“Are you all right?” Heath asked, coming back in with a worried gleam in his eye and a disheveled look to his clothing, like there’d been a tussle. “My brother oversteps. He always does. Don’t be upset that he treated you rudely.
He’s a snob.”
“Why did he say that?”
“What?” Heath said, but his eyes glinting above the darkness of his beard were cagey.
“About Nathan. That he was my omega parent.”
“My brother’s upset about—”
Adrien straightened his glasses and peered at Heath. “Is it true?”
Heath rubbed his hand over his beard, and Adrien couldn’t help but think of Lance’s story of Bluebeard. What had he done? Who had he sold himself to? Whose son had he born?
“Did you kill Nathan?” he asked quietly, his worst unconscious fear rising to the surface.
Heath startled. “Little one, that’s absurd. I loved Nathan.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“I—”
“I want to know the truth, Heath. And I want to know it now.” Michael gobbled hungrily at his chest, and tears welled in Adrien’s eyes. He hated it.
“Let’s go back down to the nest. I’ll call for Simon,” Heath said slowly.
“So we can talk without Michael.”
THE BLUE LEATHER book with the white card sat in his lap.
Nathan.
Adrien ran his fingers over the letters. “I never knew my omega father’s name. The records were sealed from me.”
“Nathan Battershell. He was…” Heath trailed off.
“So that’s why you used that name in the auction?” Adrien’s throat hurt from holding back tears. “You’re telling me that my omega parent was your lover? That this book is full of pictures of him?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
Adrien’s chin quivered. “I hate you so much right now. I’m hurt. Angry. I want to kick you and bite you and hurt you back.” He wiped his eyes. “But part of me wants to thank you because this…” He tapped the book. “Is something I’ve wanted to know for so long.”
Heath touched the back of Adrien’s neck, sliding his hand up as though to trail into his hair.
Adrien hissed and knocked it away. “Don’t touch me again unless you want me to fight you.”
“You wouldn’t win, little one.”
“I don’t care. I’d leave marks.” He felt scarred inside and out already.
Heath nodded, his eyes downcast and full of shame. “Will you ever forgive me?”
“I don’t know right now.” Adrien’s fingers clenched the edges of the photo album.
“Do you want me to go?”
Adrien hesitated. Part of him wanted to be alone to look at the pictures, to see his omega parent for the first time. But another part of him wanted to know more. Wanted to understand the pictures, to understand why Nathan was smiling or laughing, to know where he was and what he was doing when each shot was taken.
“No,” he said. “Stay.”
Heath sat very still and didn’t argue.
Adrien opened the book.
The first picture was in color. He didn’t know why he’d expected it to be in black and white like the pictures in Heath’s baby album, but he had.
Instead, he was greeted by a sharp smile, laughing eyes, and a face remarkably like his own. But more somehow. Like Adrien was just an echo of a complicated but stunning song.
Nathan was handsome. No, dashing.
He turned the pages slowly, questions heavy on this tongue. Too heavy to actually speak them.
Every picture revealed a confidence that Adrien had always lacked.
Nathan’s casual, languid poses, his mischievous gaze, and a certainty in his expression that whoever was behind the camera—Heath, it had to be—was absolutely besotted with him. And yet there was an edge of cruelty in the set of Nathan’s mouth and the slant of his stare. Like he knew he could hurt Heath and get away with it. Like he knew that he could and he had.
No, he did.
Adrien’s hand trembled as he turned another page and another.
Fashionable clothes. Fancy yachts. Mountain lodges. Tuxedos. Photos with Heath. Photos alone. Photos of Nathan nude. Photos of him posed. Casual photos and professional ones, too.
Pages of pictures of a man Adrien could never know, or love, or understand. A man Heath had loved before Adrien—did he even love him?
Or was he just a piece of Nathan that Heath had managed to scavenge? Like Lidell and Ned had implied?
“Why did you love him?” Adrien finally asked, lingering on a photo of Nathan with his head tossed back, laughter creasing his handsome face, and a glass of champagne held loosely in his hand. He was standing by another alpha, a tall, dark man with wide hands, who had them all over Nathan’s hips.
Adrien wondered how Heath had felt about that then. How he felt about it now.
“He was an asshole,” Heath said sadly. “A beautiful, cruel asshole.”
“That’s the kind of man you love?”
“No. I love you, and you’re kind, gentle, trusting. Nathan was never trusting.”
“Maybe I shouldn’t have been either,” Adrien spit out, shooting Heath a dark glare.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you. When I—”
“I don’t want your excuses again. I want the truth. Why did you love him?”
“Because he was—” Heath waved at the album. “I was bewitched.”
“And when you bought my heat, it was to have a piece of him?”
“Yes.”
“And when you fucked me in the heat cabin, you wanted to knock me up because I was Nathan’s son.”
Heath swallowed, a confused expression flitting over his face. “At first.”
“When I came here, did you want me here because I was Nathan’s son or
—”
“No! That’s not why I wanted you here.”
“Why not?”
“At the cabin. That’s when it changed for me.”
“While we were fucking,” Adrien said acidly.
“Yes. No. Just there. In the cabin with you.”
He’d never heard Heath sound so lost. “So why didn’t you tell me then?”
“What was I supposed to say? You were scared and needed me to guide you. Was I supposed to tell you while you were out of your mind in heat, ‘By the way, I fucked your omega parent years ago, but now he’s dead, and I’m hoping you can bring part of him back to me’?”
Adrien’s throat tightened. He couldn’t breathe. He bent his head over the photo album, the scent of the old pages filling his nostrils, and he choked on it as a tear splattered next to the picture of Nathan laughing.
“He wasn’t kind,” Heath said. “He was unfaithful and drove me mad. He was like a drug to me.”
“Like you’ve been a drug to me.”
“I hope not. You’ve made me feel complete. He made me nuts,” Heath said. “Our lovemaking was violent and consuming. But while you were pregnant, what we shared kept you calm, brought you joy. It’s not the same.”
“So with him, my omega parent— Nathan.” Oh, how that name tasted bitter in his mouth; thank God Heath hadn’t agreed to it for Michael. “With him, it was the thrill of the chase.”
Heath rubbed at his forehead. “Nathan would give himself to me completely. I’d feel high, wild with joy. Then he’d pull away from me. Say he needed time alone. Go off with another alpha. I’d go insane.” Heath squeezed his eyes shut. “Then he’d come back to me. I’d be angry at first, but