Chapter 5
CHAPTER FIVE
Saint
In the back of my mind, I knew I needed to stop for a second and question my motivations for taking Linus away from Kincade Slopes to confront his brother.
The part of me that liked to insist I was a rational, healed alpha insisted the confrontation was important to keep Lucas from throwing Linus into some sort of even worse situation in the future.
Lucas needed to learn boundaries and to see that his actions had consequences.
A greater part of me called bullshit on that reasoning.
I waited as Linus dressed and protectively ushered him out to my car, the overnight bag I’d intended to use for the weekend slung over one shoulder, scanning the darkened forest around the lodge like it was filled with wolves.
No omega had ever made me feel such a visceral urge to protect him.
Maybe it was Linus’s small frame and overall air of innocence, but I would have torn anyone who tried to touch him limb from limb.
Even that wasn’t the deepest reason why I tossed my things in the backseat, then rushed around to hold the passenger door for him.
The coil of tension and remembered panic that always snuck up on me at this time of year squeezed that part of my core that would always be a frightened ten-year-old boy crawling out of twisted metal and carnage into the rain.
I had to focus on something else, control something else, to stem the tidal wave of old emotions that had never really left me.
“Is that my car?” Linus asked before sinking into my passenger seat, glancing across the dimly lit lot.
I turned to look, but I didn’t know what kind of car he drove. “Probably,” I answered. “It’s my understanding that the organizers move all the omegas’ cars up to this lot and bring their things into the room where they’ll be playing after the whole thing starts for you guys.”
Linus glanced to me from where he’d been studying the parking lot, then shook his head. “I still can’t believe this whole thing is fake, or that omegas willingly put themselves through all that.”
I flushed a little and shut the door for him, then walked around the car. How did you explain why you enjoyed kink to someone who clearly didn’t? The things I’d done with past omega play partners would probably make Linus blanch.
Which was a shame, because a big part of me really wanted to play with him, to show him how good I could make him feel.
I grunted before opening the driver’s side door, then pushed all that aside as I got into the car and started it. “People get off in all sorts of ways,” I answered his statement with a shrug. “Adrenaline can be really sexy.”
“If you say so,” Linus said tightly.
I peeked at him for a second as I pulled out of the parking lot, then drove to the road that would take us down the mountain to the highway.
I don’t know what it was, some kind of instinct, but I suddenly had the feeling that Linus wasn’t as white-bread as he maybe thought he was.
His twin was reputedly a hard player, and maybe there were some genetics involved in the whole thing?
There was a certain something that I couldn’t put my finger on that whispered Linus might be up for a bit of sexy play, if the timing was right.
It definitely wasn’t right tonight. A lot of things weren’t right.
Driving off to confront the omega I’d been supposed to play with at his family’s beach house with his identical twin brother at my side was definitely in the realm of things I shouldn’t have been doing.
But I needed to get to the bottom of this.
I needed to protect my omega. I needed to feel like I was in control of something.
It was probably for the best that Linus fell asleep in his seat after giving me the address of his family’s beach house for my phone.
He’d been through a lot that evening, and his body was probably wrung out after all the adrenaline.
And honestly, I needed a couple hours of silence to think about what I was doing and why.
I wasn’t about to change my mind, but I did at least feel sheepish for pushing someone else’s family issues to get a grip on my own spiraling emotions.
Any other time of year and this wouldn’t have been a problem.
Linus woke up just as I turned onto the long, gravel drive that wound through a small wood and led out to the beach house.
It wasn’t even close to what I’d been expecting.
When I thought beach house, I imagined the sunny houses along Barrington’s popular and expensive beach district.
But Barrington was in the far northeast of the country, and the gorgeous and actually pretty huge house I parked my car in front of would have been right at home up in the mountains.
From what I knew of that area, and from the little I could see in the dark, the beach was probably more like a rocky outcropping, not a sandy playground.
There was an outbuilding that looked to be a large garage off to one side, and a large, white van parked in the drive.
I had to be careful not to hit it with my car door once I opened it to get out.
The van was one hundred percent the sort you would expect people to commit crimes in, but I didn’t have a chance to investigate.
“Who are you and what are you doing here?” a sharp, omega voice demanded from the front of the house.
I whipped around to find an exact replica of Linus charging down the stairs wearing nothing but plaid pajama bottoms, pointing a gun at us. My instinct to protect flared and I dashed around to Linus’s side of the car, which was closer to the house, ready to throw myself in front of a bullet.
“Linus?” Lucas said a second later, lowering his gun. “What are you doing here? You’re supposed to be at Kincade Slopes getting your rocks off.”
I’d reached Linus’s side by then and could see the frustration in his expression despite the dark. The beach house had floodlights that had clicked on when we’d approached, but they only made everything look washed out and dreamlike.
“It was a prank,” Linus said, slamming my car’s door and starting forward, hands clenched at his sides. “You sent me to a situation where I thought I was being kidnapped and that I would be raped and murdered.”
“What?” Lucas asked, then added a weak laugh. “It was all fake. It’s the Dark Fantasies Club omega auction event. I knew your heat was coming and I thought you could use a little playtime so you could have some fun instead of hiring a boring old B&M alpha.”
Linus continued to march toward his brother like he would start a fist-fight. “I didn’t know what was going on,” he growled. “I thought it was real. I’ve never been so scared in my life.”
Lucas tried to laugh, but he backed up the porch stairs toward the house’s front door, looking almost as afraid as Linus had been when I’d first taken him from the conference room.
Lucas’s gaze shot to me, and he gasped, “Fuck, you’re the alpha I was supposed to play with.
” For half a second, he relaxed and swept me with a lascivious look.
“Not half bad. Sexy scar.” He winked at me.
“Do not look at him like that,” Linus snapped.
I had to fight down a burst of pride and lust. My omega was defending me.
But no, he wasn’t my omega, and he was beyond pissed.
“I’m tired of you pranking me and putting me in dangerous situations,” he went on.
“What if that really had been a trafficking situation? What if I’d been in real danger. ”
“But you weren’t,” Lucas insisted. “You never were. It was all a game.”
“I didn’t know that,” Linus shouted, throwing his arms out as we all stood on the porch, the sound of waves beating against rocks coming from somewhere beyond the house and the cool, salty air swirling around us.
“I was terrified! Even though it was fake, what would have happened if Saint hadn’t turned out to be so nice? Things might have gone too far.”
“Saint? That’s an odd name,” Lucas said, aggravatingly clueless. “I should have read the file they sent me about you a little more.”
“I think we should take this inside and discuss boundaries and appropriate behavior,” I said, stepping cautiously forward. “And I think you need to put that gun away.”
“This?” Lucas said, holding up his gun with a carelessness that made both me and Linus flinch. “It’s plastic,” he said, tapping it against the side of the house to prove it. “I can’t get a real gun.”
I quickly thanked whatever authorities had the wisdom not to sell Lucas firearms.
Then again, the fact that he couldn’t purchase a gun meant the omega had some sort of record that barred him from it.
“Can we just go inside?” Linus asked, irritated. “It’s been a long night, and I want to say a few things to you.”
“I get it, I get it,” Lucas said, still not putting his plastic gun down or moving into the house. “But you guys can’t be here right now. No one can be here but me.”
My senses prickled, especially since Lucas suddenly looked extremely nervous.
“Of course I can be here,” Linus said exhaustedly, rubbing his forehead. “This is my house, too.”
“That’s not what I mean,” Lucas said, stepping forward, like he would usher us off the porch. “I mean you absolutely cannot be here right now. Someone might—er, um, you just can’t be here.”
A few more things ticked into place in my mind, but it was Linus who asked, “Does this have something to do with the stuff you’re storing for your friend?” He glanced over his shoulder to the van. “What are you keeping for them again?”
“You’re involved in something criminal,” I said. It wasn’t a question.
“No!” Lucas insisted, dashing across the deck and standing with his arms outstretched by the stairs, as if he didn’t want us to leave now. “No, no, no. It’s nothing illegal.” He laughed nervously. “I’m just, um, waiting for a friend to come by and pick up the van.”
“Waiting in the middle of the night?” I asked.