Chapter 16 Rowan
Rowan
Istumble to the farmhouse, my vision swimming. It took me a lot fucking longer than I would’ve liked to get over here.
Please, please, please fucking open the door.
I bang on it like my life depends on it. Technically, my life doesn’t depend on it, but Mirabelle’s probably does. She seems to have an almost magical way of handling herself around the fighting dogs, but Rage is a wild card.
I don’t think anyone here trusts him as far as they can throw him. And considering how big he is, he’d be a struggle for even the alphas to throw.
“Open the door, Dad! Please—“ My voice breaks as I slump against the door.
There isn’t time for him to pull his usual game of leaving me waiting forever before he deems me worthy of his time.
To my surprise, the door opens a couple of seconds later, leaving me stumbling into the room.
I nearly faceplant. If it weren’t for my shoulder catching on the doorframe, sending a painful jolt that has me gasping with pain down my ribs, I would’ve eaten shit all over the dirty entryway rug my dad hasn’t replaced since I was born.
“The fuck happened to you?” Dad scoffs, stepping back to make room for me to stumble inside. “Was just about to call you.”
My blood runs cold when I see Jett already standing in the kitchen, leaning against the kitchen counter. He looks like he wants to murder me right now.
Well, he normally shoots me glares that could kill, but this one is potent. Like he means it.
I don’t give a flying fuck whether this makes me a tattletale. That title doesn’t mean jack shit if I’m dead.
“Jett beat the crap out of me last night,” I say, collapsing into a dining room chair. The furthest one away from my brother.
“Seriously?” Dad huffs, shooting a glare at Jett. “I can’t fucking deal with your bullshit when I’m dealing with this fucking crisis.”
“Crisis? What crisis?” I ask, my blood running cold.
Is Mirabelle dead already? Oh god. Was I too late?
“The facility that... supplied the omega we were given? It got raided. Shut down by some piggish Northside cops,” Dad says, his lips curling in disgust. “Apparently, there’s a whole case against the pharmaceutical company.
Which means we’re still trying to see whether that affects the supply chain for the product we sell from the dogs. ”
I know I should jump up from my chair, explaining the full situation with Mirabelle and demanding my dad do something, but the deep-rooted childhood fear of the consequences of taking up too much space keeps me stuck to my chair.
Plus, I think I’d actually pass the fuck out if I did jump up from my chair right now.
“I’m hoping ‘cause their blood is made into suppressants and the hoity toity Northsiders will still want a steady supply of that kinda stuff to produce that shit, that we’ll still be able to sell, especially since our stock is top shelf.
But with the investigation, our supply of the enhancement drugs is fucked. ”
Jett stiffens in his chair as his gaze cuts towards me. I don’t know why he’s glaring at me even more this time. It’s not like I’m putting a big drain on our supply. I honestly think he uses it more than I do.
“Which was why I wanted to talk to you,” Dad continues, turning his gaze towards me. “How’s the omega settling in? Apparently, she’s gotten a lot more important than we originally thought, if the supply of the enhancement drugs is cut off.”
Holy shit. This is my moment.
“Thank God,” I mutter. “Dad, we’ve got a problem.”
I point an accusing finger at Jett.
“Jett was a fucking idiot—“
“Hey! Shut your mouth, shitstain—“ Jett snarls.
He’s cut off by Dad shooting him a glare so powerful it has my brother withering under the force of it.
“Go on,” Dad says, eyeing me assessingly. I guess he’s surprised I’m willing to so openly insult my brother, especially after the very obvious beating I took.
“I did a good job training the new dog. Got him all the way through the training protocol and was gonna tell you, but Jett didn’t want that to happen ‘cause he knew you’d probably assign me as the omega’s trainer permanently—“
“Get to the fucking point, Rowan,” my dad snaps, pinching his nose.
My jaw clamps shut. I give him a quick, jerky nod, which I instantly regret when it sends pain shooting down my neck.
“Jett sent her in last night with Ash, naked, and when she survived a few hours with him, he decided that wasn’t enough and sent her in with Rage, completely unprepared. Knowing him, he probably ordered for Rage’s chains to be unlocked or something.”
Dad’s shoulders stiffen and his alpha dominance explodes outwards, making me grateful I’m sitting down.
My brother grunts under the force of it and his head automatically lowers.
“You did what?” Dad hisses, stalking up to Jett and fisting the collar of his wrinkled button-up shirt in his hands. “You know how valuable that omega is now that we can’t just go back and buy another one if she’s torn apart? What if you sent one of the dogs into a rut!”
“I didn’t know—“
“Well, you should’ve fucking thought!” Dad growls, slamming Jett into the neighboring wall. “Your stupidity is going to ruin all my plans.”
“What fucking plans were this important that you didn’t think to tell me?” Jett snaps, shoving against Dad’s chest.
Bad move.
Real bad move.
My dad’s lips curl back into a snarl, and he cocks his fist back. Jett’s head jerks so hard at the blow that it bangs against the wall behind him.
The parallels to some beat downs I’d received from Jett aren’t lost on me.
My dad never really beat me all that often. I think he thought I wasn’t worth the effort. In his mind, beatings are supposed to teach you something.
I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t a little cathartic to see Jett be on the receiving end, this time around. It makes the way my ribs ache with each breath hurt a little less.
“You think you deserve to know what’s going on when you pull this emotional bullshit?” Dad snaps, punching Jett again. “What, your little brother finally pulls his head out of his ass and makes himself useful and you’re threatened? By him?”
I don’t know whether to be offended at my dad’s tone or whether I should nod along. It’s honestly ridiculous how threatened Jett got from my supposed success training Griffin.
Sure, it was an incredibly fast, unheard-of turnaround time, but maybe that says more about the default training methods than it does about anything else.
I sit there silently, my eyes never straying from the two men who are supposed to be my family. Some family we are, beating the shit out of each other like this.
Dad pauses the beating he’s giving Jett to turn his gaze to me. Jett takes that opportunity to wipe some of the blood from what looks to be a broken nose onto the back of his sleeve, even though my dad still has him pinned to the wall.
“That omega’s blood is worth more than its weight in gold,” he grits out with a frustrated sigh.
“What—what do you mean?”
He rolls his eyes as if he thinks I’m stupid.
“We sell the alpha’s blood to make suppressants. That omega’s blood can make the enhancement drugs. Now that our supply of enhancement drugs has blown up in our faces, we need to keep the one golden goose we’ve got alive.”
I’m sure I grow even more pale than I appear right now, at his words.
The enhancement drugs are made from omega blood?
My hands clench into fists as I remember the almost euphoric high of the doses I’d take. They feel an awful lot like the hits I get just being in Mirabelle’s presence.
I’m sure extracting and processing their blood wasn’t a pleasant one.
Guilt gnaws away at me. How could one of the few things that made life somewhat bearable be built upon the foundation of the pain of omegas like Mirabelle? Omegas who’ve been locked away underground for god knows how long, who’re excited about seeing clouds and eating pasta?
I should tell her. I don’t think she knows. She deserves to know this.
But how?
How do I tell her that something from her body, something that’s been stolen from her, is being used to basically ruin people’s lives?
“That facility that was raided, did they take the omegas there?” I ask. Did they help the omegas escape that hellish facility?
“Yeah,” Dad growls. “We’ve gotta figure out how to make it ourselves. I’ve heard it has something to do with denying them during heat.”
“What?” The single syllable leaves my lips as a wave of horror crashes over me.
Sure, Mirabelle was the first omega I’ve really spent time with and I barely passed our high school biology class—or any of high school, really—but everyone knows that denying an omega during heat is one of the most torturous things you can do to them.
It apparently is the kind of pain that’s incomprehensible to my beta mind, plus, it has all these long-lasting medical effects. And if Mirabelle has been trapped there since she was a child, then God knows how long she’s had to endure that.
It makes me want to throw up. Or pass out. Or both.
“But that means we can’t just go out and buy more,” Dad continues.
That reminder seems to piss my dad off all over again, if the way he slams Jett back into the wall is any indication.
“Go see if she’s still alive. Call the doctor if you need,” he says, not bothering to give me a second glance.
“Got it,” I say, pushing myself up to my feet and fighting the wave of dizziness.
Right as I make my way to the door, doing my best to ignore the sound of fists on flesh, my dad calls out to me again. “Have the doctor look at you, too. I know betas heal slow as fuck.”
I think that’s the closest thing to consideration I’ll ever get from my dad.
“Thanks,” is all I manage to say before I slam the door behind me.
I don’t know whether God exists, but I sure as hell hope that there’s some guardian angel watching over Mirabelle right now.
She better be alive.