Chapter 30
Chapter Thirty
Tuesday afternoon
NOVA
Remembering my weekend makes me smile as I sit in the small waiting room. Dr. Alys’ office is in a building upstairs, and she managed to get me in quickly since she had an appointment open up.
My toes wiggle in my boots with nerves, the only allowance I’ll give myself is that I’m worried about seeing Dr. Alys. I’m here by myself, because I didn’t?—
“Nova,” Caleb hisses, slipping through the door. I blink blankly at him as he sits next to me and takes my hand. “Did you seriously think one of us wouldn’t wait with you? Barnacle, Baby Girl. I’ll be here before you go in and when you come out.”
“I just figured I’d come between seeing clients,” I rasp, still disbelieving that he’s actually here.
My pack is coming together quickly after weeks of wondering what the fuck I’m doing with them. They’re no longer the rag tag group of alphas that treated me like a second choice or mistake. Instead, Caleb, Tyde, and Lars are becoming very fierce protectors.
I think our weekend just solidified things for us. We needed that time to bond together.
“It’s a big deal to come in and talk to her, Nova. Don’t minimize this. You don’t know how you’ll feel after. Did you give yourself enough space in between this appointment and your next?” he asks.
Biting my lip, I think about how I have a newer pack from the mafia community that I’m seeing today and then I’m going by to see Aisling and Wren at Pack Hayes’ home to discuss what I need to do to establish a non-profit.
“I have a busy day,” I sigh, explaining what I’m doing today.
“I’ll have Lars bring lemon squares for when you’re done,” he grumbles.
I can tell he’s more annoyed that I’m slammed today than at me. The bond between us is giving me intention and emotions, but like Lars, it’s slow to build.
I bit him back on Sunday before we headed back. We had really hot shower sex, and I had this overwhelming need to complete the bond. His smile is something I’ll never forget.
“Nova?”
The doctor has her brown hair back in some complicated sort of bun, the kind that reminds me of ultra rich Stepford wives.
She has kind eyes though, and the rest of her looks approachable.
I think I may be biased about her hair, since Louise and everyone she spent time with were horrible with tightly pulled back hair.
Swallowing hard, I nod, taking in her slacks and pretty blouse. Maybe this won’t be so bad. Fuck, why does therapy seem so scary?
“Hey,” Caleb pulls my attention away from her as I realize I’m starting to breathe faster. “It’s just talking, baby. You say what you want and nothing more. No one is going to force you into anything you don’t want to do. Okay?”
“This is a safe space,” Dr. Alys says, walking over to me. “We can start wherever you want, Nova. You didn’t seem this agitated until you saw me. Can you tell me why?”
A tear slips down my face as I struggle to breathe, and I nod.
“It’s so…dumb,” I gasp.
“If you can’t breathe, it’s not dumb,” Caleb says, rubbing my back.
“It’s your hair,” I wince.
“This?” A quick pull of some pins has it all tumbling down in a chestnut cascade. “I had court today, and I was trying to look like a hard ass bitch. I may have managed the look a little closely.”
Sighing, I smile gratefully. “Again, it’s such a ridiculous reaction,” I explain.
“It’s not. Some people get triggered by a perfume, the way someone laughs, etc. Post traumatic responses can happen for a variety of reasons,” she says. “I rarely wear my hair like this. It did make the judge listen to me though.”
“Then mission accomplished,” I say weakly, standing. I only wobble slightly, and Caleb stands to place his hands on my waist.
“Can I get her water?” he asks worriedly.
“Yes,” she says, walking over to fill a plastic cup. “Here you go. We can go in when you’re ready.”
Taking a sip when she hands it to me, I try to settle my nerves. They’re not as bad as when I first saw her, which has to be good enough for now.
“Ready,” I whisper, and she gazes at me for a second before nodding.
“Are you coming with her…?”
“Caleb Finnegan, one of her alphas,” he murmurs. “I want her to be able to say whatever she needs to, and I’m not the best at managing my emotions. I’m going to be right outside in case she needs me instead.”
“That’s very self aware of you,” she murmurs.
“Yeah, well, I’m working on it,” Caleb sighs.
Dr. Alys and I go inside the office, and she closes the door carefully, watching my face. The office itself is cozy, and it doesn’t make me feel as if the walls are closing in.
“You can sit anywhere that makes you feel comfortable,” she says.
Seeing an egglike chair that hangs from the ceiling, I immediately head there and curl up inside it. Dr. Alys sits across from me and slides out of her heels, stretching her feet with a sigh.
“Pretending to be someone else is terrible,” she says.
“Being told you’re someone else your entire life is too,” I reply.
There are more things I want to say, but I press my lips together to hold it back. Trauma dumping isn’t something I want to do. I’ve heard too many stories of people being locked up for it, and that’s the last thing I want. Caleb pushes adoration at me, feeling my anxiety.
I don’t want to end up in an institution.
What? Tyde asks through the bond. Baby, that won’t happen. I’d never ever let that happen. Your sister would slit the nice little doctor’s throat and call it a day. She’d also never have endorsed this therapist if that was the case.
Okay. I’m freaking out, Tyde. It’s like there are waves of anxiety and I can’t keep my head above it.
“So who are you?” Dr. Alys asks, watching me closely. I don’t think she knows I’ve been having a conversation with a little voice in my head.
Snorting at my ridiculous thoughts, I shrug. “I apparently was kidnapped from my bassinet at two weeks old. My life was stolen from me. Who I am is kind of a muddy question.”
She nods, leaning forward with her arms on her thighs. It’s not very ladylike, yet it reinforces the fact that she’s a lot more down to earth than I originally thought.
“How much of a hurry are you to figure it out?” she asks.
“Honestly? I’m willing to let it ride and see.
I’m a midwife, omega, sister, friend, and mate.
Every day, I learn something new about myself,” I admit.
“The semantics aren’t important, but a part of me is mourning what could have been.
Maybe even angry as fuck that my life had to be this hard up to this point too. ”
“Tell me about your kidnappers?” Dr. Alys asks.
“I recently found out that they worked under a recently deceased mob boss. Mr. Domino wanted to hurt my biological parents and the mafia community, so he did it by having me kidnapped,” I explain.
“The people who kidnapped me pretended to be my parents, broke my bones when I wasn’t perfect, abused me, and then tried to sell me to Mr. Domino. ”
My doctor sits quietly as she processes what I said. “Do you think your life would have been happier with your biological parents?”
“And my twin sister,” I add absently. “Life isn’t roses and happiness for everyone all the time. I know that. Hollis left home at eighteen to get away from her parents so she could escape an arranged marriage. I left so?—”
“Why did you leave?” Dr. Alys asks so softly I almost don’t hear her.
“So the man I thought was my father would stop raping me,” I gasp. “I just couldn’t stay another day, where no one cared that I’d rather die than take another fucking breath.”
“Parents are supposed to protect you, and they failed at that, right? Who would break your fingers? Let’s start there, at a point that may not be so raw,” she says, glancing at the forgotten water in my hand.
It’s cold, which is an outside source I can use to center myself, so I take a sip. The burn of the freezing water as it travels down my throat is welcome as I take small breaths. Too much will throw me into a panic attack. It’s a balancing act, and one I wish I didn’t have to play.
“Louise, the woman I thought was my mother, would break my fingers when she got angry with me. It was a way to control me. If she broke too many, then I couldn’t practice the piano, or paint, or whatever thing I was supposed to learn in order to make her look good,” I murmur.
“John, her husband, would break bones when I wasn’t quiet enough, but it was usually my ribs.
He had issues with control, so Louise would keep him from beating me too badly by saying that she’d deal with me. ”
“Who did you have to impress for them?” she asks. I have a feeling she’s trying to get into a flow of conversation, but every word I utter reminds me of how awful my past is.
I simply accepted it as the standard of my childhood because I had nothing else to compare it to.
“Mr. Domino and his associates. I had no idea they were all in the mafia until just a few weeks ago. I never put it together. My father used to alpha bark me into things, and they all thought it was amusing,” I say.
“John liked to brag about his only daughter, but instead of nodding and moving on, Mr. Domino would demand that I show him what I could do. That’s when John would freak out about exposing himself as a liar. ”
“Maybe he shouldn’t have run his mouth,” Dr. Alys says.
“He never learned, and I never had a moment’s peace. Even when I left home, I was on the run. He couldn’t alpha bark me through the phone because I trained myself to break through it.”
“That’s typically a response to excessive use of one,” she muses.
“Alpha barks scare the shit out of me,” I say, shuddering. “The feeling of losing my ability to control my own actions? No thank you.”
“It’s an abuse of power in many people’s eyes,” she says softly. “Has anyone else ever done that to you?”
“Lars,” I rasp. “He and Caleb had a gut feeling that I might be someone else.”
“How?” she asks.