Chapter Thirty-Three – Hayden
By the time Pax and I pull up to the estate, I see we aren’t the first ones there. Bradford must have made it just before us; his car idles near the front door, parked as close as it can possibly be to the steps without actually going up said steps.
Pax pulls his vehicle next to Bradford’s, tosses me a hard look, and says, “I don’t know what we’re going to find in there. It could be ugly. Best prepare yourself for the worst.”
Normally I’m the one who’s talkative, not him, but this time, all I can do is grunt an acknowledgement of his statement. I’m all too aware we could walk into that house and find… find a scene that’ll haunt me for the rest of my days.
Honestly? I don’t know if I could survive something like that.
We get out of the car, and as we approach the front door—the front door that hangs wide open on its hinges—we each pull out a gun. I go for my pistol, while Pax goes for something with a bigger magazine.
Pax and I sweep through the house, room after room.
We check for Kayla, for Bradford, and for his father.
The more time that passes, the more urgent everything is.
I’ve never felt this disorientated before, this freaked out.
I found the omega I want to spend the rest of my life with, and the possibility she may have been taken from me, from this world… it’s too damn much.
Pax and I head down a hallway, and shortly after we start checking the rooms, we come upon an office, and what we find makes me catch my breath.
Bentley Sr. is on the floor, immobile, eyes wide as he stares at the ceiling, a dark stain in his pants. Bradford is on the ground a good eight feet away, his arms wrapped around a small omega—Kayla.
I lower my gun the same moment Pax mutters a harsh, “Shit.”
Shit’s right. Standing there, staring at Bradford and Kayla, it’s a scene I wasn’t expecting.
The way his arms wrap around her, how he holds onto her…
it’s clear he doesn’t want to let her go—and that says nothing about the almost crazed look in his eyes.
Those black eyes of his have never held such emotion before, not that I’ve seen.
I want to drop to my knees and hold onto Kayla, too, ask her if she’s all right, but a part of me instinctively knows I shouldn’t, not yet.
Behind me, Pax moves closer to Bentley Sr., and he nudges the alpha’s shoe with his own.
“Fuck me,” he mutters. “He’s dead. I better call this in before the police arrive.
” He pulls out his phone and dials, and as he waits for someone to answer the call, he looks at me.
“Careful with that one. He almost looks feral.”
Feral. That’s the look in his eyes. Yep. It explains why he’s so unfocused, why he hasn’t made a single move to get up or release Kayla. He is a statue holding onto her, his face leaning against hers, as he stares at nothing in particular.
You really only hear about alphas going feral when they’re rutting, when the need to claim an omega has taken control over every faculty in their being.
I never got that vibe from Bradford. It could be something in him snapped when Kayla was in danger, and if that’s the case, could I really blame him for it?
No, I couldn’t, because I feel the same damn way.
I holster my gun and move closer to Bradford and Kayla. Her face is buried in the crook of his neck, and she clings to him in a way that tells me she’s alive and relatively all right. Kneeling down slowly next to them, I reach out, but the action causes Bradford to jerk away from me.
“Hey,” I whisper, “it’s okay. It’s okay, it’s just me. Look at me. I’m Hayden, remember? You know me and you know I’d never hurt Kayla.”
Bradford’s black gaze is slow to move in my direction, but I can’t tell if my words are having any sort of effect on him. His eyes are wild, but his face is a blank page overall. Whatever is running through his mind, I can’t say, but I can’t give up.
“You called me, remember?” As I say it, his gaze flicks to Pax over my shoulder, and I realize that seeing him might not bring back good memories.
The failed kidnapping attempt. Right, this isn’t the first time he and Pax have been in the same room together, only now the circumstances are much different.
I need to get his mind off Pax, and do it quickly.
“He’s with me,” I say, my voice gentle. It’s like I’m talking to a cornered animal and I don’t know how he’ll respond.
“I work for Alabaster Security. My job was to watch you, but… as you already know, things got a little more complicated than that.” I glance at the omega in his arms. She turned her head to look at me, but she doesn’t say a word.
Maybe she senses how close Bradford is to the edge.
Or maybe she just likes being in his arms after going so long bereft of them.
“The police are going to get here,” I tell him, “and when they do, they’re going to take you.
Kayla can’t go with you, but I promise you, I will keep her safe.
If you fight them, it’ll only make things worse for you.
If you want to have any hope of getting out and seeing Kayla again, you need to stay calm. ”
Reasoning with an alpha who may or may not be fully there isn’t something I’m used to doing, but this is part of the training we receive at Alabaster Security. Never know when a hostage situation might arise. This isn’t exactly one of those, but it’s pretty damn close.
“Bradford, you need to let me take Kayla.” I extend a hand, though I don’t move to touch either of them.
He blinks, and Kayla stirs in his arms. Seconds tick by, and finally his grip around her body loosens. The wild look in his eyes fades, and he removes his arms from her, allowing her to turn to me—and that’s when I see her shirt is torn, her bra exposed.
My stomach drops. If I have to guess, I’d say Bradford arrived just in time to stop his father from doing anything worse, and if you ask me, it was good he was dead. The world doesn’t need men like that in charge of anything.
Kayla slips her small hand into mine, and she crawls over Bradford’s lap to get to me.
I pull her in and hug her tightly, relief washing over me with such power I’m suddenly exhausted.
It’s like my adrenaline stopped just like that, and coming down from its high is the worst crash I’ve ever experienced in my life.
I sigh as I hold her. “You’re okay. Everything’s going to be okay.”
Bradford moves so he leans his back against the big desk in the room, and he stares at us all the while. It’s clear I’m not the only one who’s overtaken by exhaustion; the über looks as though he could go for a nap.
“I knew you weren’t a groundskeeper,” he says with a slight frown, though there isn’t much heart behind that frown.
It’s not an accusation, just a stated fact, and it isn’t even one I can argue with.
He did suspect something, though he never prodded.
As soon as he was sure I didn’t work for his father, he made it plain he really didn’t care who I really worked for.
And now I know why: his father, Bentley Sr., has played the role of the villain in his story.
“Guilty,” I say with a slight shrug.
Bradford stares around me, at the motionless corpse of his father. “I suppose I’ll be booked for murder now. They don’t do house arrest for that.” He moves his ankle slightly, that damned monitor with a constant beep a reminder of his current sentence.
“No,” I say, “they don’t, but… maybe there’s something we can do.” I’m fairly certain when I say that, I feel Pax’s hard stare on the back of my head, but I don’t care. I know he hates Bradford for what he did, but there’s so much more to this whole thing Pax just doesn’t understand.
Maybe if I plead with Darius, I can get some good lawyers on Bradford’s side.
Hell, Bradford himself has money, so he could hire some damn good lawyers himself.
Surely there’s a loophole or something. Maybe the murder can be claimed as self-defense on behalf of someone else?
Yes, Bradford left his house, but if he hadn’t, what would have happened to Kayla?
“Regardless of what happens to me,” he whispers, an air of resignation falling upon him, “take care of her.”
I nod. It’s all I can do. This situation is anything but easy. It’s going to be a messy road, but I won’t stop until things are back to the way they should be—or at the very least, until Bradford is back home with that ankle monitor and not in prison for murder.
If I can’t help him, if it’s just me and Kayla… things won’t be the same. It isn’t like we’re pack or anything, but it feels like we are, or at the very least like we should be. I know I can make Kayla happy and keep her safe on my own, but it won’t feel right until it’s the three of us.
It might be hard, it might be complicated as hell, but this isn’t the end. It can’t be.