As the orphans ran away in a hurry, the child, who was crouching with her head wrapped, peeked up.

“Why were you out there? I told you to stay inside!”

“Because you didn’t come…….”

The sun was setting over the head of the child who answered with a sullen face.

“……I was busy with work.”

Adam answered sourly, grabbing the child by the wrist and raising her up. The child smiled broadly as if she was relieved to hear that it was because of work.

“By the way, what did you just say?”

“What?”

Is she asking me what I said when I kicked the orphans out?

“I told you not to touch you because you are my family. They won’t bother you anymore.”

Adam gave her a sour answer again this time.

On the other hand, the child shouted loudly, “Family!” as if she were very moved, and muttered it repeatedly as if she were talking to herself.

“Stop it. We’re not even a real family.”

“Well, but just now we’re a family…”

“I’m just saying it so they can’t touch you.”

The child’s eyebrows drooped when he glared. And she took out the hand held by Adam and hid it behind her back.

“I know that.”

The child looked at Adam in tears.

“I-I know that you can’t be a family just because you ate together.”

Adam’s heart ached as if he had made a big mistake when he saw the child sniffling sadly.

But he couldn’t think of anything to console her.

How to become a family without blood relations…….

There was nothing but marriage.

Adam quickly opened his mouth when the child tried to burst into tears.

“I am an Alpha. Alpha can only be paired with omega.”

The reason why he drew this line was that he wanted the child to stop giving up.

However, the child, who listened to Adam, thought hard about something and wiped her wet eyes, and answered.

“Then I’ll be an Omega!”

“……your nature is not within one’s control.”

If he could decide, he would have chosen anything but alpha, no, not born at all.

The child, who could not have known Adam’s intentions, kept asking questions.

“But what if I become an omega? Will you be my partner then?”

If you’re a partner, you’re a family! Adam kept his mouth shut when the child added in an excited voice.

For the child, family seemed to mean happiness. But Adam’s idea was different.

Being paired with Alpha doesn’t necessarily make you happy. If she becomes a family member with him, she will be unhappy.

“I don’t need a family or anything.”

Adam denied the need for a family, just as a cornered beast reveals its teeth, and the more frightened one becomes, the higher his voice becomes.

Why do you want to be an omega because of a guy like me? Marie, an Omega, you know what happened to her? The same goes for your father. He’s an Omega. That’s why he ran away to this place and left you alone.

All kinds of thoughts were seething in his head. There was only a question that would surely hurt the child if he uttered a word out of his mouth.

“You don’t want to be with me?”

Then the child secretly grabbed Adam’s fingertips. Looking at the little hand, Adam thought.

He doesn’t hate it.

No. Actually, he liked it.

He doesn’t know if he’s allowed to like it. He’s happy, but he doesn’t think she’ll be happy. What if I can’t make you happy? If you’re unhappy because of me…….

“I’ll definitely be an omega and be your partner.”

“……what?”

Adam looked at the child in bewilderment.

The child only laughed without a word. And a smile was shown.

“Let’s be happy together.”

The child’s father was still missing.

The child also had an ominous premonition, so the number of times she laughed decreased. She often zoned out and behaved poorly.

He felt like he was seeing a flowerpot withering away. Strangely, however, such a child began to smell sweet.

The scent caught him in an unfamiliar feeling. His lower stomach tickled pleasantly, and he felt guilty about that.

“Are you sick?”

“Huh? N-no.”

Even that day, the child reacted a beat slower to Adam’s words and shook her head.

“…did my father forget me?”

And she added as if she had resigned to fate.

The child who had always been bravely waiting for her trashy father finally declared defeat.