My eyes widened. I couldn’t imagine it. “I guess. If you’re comfortable.”
Angus sighed. “I don’t think I’ll ever be comfortable doing that, Colt. Frankly, I’m not sure you would be, either, and even if you were, it wouldn’t be fair to ask you to be the only one making the sacrifice. But I do need the penetration. I crave it. I think you do, too.”
Silently, I nodded. I felt sick because it was obvious where this was going.
“The way I see it, there’s only one thing we can do,” Angus said.
Don’t cry. Don’t cry. Don’t cry,I told myself. I didn’t want to lose Angus, but it was probably better it happened now rather than later. Before we got too deep.Who are you kidding? You’ve been in love with Angus for the past two years at least.
“Give up on us,” I said.
“What the fuck? No! We need a third,” Angus said.
What did he just say?
“Colt? Did you hear me?”
I heard him, but I didn’t understand. I shook my head.
“We need a third person in our relationship. Someone who isn’t an alpha. A beta, or…”
“Or an omega,” I finished.
“Well, I don’t know how feasible that would be.”
“And exactly what beta can take on pleasing two alphas?” I asked.
Angus fell silent because he knew the answer to that as well as I did. No beta could. One alpha in a “soft” rut—a rut much less intense than what supposedly happened when an alpha was with an omega—was enough to keep a beta busy in the bedroom. Two alphas in soft rut would be much too much for a beta to handle.
“We’d have to have two betas,” I said. “That would mean taking two more men into our relationship.”
“Or women,” Angus said. “We could have children.”
“Is that something you want?” I asked him. He’d had only Maddox’s dad with Lucy. Perhaps she couldn’t have another child after that.
“Well, maybe. I’ve been thinking a lot about it lately.”
I swallowed. Things were not working out for us. “I guess we could, but I wouldn’t want to be physical with a woman. I’m gay, Angus, not bisexual.”
“Oh,” Angus said, seeming to think about it. “I guess that would make things kind of uneven.”
“Yeah,” I said. “It would have to be two beta men. At that point, we’d look like we were starting a basketball team. Anyway, what are the chances we can find two betas that we both could fall in love with?”
“Very small,” Angus said. “I’ve always thought my Lucy was the only person I could ever love. I was pretty shocked when I fell for you. And to be honest, I kind of feel weird when I think about being with a woman other than Lucy.”
I didn’t say anything. We were at a crossroads.
Chapter three
Ben
David turned some music on his phone and started talking about the band. Maddox wasn’t taking his eyes off his sandwich, and when he finished it, he excused himself to go mend some more fences.
“Stay inside until…uh.” Maddox looked toward the wing we’d had built for Angus. “Until Gramps or Colt can go outside with you.”
David wasn’t in danger since he was mated to Maddox, although Maddox didn’t trust the government even with that assurance, but I was on the run from them. If someone from the government showed up at the ranch—which they could any time now to harass Maddox and David about Ollie even though it would be a while before anyone could tell if he was an omega or not—I would need an alpha with me to keep them from hauling me away. I wasn’t even sure anyone could keep them from doing that, but I knew Maddox, Angus, or Colt would put up a hell of a fight for me.
What I didn’t know was why. Maddox would probably do it for David’s sake because David and I were really close, and Davidwould be heartbroken to lose me. It was because of David that Maddox had gone searching for me when I was missing. Maybe Angus would defend me for the same reason. But Colt? I had no idea why he would put himself out there against the government, but, somehow, I was sure that he would.