Chapter 23
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Avery
Icould feel happiness radiating through our bond as we relaxed in our dressing room—another locker room—an hour before our show. I was pumped to perform and even more pumped to go back to our omega afterward.
If I had known all the pain would have led us to Kara, the last several years would have been so much more enjoyable. I hadn’t enjoyed the journey we’d been on because I’d been so inside my head.
“She’s not texting me back.” Cal threw his phone on the couch cushion between us.
“Probably taking a nap.” I didn’t look up from my phone where I was playing a game. “She said she and Anya were working on a surprise dinner for us.”
“Well, what are they doing? Hunting down a wild turkey?” Cal picked up his phone again. “I wish we could video chat with her before the show.”
“Not a good idea with so many people coming in and out.” I glanced over at him and snorted at his pout. “She’s fine, bro.”
“Bro?” He looked at me in shock. “You haven’t called me that in forever.”
I shrugged and went back to my game. “Well, you did lick my dick. It’s only fitting.” I saw him flinch out of the corner of my eye and laughed. “Although, I guess a real brother wouldn’t do that.”
“Let’s just forget that happened.” Cal grabbed his water off the coffee table.
The locker room we were in was set up very similarly to the last one we’d been in. It was spacious, with comfortable lounge areas. It also had arcade games, which Alvaro and Tate were playing the crap out of.
“It’s nothing to be embarrassed about. I would have probably done the same thing.” I used my last life on my game and turned off the screen. “I can’t wait until this tour is over.”
The locker room door opened, and our two managers strode in with Tate’s dad. This couldn’t be good.
“Shit,” Cal muttered and crossed his arms over his chest.
“Boys. Where are Alvaro and my son?” Marcus Carter was dressed in an expensive-looking navy-blue pin-striped suit, and his shoes probably cost more than my phone. Our pack had a lot of money, but we didn’t wear it.
Alvaro and Tate popped around the corner from the area where the games were. The mood in the room had shifted from content joy to annoyance and unease.
“Have a seat, boys,” Marcus said, gesturing to the sectional where Cal and I were already seated.
Alvaro sat down between me and Cal, and Tate sat on the other side of me. This was a common arrangement of ours; Alvaro close to both me and Cal and Tate next to me for added emotional support. I don’t even think they realized they did it, but I did.
Our managers moved to stand behind us, which was comforting at least. If they felt like something was wrong, they would have probably stood with Marcus.
We’d had our managers since the beginning. One of them had been fresh out of college, just like we were, and the other had twenty years of experience managing some of the biggest names in the music industry. They ran our career like a well-oiled machine.
“What brings you to our neck of the woods?” Alvaro sat back and crossed his ankle over his knee, cool as a cucumber. I was glad at least one of us was.
Marcus started to walk along the other side of the coffee table, his fingers rubbing his clean-shaven chin. “We’re going to be adding an extra concert to your tour two nights from now at Levi’s Stadium. The demand was so high we decided it would be in our best interest to add another show.”
“We weren’t consulted on this,” one of our managers added. “Tickets went on sale an hour ago.”
Tate growled. “You can’t just do shit like that. We’re fucking human beings.”
“Son, you’re an alpha. You have plenty of stamina to do another concert. To make up for the short notice, we’ve booked you hotel suites for the duration of the tour.”
I stiffened, and my heart went somewhere, but it wasn’t in my chest anymore. “We’ll stay on the bus.”
“Well, that’s another reason for the hotel rooms. The bus-”
“What the-” Alvaro jumped up from his seat just as the locker room doors burst open.
Jonathan ran in, looking like someone had punched him in the stomach. His face was pale and his eyes... something was wrong. His phone was gripped so hard in his hand I was surprised it hadn’t broken to pieces yet.
We all stood, ignoring Marcus telling us to sit back down.
“I...” Jonathan looked at Marcus and then at our managers. “I need to speak to my pack alone.”
Marcus crossed his arms. “They are going on stage in an hour. If you’re worried about the bus, don’t be. The Pack Health agents said they were taking it for a routine inspection since the pack went MIA for a few days.”
“What did you do?” Tate grabbed his father by the tie and walked him back into the wall.
Marcus held his hands up. “I did nothing, son. They were looking for you boys last night, and you weren’t with the other buses.”
My heart had returned and was beating violently in my chest. We’d cleaned the bus and doused the back room in de-scenting spray, but what if that wasn’t enough?
Jonathan was staring off at nothing. “We need to go. Now.”
That wasn’t all he wanted to say. Whatever Alvaro felt coming from Jonathan sent worry through our bond. I was grateful our pack bond wasn’t strong enough yet that I could feel Jonathan because I was struggling enough with the three.
As if sensing I was about to lose it, Cal grabbed my hand. “Cancel the show.” He started toward the door, where Jonathan was still standing.
Marcus growled. “We are not canceling the show. There are twenty-five thousand fans out there!”
Tate let Marcus go, and we followed Jonathan out into the hall, shutting the door behind us. The hallway was mostly empty and those that were in it were rushing about preparing for us to perform.
“They’re in the hospital.” Jonathan spoke so quietly I thought I heard wrong. “Anya’s in surgery to remove...” He choked up and put a hand over his eyes.
“To remove what?” Alvaro growled, his whole body vibrating with an anger I’d never seen from him before.
I could feel everyone’s intense emotions, and I quickly threw up my mental blocks. It was too much. We needed to go to our omega and make sure she was okay.
Jonathan swallowed and shook his head. “A bullet. They wouldn’t tell me anything about Kara. They just said Anya was brought in with another woman.”
The locker room door opened, and Marcus walked out, his phone to his ear. He stopped and seemed to be processing the looks on all of our faces. “Can one of you tell me what the fuck is going on?”
Tate and Alvaro exchanged glances, and Alvaro nodded. “Dad, we need a ride to the hospital.”
Everything was numb. I couldn’t let myself feel anything other than nothing as we sat in the back of an SUV on the way to the hospital.
Marcus had insisted on coming with us but was giving us space by sitting in the front with the driver. He was on his phone anyway.
I didn’t understand Tate’s dad at all. One second, he was all alpha asshole, and the next he seemed to get it completely without asking any more questions. We didn’t have to tell him. It was like he just somehow knew. I guessed it made sense given he was in a pack himself.
Cal’s leg was bouncing non-stop next to me, occasionally hitting my leg and making me jump out of the thoughts I’d buried myself under.
“Kayla and her pack aren’t answering their phones.” Alvaro had been trying to call them since we’d gotten into the SUV.
“Airplane,” Tate mumbled.
“What?” Alvaro was texting Kayla now instead of trying to call.
“If Kara is in the hospital, they would have called her family who would then have called her. They are probably on a plane coming here.” Tate was worrying even me. He was usually the strong one, keeping the rest of us from falling apart. I needed him not to fall apart.
“Why would they shoot Anya?” Jonathan had asked that a few times, but none of us had an answer for him.
Marcus turned in his seat. “I was able to get ahold of my contact in Pack Health. When the agents couldn’t locate your bus last night, they looked into your credit cards, including your betas’.
They found credit card purchases on Anya’s credit card and had enough reason to trace her phone location.
There was an incident with the dog and that’s all he could tell me. ”
I bit the inside of my cheek so hard to stop myself from losing it that I tasted blood. Our omega. Our beta. Our dog.
We could lose them all. In one night. Everything.
Cal grabbed my hand for the second time. “It’s going to be okay. It has to be.”
“Sir, we’re just about there. Where would you like me to drop you off?” The driver put on his turn signal, and as soon as he turned right, I could see the hospital down the street.
“The back. I arranged for us to use the staff elevator.” Marcus had the phone to his ear again.
“Why are you doing this?” Tate finally tore his gaze away from the window.
“It’s your pack, son. Am I happy we have to cancel the show? No, but if you went out there like this...” He shook his head, not finishing his thought. “You’re my son.”
He hadn’t said a word about our omega, but probably because of the driver. I still wasn’t a hundred percent certain that Marcus hadn’t put all of this in motion in the first place, but then, why would he be helping us?
We stopped outside an employee’s only entrance at the back of the hospital and scrambled out, not sure where the fuck we were headed, but knowing we needed to get to Kara.
An employee opened the door, and we followed him to an elevator. “Do you know what floor you’re headed to?”
“Surgery.” Jonathan looked terrified. Anya was his world, and she was upstairs somewhere having a bullet dug out of her.
Was Kara having the same thing done? I growled at the thought and Cal squeezed my hand that I didn’t even realize he was still holding.
Please be okay.
I’d already lost one omega, and before that, I’d lost my parents because they believed alphas and omegas were abominations.
I sure felt like one now as the elevator flew upwards. We couldn’t protect our omega and now she was in a hospital bed, possibly dying.
“We need the seventh floor,” Marcus said as the elevator stopped on the second.
“Go. I’ll text you once I know more about Anya.” Jonathan quickly got off the elevator.
“Need special clearance to go to the seventh floor.” That was all the man had to say for us to know that’s where any omegas were.
Marcus turned toward him. “You’ll take us to the seventh floor.” His bark was strong enough that I was even tempted to take us there myself, even though I had no clue how.
“I... I... I can’t.” The man gulped, his hand trembling as he lifted his keycard toward the panel on the door while fighting the barked command. The man was a beta, but a strong one if he was resisting a bark as strong as Marcus’s.
The elevator doors slid shut but the elevator didn’t move.
Tate grabbed the man’s wrist and raised it to the electronic pad and pressed the button with a seven on it. The man made a strangled kind of whimpering noise, sweat breaking out on his forehead.
The elevator took off again, and I felt like I might vomit. She had to be okay. She just had to be. It was a good sign if Marcus knew she was on the seventh floor and not in surgery or the ICU.
As soon as the doors slid open, I caught a hint of her scent that hadn’t been scrubbed from the air yet and was out the door before someone could stop me.
But they weren’t running after me to stop me; they were running with me.
We passed a nurse’s station and then there it was. Her room. The door was shut, but the faint scent was a little stronger here.
I stopped outside the door and turned the handle.
Locked.
I tried again, and again.
“Code Gold. Code Gold,” a robotic voice said over the PA system.
I prowled toward the nurse’s station where the nurses were scrambling. “Open the door!”
“Sir, we’re going to have to ask you and your friends to leave,” an older nurse said calmly. “We have to protect them, and we won’t be letting you into any rooms under any circumstances.”
“She’s our omega!” I wanted to grab her by the front of her scrub top and drag her to the door. “Open it right now.” My voice was deadly, and she paled.
“Avery, let’s go.” I wasn’t entirely sure who grabbed my arm and tried to tug me away from the nurse.
“Open the fucking door!” My bark wasn’t as strong as Alvaro’s or even Tate’s, but at that moment it sure as fuck felt like it.
“Freeze!”
The nurse put her hands in the air and slowly backed away, her face a mixture of fear and sympathy. I didn’t want her sympathy, I wanted her to open the damn door so I could get to my omega.
“We’re just here to see their omega,” Marcus said to the footfalls quickly coming down the corridor. “There’s no need for weapons.”
I turned back to the door, ignoring my pack mates’ pleas from behind me to freeze. I wasn’t going to freeze. I needed her. I needed Kara.
“Tranquilize him,” I heard someone say.
“Is that really-” Marcus started before I felt a stab of pain in my arm.
I looked down to find a fucking dart sticking out of it. I yanked it out, throwing it to the ground as my vision started to swim. We weren’t animals; we were human fucking beings.
“Kara! Open the door!” My voice was already fading along with the sound of Alvaro telling someone not to hurt me. “Kara...”
I leaned against the door, my body feeling both heavy and like it was floating up, up, up.
My knees collapsed, and my hands squeaked as they dragged down the door. “Kara...” Her name died on my lips, just like the last thread of my sanity.