Chapter Twenty-Five
DYLAN
Iblinked awake, squinting as bright lights pierced my retinas.
Fuck, my head was pounding, my ear stung, and there was a distinct musty smell of stagnant water clogging my nostrils.
I forced myself to focus, scanning the room.
It was small, clearly abandoned judging by the inches of dust gathered on the sporadic desks along the peeling walls. An office building of some sort?
I shifted, belatedly aware of the ropes tied around my waist and arms, fastening me to an unstable wooden chair. I wasn’t gagged, which was a mercy. It meant I could reel back and spit at the beta who sauntered in like God’s gift.
He crouched down in front of me.
“I knew I liked you,” Aaron crooned, wiping the back of his hand over his cheek. “Did you sleep well?”
“Fucking prick.”
He tutted. “That’s not very omega-like. It’s not as if you’re dead.” He poked my nose, snatching his fingers away before my teeth snapped. “We’ll get to that part soon.”
“I should’ve realised,” I sneered, scoffing a humourless laugh. “It’s always the hard done by second son.”
“First son,” he spat, his demeanour switching.
His eyes roared with a feral storm, but he sobered just a quickly, plastering on a mildly demented grin.
“Have to say, Caine kissing you at the gathering was perfection.” He shimmied his shoulders, dramatising a tingle.
“It was like watching the last episode of my favourite show, y’know?
When the two leads finally get together, and everything just falls into place.
Euphoric. I’m getting hard just thinking about it. ”
My face screwed up.
“Aaaaw, don’t look at me like that,” he said, pouting. “I might be a total rake, but I have some standards. Caine is a cunt I would not fuck.”
“You’re a pig.”
He wasn’t fazed. “I’d heard your little spat in his office, so I proposed a party.
My brother didn’t refuse since it was a ‘show of unity’ to whatever pack had their eyes on us, but I had ulterior motives.
” He sucked his teeth, beaming in triumph.
“After stalking you both for so long, you’ve grown quite predictable.
I knew you couldn’t stay away, wilful little fucker that you are, and Caine—rightfully—slavered over you all night like a dog in heat.
A simple, tried and true method of forcing you together after a petty tiff and bam: fireworks.
Quite pathetic, really, but it worked for me. ”
“That your kink, is it?” I didn’t bother suppressing my disgust. “Acting like the fucking director of our lives?”
“Oh, yeah,” he agreed before reaching out and yanking roughly on my hair, fully exposing my neck.
“Get off—”
“I knew he’d bite you,” he murmured, admiring the marks. “Fuck, you should see him. He’s beside himself. It won’t be long before he loses his mind.”
Delayed realisation smacked into me. The bond.
I fixated on the centre of my chest, under the binds.
I couldn’t feel his emotions. He was there, the string connecting him to me as my pack, but nothing else.
I glared up at Aaron, who was finding my recognition amusing.
My top lip peeled back from my teeth and I jerked against my restraints. “What the fuck did you do?”
“Neat, huh?” He widened his eyes in that crazed way of his.
“I have a knack for discovering fun little concoctions to play with. It took a few trial runs—didn’t want it to end up killing you.
It overpowers the effects of a mate bond temporarily.
He can’t track you, can’t feel you. It’s driving him fucking apeshit.
His face . . .” He snorted. “I’ll remember it. ”
“He’ll still find me.”
I had to believe it.
“No, I will,” he emphasised, his smugness intensifying. “I do love playing the hero. Just wanted to make him stew first, get him all juiced up—I prefer a cockfight.”
“Get off me.”
“Two years.” He blew out a whistling breath, relinquishing his grip—though I doubted it had anything to do with my demand. “After all his bitching about omegas and tradition, he was obsessing over you for two years. That’s commitment. Perverted, let’s be honest. How do you put up with him?”
My glower deepened.
He shrugged before standing, wandering over to the rotting table in the corner.
He tugged out one of the chairs, straddling it.
“With you and your brat under his roof, I knew it wouldn’t take long for his heart to make an appearance—even with his emotional constipation.
I just had to be patient, let it all unfold naturally, and strike when he was at his weakest.”
“He’s not weak.”
Aaron scoffed. “He’s the supreme leader and he can’t keep his kid and mate safe.”
“Not exactly fucking easy when there’s a rat in his ranks. His own twin, no less.”
“He doesn’t suspect a thing,” he reiterated gleefully. “He’s ready for all-out war with the Veenstras, but they have nothing to do with it. I kept him locked on their scent, and he’s such a dumb shit, he fell for it.”
Seething rage blistered my stomach, but using Caine as my inspiration, I stifled it. “You can’t expect me to believe you did all this yourself?”
“Believe what you like. Hatred is an elite motivator—see what I did there?” He waggled his brows exaggeratedly. My face didn’t change. “Pfft, tough crowd.”
I said nothing, preferring to perform the role of avid listener rather than active participant—for now. I didn’t want to miss an exploitable detail.
Aaron folded his arms over the chair back and rested his chin on top, sighing wistfully.
“The icing on the cake was the day Father died and I was still in second place. That was the moment I wanted them all gone. I just didn’t know how.
I had to be careful, plan in the shadows like an outcast. It was hard pretending to be Caine’s loyal subject, to care for him as a doting brother should, but so worth it. ”
Not hard pretending to be the victim, though. Clearly.
“Initially, I hadn’t suspected it to go this way,” he carried on, luxuriating in the sound of his own voice.
“It was starting to look like I’d have to smother him in his sleep, or slit his throat and be done with it, but I wanted it to be spectacular.
Honestly, back then it never occurred to me an emotion as inferior as love would bring the stony bastard down. ”
A love I couldn’t feel anymore.
I choked down the lump in my throat.
“When he returned from his three-day jolly in the Den, he was in a weird state—stronger, less irritable. I monitored him, clocking his little crush after he spied on you day and night for almost a month.” He tipped his head to the side, his leering gaze scrutinizing the whole of me.
“I might’ve downloaded a few tapes for my collection. ”
I barely smothered a repulsed shiver.
“I sent enforcers to track you down, to follow the omega who had my indifferent twin in such a chokehold. Finding out you were pupped was the universe granting me the perfect advantage on a silver plate. Luckily, being as informed as I am, it didn’t take much to charm a hacker into fucking with our systems—especially with the access and knowledge at my disposal.
” His chest puffed out. Vain prick. “I intercepted his phone calls, ensuring he never heard a single peep from you. I spent two years hiding the kid, hiding your peasantly behaviour, because I couldn’t risk Caine coming to your rescue before I was ready. The plot needed time to fester.”
He needed to fester. Under the fucking ground.
He raked a hand through his hair. “You going to the loan sharks hadn’t been in my plan, but I adapted. It actually worked out better, so . . . cheers for being destitute, I suppose.”
“Glad I could help,” I deadpanned.
He blew me a kiss.
“Once I was in a position to really get the ball rolling, I had the sharks take the brat as a warmup, to tease Caine’s protective instincts while guiding his attention to the Veenstras.
My twin doesn’t like being made a fool of, so he was dialled up to one hundred and two but facing the wrong direction.
I even planted a little decoy, a breadcrumb with a dead end. He had a lot of fun playing with him.”
I frowned. “A decoy?”
“Caine didn’t tell you about our cousin?
The ‘rat’ he kept in the basement for a month?
” It was meant as clarification, though it only served to confuse me more.
My pause spoke volumes. “Shitting hell, he was a bloody mess by the time Caine was done with him. Only one fingernail left, and no bollocks to carry on his bloodline.”
The day I’d spotted him in the hallway, covered in blood and viscera, sparked in my memory. My mouth and throat ran dry. “Was he involved?”
Aaron’s hand tipped in a see-saw motion. “Sort of. Not really. I offered him drugs in exchange for nabbing Minnie from the sharks. It was all a ploy. I had no intention of giving him what I’d promised, and I knew my brother would kill them all anyway.”
“My daughter was just a bargaining chip to you?” It was phrased as a question, though the answer was blatant. Not that Aaron would respond. There were no signs to suggest he’d even acknowledged me speaking. He just barrelled on, unperturbed.
“I could’ve killed you and Minnie in the warehouse, then lodged a bullet in Caine’s skull, but that idea wasn’t as fun.
Or effective. I wanted him to be obsessed.
I wanted to take what he loved and make him watch as it all collapsed around him.
I needed it to hurt. I’d waited this long, so what was another few months to ensure he had something really worth losing before the killing blow? ”
If he had gone down the other route, he wouldn’t have survived it. The pack would’ve branded him a traitor and executed him on the spot. He needed the shield of another pack before making his move. He needed their security, their reassurance.
I stayed silent.