”

“Maybe not on his own, but he’s not on his own. He’s with a team of people that he has raved about for the last three months, and if it happened quickly, and everyone was on board, I can see him getting caught up in the moment and joining in.”

I frown. “Peter isn’t spontaneous.”

Aiden laughs as he bends down and scoops up Mr Fluff from my side. “Seriously, Jewels? You don’t think the kid who went to work in Antarctica for three whole months is spontaneous?”

“That was different,” I argue, but he just scoffs as he scratches under Mr Fluff’s neck. “He spent months getting ready for that— we spent months helping him get ready for that. He knew exactly where he was going and how long he was staying there. I can’t see him just going to Chile at the last moment without knowing where he was staying or how long he would be there.”

“Not even if John was there, too?” He counters, and I get stuck on my next breath, because I can not argue that one so quickly.

The very last thing either of us expected Peter to find on his latest expedition was a partner, though I guess that wasn’t the right name for it. They seemed more like lovers, but Peter had never called him that, or called him anything beyond a friend, really, but Aiden and I weren’t dumb.

We put it together on our own sometime after Peter started turning into a peach whenever he brought up John in a story about the team, and then there was that one time on the phone when he didn’t sound like he was alone…

From the pictures, John seemed the type of man that Peter would usually run from— naturally large and imposing— but against all odds, the human had been the one to charm him. Though that didn’t change the fact that this whole thing was weird.

“It’s odd, Aiden,” I say finally as I stare at the phone again. “It’s not Peter.”

Aiden stays quiet, letting the seconds tick by until I watch him step into the space in front of me and stoop down. He lets Mr Fluff hop away and takes my hand in his, waiting patiently until I meet his gaze.

“You’re right. It’s not like him— not like the Peter we know,” he concedes quietly, and my breath comes short, “but…” He squeezes my hands as if he feels the way my heart sinks, “Peter has been changing recently, coming into himself, and so there are things he might do that will feel off. Remember what he did at that last meet in the gallery?”

I did, though I could hardly still believe that Peter had not only talked to an unmated alpha who had not hidden his interest in him, but flirted with him, and then scolded us for getting in the way when we thought he was afraid.

“He can be bolder than we give him credit for, and he’s seen more of the world than us, Jewels. Is it so surprising that the kid who’s worked in the Seychelles would want to make a pit stop in Chile with people he trusts?”

I stare at our hands, struggling not to immediately argue because I know he’s right.

“And…” Aiden shuffles closer, gentling his tone and gaze before he speaks. I shake my head, already knowing what’s coming, but his apology trickles through our bond before he continues anyway. “You know how he feels about coming home.”

My chest clenches, and I try to pull my hands from his, but Aiden holds fast while my heart breaks all over again.

Christmas over the years had become our family’s favourite holiday, and while we couldn’t spend the entirety of it together, when it came nightfall, everyone found their way to ours so that we could spend Christmas dinner together, as a family.

Last Christmas, we’d been afraid Peter wouldn’t make it. He was so caught up with work that it had seemed impossible, but then he’d shown up at the door with no notice, just his suitcase and a smile. And we’d all been too happy to see him to really question why he hadn’t told us he was coming, or why he’d chosen to take two planes and a coach to get home when Nikola was more than content to get him.

Aiden had been the one to notice that something was off, but we’d agreed to talk to him about it after Christmas passed and everything was quieter.

We never got that chance.

It had happened suddenly that night. We were all sitting around the table, going around as always to share what we were grateful for, and then Peter was suddenly on his feet, running out of the room with tears in his eyes.

The panic that had surged through our family bond had been suffocating.

We’d all risen to follow, but in the end, Aiden had been the one to go, only after demanding that he alone did so.

It had been harder than words could describe not to go with him, but he’d been the first to sense that something was wrong with Peter, and so I’d let him go.

They returned a while later, Peter’s eyes puffy, but dry, while he clung to Aiden as though he was his lifeline. Aiden had looked angrier than I had seen him in years. I would later learn that that anger was directed solely at our Goddess.

Despite his reappearance, Peter hadn’t wanted to speak about it, and Aiden made sure we didn’t push him, despite how desperately we all wanted to. But he had told me afterwards, and the truth had broken my heart.

Peter did not enjoy being home anymore.

He loved us, and wanted to see us, but being with us… — all of us, when we were mated while he was not— had chipped away at him until he could not take it anymore.

It broke him to be around us, to have to watch his siblings find the love he so desperately craved, to witness them grow their families while the years passed on with no sign of his mate.

He just couldn’t do it. So… Aiden told him to go.

To pack his bags and go to Antarctica, or anywhere his heart desired. To spend the time away from home, if he was happier when he was not there. To just be free and not feel pressured to be around us if it only hurts him to do so.

And it hurt, Goddess knows it hurt when he told me that. I wanted to kill him, to find Peter and tell him that we could find a better way to make him feel comfortable and happy around us. But after the panic and the pain settled and I stopped struggling against Aiden’s arms around me, I hadn’t done a single one of those things, because I knew he was right.

Peter had chosen to take as long as he could to return home, and he’d lied about his work and time off, just so he wouldn’t have to be around us all so long. And if he had to do all of that just to endure a week around his family, then it wasn’t worth him.

We could see him in portions, and had planned to, but if time away was what he needed, then all we could do was support him.

That didn’t make it easy, though, especially as a father when I knew even away, he was hurting on his own.

“There is the possibility that he is doing this because he’d rather be there than here,” Aiden whispers while I fight against the tears in my eyes. “And I know that hurts, baby, I know, but there is nothing we can do about it.”

“But if that’s the case, then how long does this go on?” I rasp while I cling to his hands. “Is this going to be what it’s like forever?”

“No, of course not,” Aiden whispers while he lifts a hand to catch my tears before they fall. He smiles at me, somehow at peace in all of this. “It’s just what he needs right now, so we can’t get in the way of that just because we miss him.”

I nod, even as I bite my lip to stop it from trembling.

“Hey,” Aiden curls a finger under my neck, rubbing gently. “He’s okay. He’s smart, he knows how to fight, he’s got magical fucking C4 strapped to his chest—” I laugh, and he does too as he grins at me, “—and he might be our Little Peter forever, but he’s 26, Jewels. If he’s in Russia right now and lied about it, then Pozdravlyayu!”

I snort around another laugh. “What the hell does that mean?”

Aiden shrugs. “I don’t know. Heard Hagen say it once and you know that kids like a fucking multilingual encyclopedia.”

“I think they call them polyglot.”

“I see where he gets it from,” he pokes, and as I laugh again, his smile spreads wider. “My point is, Peter’s an adult, and that means that he can do whatever the fuck he wants without us showing up to crash the party just because we’re worried.”

“I guess that’s true,” I murmur as I blink away my tears and nod, forcing my panic back as I cling to Aiden’s words. “You’re right.”

“Of course, I’m right,” he scoffs. “I’m, like, a fucking genie.”

“Sure,” I grumble, even as my lips pull into a smile. I stare at him until I have to sigh. “I don’t know how you do it.” He raises a brow. “Not freak out when it’s the first thing I do.”

“You’ve got the senses of a wombat,” he replies, and I can’t help but blurt another laugh. “You always know when something’s wrong, and I’m not saying that something isn’t off and that the kid’s message wasn’t weird. I just know that if he really was in danger, he would’ve been home already.”

I nod again. That I could agree with for now, at least

“Okay,” I say, slapping my hands to my thighs as I clear my head. “So what’s the plan?”

Aiden perks up, all but jumping to his feet as though I’d just slid a firework under his butt. “Happy hour and the aquarium.”

“Hmm,” I hum, and his expression drops before I rise and slide my arms over his shoulders. “How about… we enjoy happy hour, get tipsy, not drunk, and then we come back here, and I let you put me through the mattress?”

Aiden’s mouth falls open, and I smirk while I peck across his cheek. When he comes to again, he jerks his head about like a bobble head, and I laugh as he starts kissing all over my face.

I soak them all in, the same way I do the peace and joy he brings me when I would’ve otherwise already been hunting Peter down.

I still wasn’t convinced that the message he’d sent had been true, but Aiden was right about the fact that if something was wrong, then that wasn’t the message he would’ve sent at all.

Just because something was off didn’t mean that he was in trouble. Not yet.

I could only give him the space he needed for now, and I would, but let Goddess give me even a hint of him being in danger, and there’d be nothing strong enough in this realm or the next to stop me from finding my boy.

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PAPA BEAR JEWELS IS ON THE CASE! Lol, sedated for now, but not for long…

Thoughts?????????

Thoughts on the surprise Julian and Aiden snippet???? On Julian’s POV???

Peter not wanting to be home was mentioned briefly in the earlier chapters so it’s no surprise, but hearing from Julian’s POV hurtttttttt! Like that’s his baby and he doesn’t feel happy being home ughhhhh

But I also love how Aiden’s like, the kid’s not dying so let him do his thing looool

There’s actually an entire extra out with the Christmas of Peter not wanting to be home and talking to Aiden – it’s called ‘Peter gets tired of waiting for his mate’ and it’s out on Patreon and my website for select tiers

And there is even the extra where he flirts with an alpha, and it’s HOT, and that one is ‘Peter gets hit on’

I’ll add the links to each to my message board before the end of the weekend, but you can find links to my Patreon and website in my bio!

ANYWAYSSSSS ONTO THE NEXT