Chapter 64

Ollie’s POV

The next day, I’m surprised to receive a text from Hugh to my regular phone, telling me to come up to the main foyer right away. Confused, I hurry up there, where I find the four brothers, looking various levels of annoyed, all glaring through the open doorway.

Outside the door, Jake stands in an ill-fitting suit. He’s holding a bouquet of flowers. When he sees me, he tries to hand it out to me. Before I can even reject it, Conrad knocks the flowers to the side.

“What are you doing here, Jake?” I ask. Looking to the brothers, I add, “What’s going on?”

“Your boyfriend,” Hugh says with no small measure of clear disgust skewing the word, “wants to speak with all of us.”

I look at Jake again, still searching for answers. “About?”

“I want to convince them to give me their permission to date you,” Jake says.

My own outrage starts to brew. “Jake, I told you that I’m not interested.”

“I know where your heart truly lies,” he says. “You keep pretending, but once I’ve convinced them, you won’t have to pretend anymore.”

He must be the world’s worst listener. While I can give him points for bravery – standing up against one of the Alphas is no small feat, all four at once is practically unheard of – all of this is unnecessary.

“Jake, you should just go,” I start to say.

“No,” Conrad says suddenly. His arms are crossed and he looks pissed as hell. Yet still he says, “Let’s hear him out.”

The other three brothers all look at him in surprise. I do too.

“I want to hear what he has to say for himself,” Conrad says. He asks his brothers, “Don’t you?”

Soon, they all relent.

“I suppose,” Hugh says.

Declan grunts.

Wes returns his suspicious gaze back to Jake, who seems thrilled by the prospect of being allowed a chance to speak, not realizing that the brothers aren’t likely to ever take his side. This has to be some kind of setup.

“Jake,” I say, trying once more to convince him to just leave.

He continues to not listen to me. “Don’t worry, Ollie. I can convince them. I just know it.”

Ten minutes later, the brothers, Sylvia, and I are all sitting in the living room, with Jake standing in front of us.

Conrad sits on one of the high backed chairs opposite the couch. He leans back, stretching his arms and legs out like a lazy king about to hear the plea of a particularly bothersome peasant.

“Get on with it then,” he says. “We’re listening.”

“Right,” Jake says. He reaches into the inside pocket of his suit coat and pulls out some notecards.

Sylvia snickers when she sees them, though she covers it with a cough as Wes glances at her. She can’t hide her true feelings from me though. The minute we headed for the living room, she imposed herself on this situation and has looked like she’s thoroughly enjoying herself ever since.

I bet she’d get herself a bowl of popcorn if we’d promised not to say or do anything for five minutes. As it was, she seems to not want to miss a moment.

Jake clears his throat. “As you already know, uh… Ollie…” He juts his hand out toward me. “She’s great. And I… uh…” He loses his place on the notecards and takes a moment to find his spot again. “Oh, right. I know she is an Omega, and I can understand why you must be protective of her, but I care about her. And I know I can treat her right.”

“Are you in the university?” Declan asks.

“No, I, uh… Well I was…” Jake’s fingers dance nervously on the back of his notecards. “I dropped out.”

“What do you do for work, then?” Hugh asks.

“I work in my dad’s garage. He fixes cars.”

“Are you a mechanic?” Wes asks.

“Uh… no. I answer the phones,” Jake replies. He lowers his head, embarrassed.

“You want to father Ollie’s children,” Declan says and I cringe hearing it aloud again. “How do you expect to support them longterm?”

“I mean, well… Ollie and I can figure it out,” he says.

What annoys me the most about this entire interrogation is that my voice has no bearing. No one seems interested in what I think, and when I try to speak up for myself, I am so easily dismissed.

I feel so unnecessary that I’m ready to just walk out of the room and let them argue all day and night. The only reason I stay is because, even though Jake is infuriating, I still consider him a friend. If I left him alone with the brothers, who knows what they might do?

Even with me here, things are starting to get out of control.

Wes stands. “You pursue Ollie without a financial plan, wanting to father her children, and you expect us to believe that you aren’t attempting to worm your way into the family’s good graces?” He turns to his brothers. “I think we have it wrong. We thought Ollie was trying to baby trap him, but what if it’s the other way around?”

Hugh laughs. “Joke is on you. You think we would support Ollie if she was fool enough to get pregnant?” Toward the end of his sentence, his laughter ceased and became a growl. It happened so fluidly, I wonder if he even noticed.

“I love her,” Jake says. “I’m not after anyone’s money.”

“We don’t believe that,” Conrad says.

“Ollie is just an Omega,” Sylvia adds, no help at all. No one comments on her words, not even Jake.

“I came here today to prove myself open and honest,” Jake said. “I love her, and –”

“You don’t love me, Jake,” I say firmly, unable to hold my tongue any longer. “You don’t even know me that well. We’ve only ever interacted at the store.”

“But –” he starts.

“I’ve heard enough,” Conrad says. “Declan, will you take out the trash.”

“Gladly,” Declan says. Standing, he marches over to Jake and grabs him by the back of the collar.

“Now, wait a minute!” Jake says, but he doesn’t listen. Instead, he just drags him down the hallway toward the door.

I almost intervene. I don’t want Jake to be hurt, but Declan doesn’t seem to be roughing him up any. He’s just firmly dragging him to the door.

When they are out of earshot, Conrad looks at me.

“This is the man you have chosen to give yourself to?” he asks.

“No,” I say, “I have no interest in –”

“I tried to warn her, Conrad. She confided her feelings for Jake in me, and I tried so hard to talk her out of it,” Sylvia says. “I’m so sorry I failed…”

“It’s not your fault,” Wes tells her at once.

She’s lying right through her teeth. I never confided anything in her! And anyway, there is nothing to confide!

“None of this is true,” I start to say.

“You should be more like Sylvia,” Hugh tells me. “She has her head on straight.”

“Omegas are eager to pair up,” Wes says, like that’s a known fact. “But you need to have more restraint, Ollie.”

“You will never have our permission to date Jake,” Conrad says gruffly. “In the future, you will only be involved with men that we pick for you. Do you understand?”