Chapter 36 Thirty-two
Thirty-two
Brea
Five days since Gail’s news, and Taryn had barely spoken a word, burning up just about every daylight hour traipsing about the city. Most of my energy went toward resisting the urge to stare at her avatar on my phone screen, milling about aimlessly from place to place.
Not so long ago, Lin had been congratulating her on an hour out of the house. This didn't feel like a victory though. It felt like retreat.
The rest of us weren’t much better. We coexisted like cacti—afraid to approach one another for fear of being stuck.
I hated it.
They hated it.
There was no short-cutting this pain, though. No over or under it. Just through.
Brooks sat beside me, his head on my shoulder and his arm linked with mine. We both rocked sweats and tees, neither of us feeling like trying to be productive in our spare time today. I guessed he was drained enough he didn’t care about getting pricked by my spikes.
“Have you had any classes on hypnosis?” he asked after a while, making me jump at the broken silence.
I nearly snorted. “No, I have not.”
“Ah,” he said, mild disappointment in his tone. “Hypnosis would be useful right now.”
“And what are you hoping to be hypnotized about?”
“I dunno,” he said as he nuzzled deeper into my shoulder. “Could make us all forget all the ways the world sucks. Or like, give us a code word and when we get too depressed, you say it, and we just fall asleep and wake up un-depressed.”
I hummed, doing my best to hold a laugh in. “Yes, all the wisest psychotherapists suggest simply shutting off your brain the moment you feel too much.”
“Who said anything about wise?” Brooks pushed himself to a seated position. “I’m about quick fixes, doll. Distraction, concussion, whatever does the trick.”
I ruffled his hair. “You,” I said as I gave a little tug, “are an idiot.”
“Pfft,” he huffed, pulling out his phone. “You’re no help.”
He scrolled silently for a few minutes, and I closed my eyes and rested my head back on the couch cushions.
A little memory wipe spell wouldn’t go amiss, actually. Just reset all of us to a time before Heath’s attack and dark web bounties and lab experimentations. Just let us all be together, and be joyful.
We could pick a fun code word, too. Lascivious. Epitome. Efficacious.
Not necessarily fun in definition, but pure delights to speak. That could be fun. Maybe we could brainstorm over dinner tonight, try to out-humor each other with our word choices.
“What the hell?”
I opened my eyes and looked to Brooks. He stared open-mouthed at his screen. I looked down at it. Taryn spoke on his screen, her voice muted and subtitles playing. At my angle, though, I couldn’t read them. “What’s wrong?”
Face grim, he tapped the video. It expanded to take up his whole screen, and the volume turned on. He started the clip over.
The opening image was a screenshot of a newspaper photo of Taryn. From a distance, from behind, from below. A shadow in a hospital gown, standing on the ledge of a skyscraper.
Taryn’s voice spoke over the image. “You may remember this article from earlier this year. A mysterious would-be jumper on top of the Phoenix Lab building in Remington City.” The video cut to Taryn’s face.
“That would-be jumper was me,” she said, eyes staring straight down the camera lens. “My name is Taryn Maddox. I am an omega. And this is a warning to any omega considering enrolling in Phoenix Labs’ clinical trials.” She leaned forward. “Their goals are not what they claim.
“My medical treatment at Phoenix Labs was nonconsensual,” she continued. “And my standing on that ledge was not due to adverse reactions. I was not delusional or suicidal. I stepped on that ledge because a researcher within that facility threatened my life, and my pack’s lives.
“The full story is honestly too long for an online video. So let me just say this: If you partake in these drug trials, you will be making not only yourself, but your children, vulnerable to abuse from Phoenix Lab and Wainwright itself.”
“Shiiiit,” Brooks muttered beneath his breath.
“I repeat,” Taryn said. “Omega, beta, or alpha—do not enroll in any Phoenix Lab clinical trials. Or any other programs ultimately owned, commissioned, or controlled by Wainwright.”
The screen went black for just a moment before looping back to the image of Taryn on the rooftop.
I looked below the video. Uploaded thirty-six minutes ago. Nearly a hundred thousand views.
Holy. Fucking. Shit.
Taryn’s bond faded in as she approached the apartment. Giddiness and anxiety created a head-spinning mix. Underpinning it was a faint streak of rage, like a hot pepper in a fruit salsa.
Step by step, it grew stronger. Watching Lin’s and Caine’s faces, they felt her coming too.
They’d arrived home not long after Brooks and I stumbled on the video, so of course they’d then seen it. Their fruity scents had gone rotten, over-sweet, and they’d both gone quiet.
Like that, we’d been waiting for hours. The knob turned, and Lin immediately stood, arms crossed over his chest. Caine leaned on the back of the couch Brooks sat on, and I perched on the edge of the armchair.
As much as I didn’t want Taryn to walk into an ambush…well, she was walking into an ambush.
I swore I almost heard her heart pounding from my seat, and her scent was a strangling burnt and sweet combination. Her obvious exhilaration at what she’d done mixed and merged with—I assumed—the knowledge that her pack was about to skewer her for it.
Easing the door closed and dropping her bag to the ground, she took a deep breath and faced us. For a moment, no one spoke. Five hearts racing, five minds spinning.
“What,” Lin finally muttered, “the hell were you thinking?”
Alpha power exploded from him like a smoke bomb, everyone in the room shuddering against it. I’d never seen Lin this angry. His eyes were taut, the cords of his neck standing out. He’d been so unendingly gentle with all of us. Part of me had started to believe he couldn’t actually get angry.
I was wrong.
Taryn squared her shoulders. “I was thinking I wish someone had told my mother what she was actually signing up for.” She stepped further into the living room, meeting the lion with a chair and whip.
“I was thinking about Nova, and the other omegas they’ve used up and thrown away.
Maybe she’s content to crawl under a rock and hide, but I’m not. ”
“Sweetness,” Brooks said, scooting forward on the couch cushion. “We’re on your side, you know we are. But, I mean, couldn’t you have told us?”
“You’d have tried to talk me out of it.”
“Really?” Brooks sniped back, a silver edge to his tone. “I would have?”
Taryn’s cheeks pinked and she averted her gaze, something like shame filtering down the bond.
“You’re damn right we’d have talked you out of it,” Caine said as he walked around the edge of the couch. “Taryn, sunshine, we just got out from under their thumb. Do you have any clue what something like this could do to us? All of us?”
“No, she doesn’t.” Lin paced, scowl so intense even I averted my gaze as he stepped closer. “Or maybe she doesn’t care.”
Goosebumps rose over my skin, my scalp tingling. I stood from the chair and inserted myself between Taryn and the rest of the group. “Okay. Let’s all take a breath here.” I turned to Taryn, my heart heavy. "We're just a little blind-sided here."
She crossed her arms across her chest, practically vibrating with the adrenaline that turned her normally sweet scent sour.
"I've said since the beginning that sitting back and just…
letting all this happen again isn't an option for me.
So if Gail is out, then I had to find another way, and that's what I did. "
“Do you think, Taryn,” Lin bit out, every line of his body tense, “you were the only one who came home with scars?” The look he shot at her could've ignited a pyre. "You think you're the only one who gets a say in how we deal with this?"
Caine stepped before our head alpha, hand on his chest. “Easy there, Lin.”
“We put our lives at risk for you, Omega!” Lin pointed an accusing finger at Taryn over Caine's shoulder. “Every one of us would carve out our hearts for you, and you just cut us out? How could you fucking do that, Taryn?”
Taryn swiped at the wetness on her cheeks. Brooks stood now, another body between our quickly fading omega and the increasingly irate alpha.
“Lin, baby, this is the alphadrenaline,” Brooks whispered, trying to cradle his alpha’s face in his hands. “Just close your eyes and breathe.”
“Yeah, and why’s that?” Lin snapped before aiming his furious attention back to Taryn. “They…that place broke something in me. None of us left the same. But you don’t care. I am crumbling inside and you don’t care!”
Lin’s face grew redder and redder, his voice louder with each word. Taryn trembled, her arms wrapped around herself.
Caine met my eye. “You three, go.”
Brooks and I each looped an arm around Taryn and ushered her without protest from the apartment.