The Nanny and Her Alphas (Knotted and Claimed #2)

Chapter 1

One

FRANCINE

Mother is dead. Dead. She’s finally dead. And I don’t feel anything in my heart at all.

The casket gleams black under the sun as they lower my mother into the ground. The males grunt with the effort, ropes sliding between their gloved fingers. The wind of Howl’s Edge Island whips my hair across my face, but I don’t bother brushing it away.

I hug my coat tighter around myself, feeling nothing but the cold.

The casket hits the bottom of the grave with a dull thud.

It’s final. Permanent. Just like she deserves.

I barely notice my two older sisters standing on either side of me.

Carmen stands rigid to my right, her jaw clenched so tight I can practically hear her teeth grinding.

Lena sobs openly on my left, clinging to her alpha husband as if she might collapse without his support.

His lips move against her ear, whispering comfort words.

They don’t know.

They can’t know what Mother told me because it would taint their memories of her. But the secret of it is burning through me.

The priest drones on about peace and eternity.

I stare at the casket without blinking until my eyes burn. The wind cuts through my thin black dress beneath my coat, but the chill feels good. I couldn’t sleep at all last night, thinking of my mother’s confession on her deathbed.

“Are you okay?” my sister Carmen whispers, looking over at me in concern.

I don’t answer her. I’m really not okay. The memory of my last exchange with Mother plays through my mind:

“Francine, come closer,” says Mother, her body weak on the hospital bed. Her voice is barely audible, a wisp of sound escaping from cracked lips. Her skin looks like tissue paper stretched over bones. Tears flood my eyes.

I don’t want her to die. Not now. Not ever.

The antiseptic smell of the hospital burns my nostrils, the beeping of machines counting down the last moments of my mother’s life.

“I’m here, Mother,” I say, my chair scraping across the floor as I lean in.

Her fingers clutch at mine, surprisingly strong for someone so frail. Her eyes, once sharp with intelligence, now cloudy with medication, fix on my face with sudden clarity.

“I need to tell you something before I go,” she whispers. “Something I’ve never told anyone.”

I nod, expecting some final motherly wisdom. “Yes, Mother?”

“I killed your fathers.”

What?

The words hang in the air between us. She really said that. My heart stops, then pounds painfully in my chest.

“What do you mean?” I ask, thinking I misheard. Maybe the medicine confused her. “You told us they ran off with another omega.”

She shakes her head, tears leaking from the corners of her eyes. “No. I set their workplace on fire.”

“How? Did you know they were inside the building?” I ask, still unable to believe this new reality. They weren’t just alive somewhere.

“Yes. I needed the insurance money.”

They’ve been dead this entire time. Not hating me, like my mother always told my sisters and me. Ice floods my veins.

The monitor beeps behind her, suddenly sounding loud and deafening in my ears.

“You’re confused,” I say, my voice strained. “That’s not what happened.”

“It’s the truth,” she says, her grip tightening on my hand. “The fire burned them beyond recognition. No one questioned it. I was so selfish. So desperate.”

“Why?” The word tears from my throat. “Why would you do that?”

Her eyes close, momentarily. “Money. The insurance. We were so poor, and they were going to leave me anyway and leave us with nothing.”

The room tilts around me. Memories of my fathers flash through my mind—Papa’s booming laugh, Dad’s gentle hands braiding my hair. The emptiness when Mother told us they’d abandoned us.

“How could you?” I whisper, feeling sick to my stomach. There was no way. She couldn’t.

“I was different then,” she says, her fingers scrabbling against mine as I pull my hand away. “Please, Francine. I need your forgiveness before I go. You understand me. You’re not like your sisters.”

I rip my hand from hers, standing so abruptly that the chair crashes to the floor behind me. “Understand you? I don’t know you at all. You were always hard to live with. And now I know you’re just plain evil.”

Her face crumples. “Please… Franny.”

“Don’t call me that. Papa used to call me that,” I spat, tears rolling down my face. “You took away the only people who truly loved us.”

“Francine, let me explain…” she blubbers as I back towards the door, not knowing what else to say to this murderous wretch who was my mother.

Sobs tear from my chest as I stumble down the hospital corridor. I hide in a bathroom stall, retching until there’s nothing left but dry heaves and the hollow knowledge that everything I believed about my family was a lie.

As soon as I regain my composure, I head back to Mother’s room, but there’s a crowd of nurses in there.

I suddenly look up at the monitors, and there’s a flat line letting out a long continuous tone.

“…and now we commit her body to the ground.” The priest’s voice drags me back to the present.

I blink, the brightness of day jarring after the dim hospital room of my memory. I take deep breaths to try to calm down. There’s nothing I can do to fix the past, I tell myself.

Around the grave, Carmen’s and Lena’s children fidget in their formal clothes, too young to understand the finality of what they’re witnessing. My sisters’ alpha mates hover protectively behind them, keeping their packs safe.

I’m the only one without a pack. But right now, that feels like a blessing. I can go home after this and be left alone for as long as I want.

I have my job at Tiny Paws, my sister’s babysitting agency. And for now, that’s enough for me.

“Would any of Margaret’s daughters like to say a few words?” The priest looks at us expectantly, his expression professionally somber.

Carmen steps forward first, a single white rose clutched in her fist. She stands at the edge of the grave, her back straight as a rod.

“Mother wasn’t perfect,” she begins, her voice carrying on the wind.

“Life was hard with her, harder than it should have been for three girls growing up.” She pauses, swallowing visibly.

“But I believe, deep down, she cared for us in her own way. She wanted us to be strong, independent women. In that, at least, she succeeded. Bye, Mother.”

She drops the rose onto the casket. It lands with a soft thud, white petals stark against the black lacquer. The wind howls around us as Carmen returns to her place beside me, her expression grave as tears roll down her cheeks, crying for the first time.

Lena goes next, her steps unsteady. Her alpha, Damon, reluctantly releases her, his eyes never leaving her as she approaches the grave.

“Mother,” she starts, her voice breaking immediately. She takes a shuddering breath. “All you ever wanted was for us to be successful. I hope you’ve found peace now.”

She drops her rose and nearly collapses, saved only by Damon rushing forward to catch her. He guides her back, whispering in her ear, his arms a protective cage around her.

I remain motionless, my hands empty. No rose. No words.

Just the cold truth locked behind my heart.

Lena leans toward me, her voice thick with tears. “I know none of us were close to her, but please, Francine. Say something. Anything.”

I shake my head once, sharply.

Carmen turns to me, her eyes narrowed. “Weren’t you the closest to Mother? You’d better say something. You’re going to embarrass us.”

“You may be the boss of me at the business,” I snap, annoyed. “But you’re not the boss of my personal life. You’re not the one who had to stay with her for years.”

Her eyes widen in surprise, then narrow in anger. “This isn’t about the business. It’s about respect…”

“Respect for a woman who…?” I immediately shut my mouth about to say ‘murdered people’, but I hold myself back. They don’t know what kind of monster she is.

“Who what?” Carmen demands.

“Nothing,” I say, deciding it’s a good time as any to leave the funeral. My heels sink into the soft cemetery ground as I stride toward the parking lot.

Behind me, I hear the confused murmurs of my family. Let them wonder. Let them think I’m overreacting. It’s better than them knowing the horrible real truth about our mother.

I don’t look back as I reach my car, fumbling with the keys. I can’t tell them. What would be the point? Mother is dead. Nothing can bring our fathers back.

Tears blur the road ahead as I grip the steering wheel of my old Honda, knuckles white against the cracked leather.

The windshield wipers screech against dry glass, matching the ragged sound of my breathing.

I need to pull over. Now. Before I crash this piece of shit car and give my sisters one more thing to deal with today.

My tires crunch against gravel as I veer onto the shoulder, the car shuddering to a stop like it’s as exhausted as I am.

For a moment, I just sit there, engine idling, staring blankly at the gray stretch of highway ahead. Then the first sob rips through me, violent and unexpected. I cover my mouth, trying to hold it back, but it’s like trying to stop a dam with my bare hands. Everything breaks at once.

“Fuck,” I gasp, slamming my palm against the steering wheel. “Why? Why? Why?”

She wanted forgiveness before dying. I was the only one she trusted.

I curl in on myself, arms wrapped around my middle as if I might physically fall apart without the pressure holding me together.

The tears come hot and fast now, soaking into the collar of my black dress.

Carmen was right. I was the closest to Mother.

Always had been. When our fathers disappeared, no, when she murdered them, I was the one who crawled into her bed at night, seeking comfort from the very person who’d caused our pain.

I was the one who made her tea when migraines left her bedridden.

The one who stayed in her house the longest, living with her until she ended up in the hospital.