Chapter 78
Ciel
The meeting is actually not that bad.
I don't know what I was dreading.
It's… nice. Really nice.
Talking to another omega without feeling like I'm on guard, without the heavy weight of everything I've been through pressing down on me — it feels almost foreign. Ivan's easy to talk to. He has this light energy about him, like everything's a little softer around him.
Lanny is sitting in his lap, gleefully chewing on a teething ring while Ivan talks about how his daughter, Nia, used to be obsessed with chewing on anything that wasn't meant to be chewed on.
"I once caught her trying to bite the table leg," he says, laughing softly.
I snort into my paper cup of lukewarm tea. "That's impressive. Lanny once tried to chew my alpha's wallet."
He gasps dramatically. "No! Did he survive the teeth marks?"
I can't help it — I laugh. A real one, the kind that makes my shoulders shake and my chest ache in a good way.
