Moira’s quieter counterpart and Mackenzie’s grandfather—an average-sized man in his midseventies who seems content to let his wife do most of the talking—nods absently as he tucks a bite of pot roast into his mouth.
“Been a while,” Phil answers gruffly.
“See?” Moira tuts. “You can’t just bring someone like Noah home and not expect me to gush. I mean, my goodness. I’ve never even met an alpha. Have you, Phil?”
Phil shrugs, pushing his mashed potatoes around. “Knew a guy at the auto shop once. Big fella. Could take a tire off in twenty seconds. It was the damnedest thing.”
“But Noah is a doctor,” Moira gushes. “What a match you two make!”
I can almost feel myself blushing, Moira having been praising me for just being . . . me since we sat down for dinner.
“Oh, well . . .” I push my fork through my peas distractedly. “It’s . . . very nice being with someone so familiar with the field.”
From the corner of my eye, I notice Mackenzie smiling. Something tells me that part of her is enjoying my discomfort. I can sense an entire heap of teasing building up in her that she’ll be subjecting me to later.
“Not to mention how fortunate it is for you two to find each other,” Moira goes on, cutting her roast. “I mean, what are the chances?”
My brow furrows, pausing midbite. “What do you mean?”
“Oh!” Mackenzie’s outburst is sudden. “By the way, Gran. I forgot to tell you—Parker is seeing someone new.”
“That boy,” Moira huffs. “He never tells me anything. Someone from work?”
“No, no,” Mackenzie says. “Someone he met at hot yoga.”
Moira looks taken aback. “What in the world is that?”
“It’s just . . . yoga, but hot. They crank up the heat so you sweat more.”
“Is that what you’re doing?”
Mackenzie nods, taking a large bite of potatoes. “Mhm.” She works down the massive bite. “You sweat like a whore in church, but it’s a good workout.”
“Language, Mackenzie,” Moira chides.
Weirdly, I barely even notice her words, too deep in a train of thought that involves a contorted, sweating Mackenzie on a yoga mat.
What on earth is wrong with me?
“Well, either way,” Moira barrels on. “Good for him. He’s such a good boy, Parker.”
“Gran, he’s creeping up on thirty. I don’t know if you can keep referring to him as a ‘good boy.’？”
“Oh, hush.”
I shake away any lingering thought of Mackenzie in her too-tight yoga clothes sweating in a studio somewhere, chalking it up to proximity and the invasive urge that’s possessed me lately to kiss her every time she’s within three feet of me.
“So Mackenzie tells me the hospital has been making a fuss about your designation?”
I press my lips together, not entirely comfortable with too many people knowing this particular fact, but I suppose I can’t fault Mackenzie for sharing it with someone so close to her. She is, after all, saving my ass, as she would say.
“Just a bit,” I tell her, downplaying it. “I’m hoping it will be resolved soon.”
“Bunch of nonsense, if you ask me,” Moira huffs. “I mean, my goodness. For us to be judging people based on their identity in this day and age! It isn’t as if you can help the way you’re born. I mean, it’s never been a problem for Mackenzie. You don’t see them breathing down her neck about being an omega.”
I go still, nearly dropping my fork. Something about the word that seems to ring in the air long after Moira has said it makes every muscle in my body go rigid. I turn my head to meet Mackenzie’s gaze, finding an apology in her eyes. I realize this is most likely something I should have already known—so I quickly mask my surprise even with the chant of omega omega omega ringing in my hindbrain like some sort of caveman shout that is as irritating as it is unavoidable.
“Of course,” I manage tightly, hoping I sound calmer than I feel. “Less stigmas, I guess. You’ve never heard horror stories about omegas mauling hikers.”
But there are plenty of other stories, some carnal part of my brain whispers, a voice that I know doesn’t belong to reason but instead to the more basic part of me.
“It’s almost like fate that you stumbled across each other,” Moira says gleefully. “No other way to explain something so rare!”
“Right,” I say with a wooden smile. “Fate.”