I was about to ask Ben what he meant by that last part when he started talking again.
“In the dream about my parents, when my alpha father said ‘He’s not like you’ to my birth father, I think he meant not simply omega, butomega x.”
“Ben. Are you certain those dreams meant anything? You’ve been upset at the idea of what happened to you as an infant. You could have been sick that night when we couldn’t wake you. That dream may have just been a manifestation of your subconscious hurt. And we’ve spoken enough about the founding colony we read about in the history books for you to dream about that.”
Sitting up, Ben turned on the swing to look at me. “Those dreams were unlike any I’d ever had. I know they meant something. You’re just going to have to take my word for it.”
“Okay, okay.” I pulled him back into my arms. “I believe you.” When he relaxed against me, I said, “If those people in the dream about John Waters were from the first colony, and you are right that he was the one mated to Pleasant Adams, and if Pleasant was omega x rather than just an omega, then maybe they found out about his abilities and thought he was a witch. They killed people they suspected of witchcraft back then.”
“Oh,” Ben said softly. He was quiet a moment before speaking again. “And they killed the baby, too, just in case? Or could they tell? How did my parents know that I was omega x?”
“Some kind of physical sign,” I concluded, stopping the swing with my foot.
Ben looked up at me. “Right? And if both Elliott and I are omega x, we must have that sign. What could it be? I don’t have a birthmark.”
“Maybe those men from the SOS can shed some light on all this,” I said, hoping it was true.
Chapter thirty
Ben
When Laura arrived, that evening, she brought Keane and Elliott with her, along with the CEO and the president of the SOS.
The CEO, Kristopher Gatlin, was a nicely dressed alpha whom I judged to be in his fifties, with graying dark hair and a serious manner about him. His mate, Jermaine, the president of the SOS, was a blond beta about fifteen to twenty years younger than he was.
Laura introduced everyone, and Maddox and Colt brought some chairs in from the kitchen. As everyone was taking seats, Jermaine smiled at me and said, “In your ninth month?”
“Fifth,” I said.
His eyes grew wide. “Your fifth…”
“I know I’m really big,” I said, and shrugged. “Laura doesn’t think I’m having twins.”
“Alright, everyone,” Laura said. “We’re ready to have our discussion. Kris?”
The older man looked at where I sat with the other omegas. I hadn’t even noticed that we’d all sat together.
“It’s nice to meet you all at last. Jermaine and I are familiar with your situations, as we’ve followed you through Laura and the Michaels. Thank you for inviting us here. We are excited to speak to you. Let me tell you a little about us. I have been with the SOS for thirty years now. When I was fourteen, my life changed when the government came for my best friend, Wyatt. We knew it would happen, of course. He was registered. We’d promised to always keep in touch, and I waited years to hear from Wyatt, and so did his family. At first, we thought he would write or call when he settled down. Then we thought he would when he was older and placed with an alpha. But none of us ever heard from Wyatt again.
“His parents contacted the government multiple times and received what they called the runaround. They chased phone calls for a year before receiving a letter telling them that Wyatt had been placed with an alpha who worked for an oil company in Texas and all was well. But no real information. Wyatt’s parents contacted every oil company in Texas, but without a name for the alpha, they got nowhere. Finally, they decided to go to the capital and demand to find out where their son was. They couldn’t even get past the doors of the Omega Registration, Collection, and Redistribution Office.
“After that, Wyatt’s parents went to the press, but no one would pick up the story. Defeated, they returned home. Throughout all this, they kept me informed. My desire to know what happened to Wyatt, along with my indignation and sense of wrongness at how his parents had been treated by the government program, steered my interests to law school. While I was there, Wyatt’s father called me and told me about a small group called the Society for Omega Safety that believed the government was lying to us about omegas. So, when I graduated law school, I sought them out and have been working with them ever since.”
Kris looked to his spouse-mate. “Jermaine?”
The younger man smiled. “I met Kris after he came to my university and spoke about the SOS. A lot of people thought it was a conspiracy theory, but I was interested. Like Kris, I had known an omega growing up. We hadn’t been close, but I had been affected by his departure when we were adolescents. My parents had explained to me that he was an omega and why he had to leave, and I was very upset. I never forgot it. So, when Kris spoke at my university, I went to the front to see him after his presentation.”
“The rest is history,” Kris said, chuckling. “Jermaine and I eventually took over the SOS when the founder—Celia Franco, a woman who had twin boys taken by the government—passed away. The Society has grown substantially, particularly in the past decade or so, as the word has spread and parents are beginning to demand information on their omega children. Laura has tirelessly researched the omegas we’ve been able to save.”
“What have you learned about that?” Colt asked. “Have the omegas you’ve rescued told you anything useful?”
“As of yet, we do not know the location of the omega house. Our omegas have all been rescued in transport and know nothing. To date, we have no real evidence. Even the omegas that Laura has worked with for the past five years had no useful information for us. We don’t know that their kidnappers were affiliated with the government.”
Colt exchanged glances with Angus and Maddox.
Clearing his throat, Kristopher said, “I understand you have questions and, perhaps, some information for us?”
“We do,” Angus said. “Have you ever heard of omega x?”