Chapter 14 #2
It took a second, but Jack caught on. He snapped his gaze up to me from where he’d been staring at my tattoos, and his mouth dropped open a little.
“Are you saying that I should gather all this damning evidence and present it to him like I’ll take it to the press?
And that I should demand my freedom from him, with money and without him undermining me in the future, as an exchange for not leaking everything and ruining his election chances? ”
I beamed at my alpha. Who needed a bond when we were already so like-minded that he could tell what I was thinking that easily?
“That’s exactly what I’m saying,” I said, digging my fingers into his chest a little. “What does your dad care about more? His reputation, position, and potential for power or his son?”
“Definitely not me,” Jack said. He held his breath for a moment, then said, “This might actually work. Specifically because he doesn’t value me. He might be glad to get rid of me if I promise to fade off into the background and never interfere with his ambitions again.”
“So do you want to do it?” I asked. “Do you want to try to gather all this information to use as the key to open your gilded cage?”
“Yes,” Jack said definitively. He pulled me closer, slanting his mouth over mine and giving me a searing kiss. “I would do whatever it takes to get out of that life and to start a new one with you. Whatever it takes.”
“Me, too,” I said, really believing it in that moment. “All I want is to be with you. I love you, Jack.”
I felt a ripple of excitement race through Jack’s body. “I love you, Quincy,” he said, then kissed me so hard it had my head spinning and my inner omega weeping for joy.
We might have been able to plan our escape a little more thoroughly that night, but Jack was more interested in fucking me again, and I was happy to let him. It felt so good that I was certain our plan would work and everything was possible.
We ate supper after that, then went back to bed for more sexual gymnastics. I didn’t care that my poor body was getting sore or that the rest of the world really was out there waiting for us. We fell asleep in each other’s arms, messy and sated.
It was the best night’s sleep I’d had in years.
In the morning, long before dawn, we both had to rush to get ready for the long day we each had ahead of us.
“Your family won’t worry about you being out all night?” Jack asked as we shared one last kiss beside his front door.
I shook my head, lowering my face slightly. “It won’t be the first time I stayed out all night without telling them,” I confessed.
“Ah,” Jack said, hugging me tighter. “Well, if I have my way, you’ll never have any reason to go out and blow off some steam again.”
I hugged him back, resting my cheek over his heart. It amazed me that Jack understood me without needing an entire lecture on the side effects of severing.
I just hoped that the downsides to having an omega with challenges that he couldn’t bond with wouldn’t mean Jack got tired of me.
“Okay, I’m going,” I said, pushing back from him and reaching for the door.
“I love you,” Jack said, grinning like a fool over the fact that he could say that. “I’ll let you know what I find out about advancing this whole plan of ours. I think I know a journalist who would eat this kind of story up.”
I loved hearing that. It gave me hope. And God only knew that I hadn’t had a lot of that in the last few years.
As much as I hated leaving Jack, it was easy to drive home through pre-dawn streets.
It was early enough that few people were on their way to work so far.
There was a good chance that I could let myself into the house and creep up to bed so that my parents thought I’d just stayed out late and got home after they went to bed.
That would have been nice, but it wasn’t even close to what happened.
Because there was an unfamiliar car in my spot on the driveway once I got home. An expensive, unfamiliar car.
“Thank God, honey. There you are,” Papa greeted me as soon as I stepped through the kitchen door.
That would have been bad enough, but Papa and Dad were both sitting at the kitchen table, cradling coffee cups, and Chester was with them.
“We were so worried about you,” Chester said, standing. That was all he did, though. He stood and immediately shuffled in his spot, like he was massively uncomfortable.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, glaring at him.
“Chester showed up last night after supper looking for you,” Dad said, standing as well.
I gaped between the two of them. “You’ve been here all night?”
“I was deeply concerned for your wellbeing,” Chester said, peeking anxiously at my papa. “You know that omegas with—” he coughed slightly, “—severed bonds are prone to impulsive, reckless behavior.”
“No shit,” I said, crossing my arms tightly and leaning against the counter.
“Quincy. Language,” Papa said, getting up and rushing over to me. “We were worried about you.”
“I’m fine,” I said, trying not to be angry with my parents. They’d dealt with me running off before, sometimes for days at a time. I always came back safely. Maybe with more tattoos, piercings, or a different colored hair, but fine.
“They didn’t know that,” Chester said. “There was a report of an omega who was killed last night in a bad section of town.”
“It wasn’t me,” I snapped. Immediately, I felt terrible. I pushed away from the counter and hugged Papa. “It wasn’t me, Papa. I’m fine. See?”
“Where were you?” Papa asked, holding me tightly.
“At a friend’s house,” I said. It wasn’t exactly a lie. “I went over there for dinner and to hang out last night and we fell asleep.” Also not a lie, but not really the truth.
“You should have called,” Dad said. I could see the conflict in him. He knew I was an adult, but he couldn’t let go of his fatherly feeling of responsibility toward me.
Because I was broken.
And the man who had broken me had spent the night in their house doing and saying God knew what.
“You can go now,” I told Chester. “I don’t even know why you came here in the first place.”
“I was hoping we could talk,” Chester said, rubbing the back of his neck anxiously. “It was…it was nice seeing you again the other day. Call me crazy, but I was thinking we could…start seeing each other again.”
“Not interested,” I said without hesitation.
Dad and Papa looked surprised. Surprised and forlorn.
“Is that any way to talk to the man you’ve known since you were children?” Dad asked, not scolding, but definitely wanting me to make nice with Chester.
“The two of you were bonded once,” Papa said, resting a hand on the side of my face. “Maybe being friendly with Chester could, you know, help.”
I loved my Papa so much, but it was hard not to be frustrated with him. “Papa, you know what the doctor said all those years ago.” I sent Chester a look of murder. “Once a bond has been severed, nothing can repair it. I’m damaged forever. There’s no cure.”
“I’m sorry,” Chester said lamely.
I wanted to snap back, “No, you’re not,” but my parents were there.
“Now that we know you’re safe, we’ll leave the two of you alone,” Dad said, coming to take Papa’s hand and lead him away from me. “We might even be able to get an hour or so of sleep before we have to get the little kids up and go to work.”
I didn’t want to be left alone with Chester, but I didn’t want my parents to suffer because of him either. I said nothing as the two of them left the kitchen, Papa smiling sadly at me as he went.
Once they were gone, I turned to Chester and growled, “Get out.”
“I’m only trying to make amends,” Chester said quietly, holding up his hands. “I feel bad about everything that happened.”
“The time for feeling bad was five years ago,” I hissed. “I begged you not to make me go through the severing procedure. I knew what would happen. My life has been nothing but pain since then.”
“It’s not my fault—” Chester started defensively before stopping himself.
He lowered his hands and let out a breath before taking a step closer to me.
“I wish I could make things better,” he said, like being compassionate was a struggle for him.
“It sucks that things turned out the way they did. But I would like to at least be friends again. Who knows what might happen from there?”
“Friends?” I snorted and shook my head, crossing my arms again. “After what you did to me, you want to be friends?”
“Maybe?” Chester said, then shrugged. “It would be…useful.”
I couldn’t believe his nerve. “I’m not interested in being useful to you, Chester. You can get the fuck out now.”
“Quincy—”
Chester took another step toward me, but pulled back with a queasy look. He must have remembered what happened before when he’d touched me. The way he looked at me like I might contaminate him was a direct contradiction to his play-nice words earlier.
“Okay, I’ll go,” he said at last. “But I really want you to think about getting back with me. It would be good for you, good for your family.”
Warning alarms rang so hard in my head that I froze for a second. “Good for my family?”
“Yeah,” Chester said, his expression completely guarded. “I know you guys have always struggled with money. It might be nice for them to have a little extra. And it would suck if anything happened to them.”
The warning alarms turned deafening.
“Why would anything happen to them?” I asked. “We’re fine. We’re all fine. Are you trying to bribe me into getting back together with you?”
“No! No, I’m not saying that at all,” Chester’s face and neck went red, and he wouldn’t meet my eyes. “I’m going now,” he said, marching for the door. “See? Just like you want me to. I’m going. But I left my number on the table. Give me a call sometime and I’ll take you out to a nice restaurant.”
I didn’t say anything one way or another. I glared at him, jaw clenched, as he scrambled to get out of the house as fast as possible.
Once he was gone, I let out my breath and dropped my arms. Chester didn’t want to get back together with me any more than I wanted to be around him. Someone was putting him up to courting me. Someone who had enough power to tell a billionaire what to do.
Three guesses who that was.