Chapter 51
FIFTY-ONE
Tyler’s message reverberates in my head, and I give up all pretense of hiding who I am and what I’m here for.
I am Crystal Manson’s Alpha. Above all else, I will protect my beautiful, battered, and broken Omega.
I’m flying up the stairs, Gage close behind me, as I pray to whoever will listen that my Omega is okay.
I can hear the Beta’s gasping, panting breaths as he tries to keep up with me. I slam into the door to Kieran’s office, but it’s locked. My keys are heavy in my pocket as I fumble to get them out and unlock the door.
We pile in but stop short just inside the doorway at the sight in front of us.
Blood is splattered around the office. On the floor, the walls, the furniture. A trembling Crystal is bathed in it as she stands, gasping for breath, over a nearly unrecognizable Kieran Cobb. There’s a small, blunt dagger in her hand.
His letter opener.
Kieran’s body is riddled with small, shallow puncture wounds, and his face is busted and battered. A heavy paperweight, covered in blood, lies discarded on the floor beside his caved-in head.
As I step towards Crystal, she spins, and I hardly recognize her.
Her features have always been sharp and angular, but now they look foreign, twisted in agony and fury. Her hair hangs limp, blood clinging to the purple and blue strands and dripping onto her bare shoulders.
She’s completely naked.
Beneath the blood, which I can’t tell if it’s hers or his, I can see the beginning of bruises and some swelling. Her right arm hangs limply beside her, clutching the letter opener.
Her unseeing eyes look through me, and when I take a step towards her, she snarls and lunges, blade aimed directly at me.
“Crystal,” I bark, but it doesn’t have much weight behind it because of the suppressant drugs that are still in my system. “It’s me. Puck. Your Alpha.”
I get no response from her, only a growl.
In the back of my mind, something tickles with familiarity.
“Gage, no sudden movements,” I tell the Beta behind me. Not that I have to worry. He’s been frozen since he laid eyes on her. “I don’t think Crystal is home right now.”
“No fucking kidding,” he hisses. “What the hell happened here?”
I survey the room as I slowly reach for my phone. “What happened here is that we need Lupine and the Hawks here now, and to call Mav and Manny.”
I place the necessary calls, and despite Harvey and Wyatt yelling at me that we can’t possibly pull off a full takeover without the trafficking ring under control, they agree that extraction has to happen now.
Unfortunately, Crystal’s actions have forced our hands, and now we’re out of time. We have to hope we’ve got enough in place to transfer power to the Hawks.
Gage pushes his phone back into his pocket and updates me on his call. “Manny and Maverick are already here. They followed us.”
“Trey will need to let them in,” I mutter, trying to figure out how the fuck we’re going to manage this without more casualties. Especially since it appears that I have a homicidal Omega on my hands.
“Move slowly,” I say to Gage without looking away from Crystal. “And leave the room. Find Trey. Tell him I need him, and Queenie needs him, and to follow you. Don’t come busting up here, and don’t tell him what’s happening.”
I hope Trey’s affection for Crystal will be enough to get him to listen to a stranger he saw led to the interrogation room.
Thankfully, Gage doesn’t backtalk, and once he leaves, I take another tentative step towards Crystal.
I think I know what happened.
When I researched the blight bond, some reports suggested that the bond had the potential to cause the Omega to fracture from the person. A protective measure meant to hide the conscious mind from trauma until things are safe again.
In most Omegas, it happens in the form of a drop. But blighted Omegas don’t have the luxury of that protection. The pheromone poison caused by the forced bond rips the conscious mind from the Omega instincts.
Something must have triggered her Omega. I don’t think threats against her would be enough.
When Gage returns with Trey, Crystal stares down the two Betas, panting.
“What the fuck happened?” Trey yelps, taking a few steps out of the room. “Is Kieran dead?”
“He is,” I say through tight lips. “And if you don’t want the same fate, here’s how things are going to go. I like you, Trey. You’ve always been good to Queenie. I don’t know how you got tangled up in the Conglomerate, and I don’t care. Do you want out?”
His shoulders droop as he stares at the floor. “More than anything, man, but I can’t.”
“You can now. Here’s what’s going to happen. Crystal’s Alphas are outside the club. You’re going to get them here. You called Walter like I asked?” The Beta nods tightly. “Get him up here. You’ll tell no one what you’re doing or what you saw in this room. Once you’ve gathered everyone up for me, you’ll leave any tech or equipment the Conglomerate ever gave you, and you’ll walk out the door, get in your car, and drive. You can’t stay in Lunarcrest, just to be safe, but I won’t be telling anyone you existed.”
He gapes at me, mouth opening and closing like a fish desperate for water. I grab his shoulder. “Do you understand me?”
“Yeah, I do,” Trey whispers. “Are you serious? I’m free?”
“I am. Shit is about to change at the Conglomerate.”
Resolve strengthens his features. His eyes sweep over Crystal’s naked and blood-splattered body. “Good. I’ll go get everyone and be back in a few.”
The Beta leaves without fanfare, and I give Crystal my full attention again. But she’s not looking at me. She’s staring at Gage as if she saw a ghost.
That’s when I pull my head out of my ass and realize the problem.
“She must’ve thought you were dead,” I tell him. “Kieran probably said he killed you. Her Omega claimed you, so that trauma must have caused her to … become this.”
At the mention of his father’s name, Gage’s vision narrows in on the broken body on the floor. “She killed him? For me?”
“I don’t think she would’ve done it for herself. That’s not who she is. But for someone she loves?” My chest aches. After all I’ve done to her, will she ever care for me like that?
“She doesn’t love me.” He shakes his shaggy auburn hair, the cracked and dried blood on his face flaking off with the movement. “She can’t.”
“All signs point to her being told you’re dead and becoming,” I gesture at our naked and panting Omega, who stares at Gage with wide, hazy eyes, “whatever this is so that she could avenge your death.”
He tries to take a step towards her, and she hisses, shuffling backward, nearly tripping over Kieran’s corpse.
Ten minutes later, Trey returns with Maverick, Emmanuel, and Dr. Talbot in tow.
“Go now, Trey.” I wave him away.
“Will she be okay? I need to know she’ll be okay.” His voice quivers a little, and a snarl rips out of my throat.
“She’s not yours to be concerned about!”
“She’s my friend!” he snaps. “At least tell her I said goodbye. She’s important to all of us, and you’re a moron if you haven’t noticed it. Everyone in here would put themself on the line for that Omega. Tyler is downstairs, about to go feral.”
Tyler again. What the fuck is he doing here? I wave Trey off. I don’t have time to argue with him. He can stay or go. It doesn’t matter at this point. Manny and Maverick are taking slow steps toward a snarling Crystal.
Tears run down Maverick’s cheeks, his nose red and eyes swollen. He reaches a shaky hand out towards her like she’s a scared dog. She stares at it but doesn’t move closer.
Emmanuel turns towards Dr. Talbot, who seems shocked to see him there.
“Mr. Ortega,” he stutters. “I don’t know what you think is happening here…”
“Can it, Walter,” I snap. “He’s her Alpha. He knows exactly what’s happening here and your role in it all.”
Walter winces and turns away with a reddened face. “I didn’t have a choice,” he mutters.
“None of us did, not really,” I remind him. “Now, we need your help. Crystal has been living with a blighted bond from Kieran for four years.”
“That’s impossible!” he shrieks. “A blighted bond disappears after a heat.”
“It’s possible because he bit her again after every heat.” Gage stutters around the words. “Seventeen times.”
Walter wrings his hands together as he watches the cagey way Crystal has begun to pace the room. “That’s incredibly damaging to her body. There is a chance she won’t be able to take a regular bond at all.”
“What about with her scent matches?” Maverick asks. “Would that make a difference?”
The doctor looks at the four of us, wrinkling his nose. “Potentially, yes. You and Mr. Ortega are her scent matches, I presume?”
“And me,” I bark. Walter pales as he looks me up and down. “I’ve been using an experimental Alpha suppressant. She’s my scent match.” I can feel that it’s mostly burned off and know that if I got close enough to Crystal, I’d smell her sweet shortbread scent soaked in the metallic tang of blood.
“O-okay then. It appears she’s going through a fracture. Her Omega is untethered from repeated unreciprocated bonds. And is that…” He points at the back of Crystal’s neck, where a new, gaping wound rests, barely visible through her blood-slicked hair. “I believe that is a fresh bond.”
“Mother fucker ,” Manny snarls. “What are we supposed to do?”
“She needs to burn off this bond, and she needs a real one to tether her back. It’s the only possible way to reunite her Omega and conscious mind.” He watches my Omega as if she were a science experiment.
And maybe she is.
I doubt this is a common occurrence.
“She has to go into heat to burn off the bond,” Gage says thickly. “She’s been having spikes, but she’s not there yet. Is she going to be like this for six weeks?”
“No, she won’t.” Maverick spins to face us all, eyes wild. “She won’t. Fizz. We’ll give her fizz. She told me that it made her bond fade faster, and maybe she’s close enough to her actual heat that if we give her a big enough dose, it can bring it on for real.” He rushes Walter, grabbing his hands roughly. “Will that work, Doc? Can it work?”
Walter blanches, trying to step back from the wild Alpha, but Maverick holds him tight. “Maybe. Combined with the bite of a scent matched Alpha, it may be enough to push her into full heat. But, if it works, it won’t be an easy one.”
“It’s our only option, isn’t it?” Emmanuel whispers. “Taking her choice away from her to get her back. We’ll be no better than him, bonding her without her consent. Inducing her heat. She can’t consent to being with us, and she’s going to be in so much pain.”
“Maybe once the heat hits and the bite goes through, she’ll be lucid enough to consent?” Gage hopes.
“I don’t think she’d be upset with any of you three,” I say quietly. “She trusts you all implicitly. She loves you. She’ll understand.”
“Us three?” Maverick asks. “Are you not included in that?”
“You know I’m not.” It’s not self-loathing, it’s a fact. Crystal and I aren’t there. The trust doesn’t exist between us yet.
And it may never after what I have to do.
“Omega,” I say gently, pushing a small amount of bark into my voice. “Sweet Omega, you’ve done such a good job.” She whips her head towards me, cocking it to the side as she watches me approach slowly. “A perfect little Omega, taking care of your pack. Did he hurt your Beta?”
She whines, a pitiful broken noise, and my chest cracks open. “Your Beta is okay. I’ve got him right here. Gage, can you tell her you’re okay?”
“I’m okay, Crys. I’m right here.”
A purr stutters from her chest, and hope blooms within me. Maybe we can reach her. Maybe we can get her out of this without a bite and a heat.
“See? He’s okay. But we need to get you cleaned up, Omega. We need to get rid of the bad Alpha who hurt your Beta. Can you come with me?”
She looks down as if noticing Kieran for the first time, and a snarl rips from her throat. The ornamental letter opener in her hand is slammed into his eyeball before I can stop her.
Maverick retches but quickly gets under control when she looks at him.
Gage reaches out, murmuring low, and takes Crystal’s bloody hand in his. He guides his father’s murderer from the scene of the crime gently. “Where are we taking her?”
“Pleasure dens,” I say roughly, stepping around him to lead the way. “They’ll have fizz there.”
Quick steps have me tracking Walter Talbot’s attempt at a sneaky escape, and I snag him by the front of the shirt. “You were never here. This never happened. You saw nothing, Walter. You know nothing. As long as that stays true, you are done with the Conglomerate.”
“Understood,” he says sharply. “I was never here.”
The club is in chaos, with shouts and yells echoing throughout the building, but not yet near us. All signs point to Lupine and the Hawks beginning the process of clearing this place out.
When we get to the pleasure dens, I’m a little surprised to see all of the doors to the rooms swung wide open and the place empty. I didn’t think Sebastian would have been here yet, but I’m glad all of the Omegas got out already.
Atlas was supposed to stick around for cleanup, but he’s not here either.
I don’t have time to think about it much as I rifle through a locked cabinet behind the reception desk and pull out a few doses of fizz.
Gage has led Crystal into the girlfriend experience room and gotten her into the shower. As the water runs, I look at the other two Alphas. “I’m going to bite her,” I say slowly. “And before you interrupt me, it has to be me. She needs you both so much. She loves you, and she trusts you. She needs someone she trusts to get her through this heat. We don’t know what it’ll look like, so we don’t need her avoiding you because she hates you.”
“She doesn’t hate you, Puck,” Manny insists. “Her feelings are complicated, sure, but she wants you around.”
“Be that as it may, I am the safest bet to do this. Let me be the one she hates for this.”
Of course, I don’t want her to hate me.
She’s my Omega.
I love her.
I loved her before I knew she was my Omega.
I love her sense of humor and the way she never broke. The way she challenged me at every turn.
The water turns off, and Gage pushes a docile but empty Crystal into the room. She’s wrapped in a fluffy white towel, her hair still dripping on her bare shoulders. I pass the packet of fizz to Maverick, who drops a pill in a bottle of water he snagged from the cabinet. As Gage holds it to her mouth, Crystal takes tiny swallows until the bottle is drained.
It doesn’t take long for fizz to start working, and with Queenie having so many heat spikes lately, it hits her hard. She doubles over, arms wrapped around her abdomen, and whines loudly. Her pheromones fill the air, and buttery shortcake invades my senses.
“Come here, Omega.” It’s a brutal effort to get the words out.
Because chances are, this will be the last time I get to be with her.
She won’t want to keep me around after this.
Which serves me right, honestly.
Crystal stumbles over to me, and I pull her onto my lap, where she immediately starts gyrating, moaning, and begging incoherently. I brush her hair away from her neck, shifting her slightly to see the bite Kieran left on her.
I wrap my arms around her body, pulling her close, luxuriating in the feel of her on me and at the contrast in our skin tones. I run my nose down the edge of her throat, nuzzling into her and soaking up her scent.
And then I tilt her head forward, angling my mouth directly over the blighted blond Kieran gave her. “I love you, Queenie,” I say as tears run down my face. “Please forgive me.”
I sink my teeth into her flesh.