Chapter 21 #2
I hit Play. Static for a moment, crackling and uncertain, then her voice filters through the speaker, and my entire body reacts. Every muscle tenses, my heart rate spikes, and my breath catches in my chest.
“Good evening, everyone tuning in hot tonight. This is The Heat Line, where we turn up the temperature on conversations nobody else wants to have. And I’m your host, coming to you live on this late, snowy night.”
Her voice is different than I’ve heard it before. Lower. Sadder. Rougher around the edges like she’s been crying for hours, which she probably has been. My chest constricts painfully just hearing her like this.
“I want to start tonight with an apology,” she continues, and I can hear her taking a shaky breath. “To all of you listening who trust me to be honest and authentic, and to some people who probably aren’t listening but desperately need to hear this anyway.”
We’re all frozen in place, hanging on every word like our lives depend on it.
“I thought I was doing something supportive, something that would help protect our community from harm, but I went about it completely wrong. Without getting all the information beforehand, without verifying facts, without giving people the benefit of the doubt. And I ended up hurting good people when all I wanted to do was protect everyone.”
She pauses, and I hear papers rustling. Probably her notes.
“I won’t go into details because it’s not my story alone to tell, and as you know, we don’t share names on this show.
But the situation I was investigating isn’t as clear-cut as I thought it was.
The information I received was incomplete, biased, and ultimately wrong, and I won’t be pursuing that investigation anymore. ”
Another pause, longer this time. I can practically hear her gathering courage.
“Maybe down the track, when it’s not so raw, when I have more perspective and emotional distance, I’ll share the full story. Share what I learned about rushing to judgment and the danger of confirmation bias. But right now, it’s too close. Too painful. Too fresh.”
Her voice cracks on that last word.
“I need to apologize so much for hurting them,” she says, and now she’s definitely crying, with her voice breaking and wavering. “And I doubt they’re even listening to this right now, but I want to put it out into the universe anyway. I want my sincerity to be public and on record.”
She sniffles, and the sound goes straight to my heart like an arrow.
“I haven’t been able to stop crying since this afternoon, since I had to look them in the eyes and admit what I’d done. I wish I could take it all back. Every lie. Every deception. Every moment I wasn’t completely honest about who I was and why I was there.”
Dylan makes a pained sound beside me, low in his throat, and when I glance at him, his green eyes are bright with unshed tears.
“I’m announcing this publicly because you all deserve to know when I make mistakes,” Anita continues, her voice getting slightly stronger even as it shakes.
“And this was a big one. The biggest mistake of my life. I hurt people I care about, people who showed me nothing but kindness and respect and… and more than that. And I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”
The silence that follows is heavy, weighted with emotion.
Then she takes a deep breath. “But what this situation has given me, what I’ve learned from this colossal fuckup, is an opportunity.
A chance to refocus my energy where it actually belongs.
To expose one of the biggest misogynist promoters out there, someone who truly deserves to be called out and held accountable for the harm he causes. ”
She’s talking about Reed. Has to be.
“I’m changing tactics. Refocusing my investigation, and I’ll be pursuing this new path with everything I have because there are real threats out there. Real people causing harm to Omegas every single day, and I need to focus on them instead of chasing shadows.”
Slater suddenly stands up, pulling his phone from his pocket, and walks out of the room without a word.
“What’s he doing?” Jasper asks, watching him disappear down the hallway toward his office.
I shrug, my eyes still fixed on my phone, where Anita’s voice continues pouring out of the speaker.
“Okay, we have a lot of calls tonight,” she’s saying, and I can hear her trying to pull herself together, switching back into host mode. “So let’s start taking them. First caller, you’re on The Heat Line.”
“Hi,” a woman’s voice comes through. “I just want to say that what you’re doing takes real courage. Admitting when you’re wrong publicly like this. A lot of people would just disappear and pretend it never happened.”
“Thank you,” Anita says softly. “But it’s the least I could do.”
Dylan and Jasper are completely glued to the radio broadcast like they can’t hear anything else in the world, and I feel that intensity deep in my chest.
We listen to a few more callers. People asking questions about the situation without knowing the details.
Others sharing their own stories of making mistakes and trying to make amends, and Anita responding to each one with that combination of sass and compassion that makes her so good at this, even when her voice is rough with emotion.
Then she pauses mid-sentence. “Hold on, my producer is telling me there’s a specific call I need to take. She says it’s important, so let’s do this. Okay, you’re on The Heat Line. Thanks for calling in.”
“You know who I am.” A male voice comes through, and we all freeze simultaneously. Deep. Rough. Unmistakable.
“Fuck off, is that Slater?” Dylan blurts out.
I burst out laughing, and Jasper is grinning.
There’s a pause on the other end. “Very hard not to with that voice.” Anita’s voice is breathless.
Silence for a heartbeat. Two. Three. Like the entire world has frozen on its axis, holding its breath.
“Okay,” Slater says finally, and his voice is careful now. “So we now understand what you did and why you did it. The full picture. And I’m starting to better understand the real danger. The actual threat that’s out there, the opposition you’re facing.”
Another pause.
“But what you’re proposing sounds dangerous. And, well…” He clears his throat, and there’s vulnerability in the sound. “If you want us to help, if you need backup or support or just someone in your corner, then you know where we live.”
“Oh.” That one word from Anita contains entire universes.
Shock. Relief. Gratitude. Hope. Longing. Disbelief. So many emotions packed into one syllable as if she’s reached through the radio waves and grabbed my heart.
She’s gasping slightly, trying to catch her breath. “You have no idea how much that offer means to me. I didn’t think… After today, after everything, I thought you all hated me. That I’d ruined everything beyond repair. That there was no coming back from what I did.”
“We don’t hate you,” Slater states, and his voice is softer now.
Gentler. More like the Slater we know in private than the commanding pack leader he shows the world.
“We’re hurt. Confused about how to move forward.
Trying to figure out how to rebuild trust. But we don’t hate you.
That’s not who we are, and we’re not the kind of men who walk away from someone who needs help. Especially not our…”
He trails off deliberately, leaving the word hanging unspoken.
Especially not our Omega.
“Thank you,” Anita whispers. “Thank you so much.”
“Think about what I said. The offer stands.” Then the line goes dead with a soft click.
Anita lets out a long, shaky breath. “Oh, geez. Okay. I can breathe now. Holy shit. I guess they were listening to tonight’s program after all. And the phones are going mental right now.”
Slater walks back into the room, and the grin on his face is the smuggest, most satisfied expression I’ve ever seen him wear.
“You absolute legend,” Dylan says, staring at him with open admiration and a grin that matches Slater’s. “That was perfect.”
“Smooth as hell,” Jasper adds, shaking his head in appreciation. “Exactly the right amount of support without letting her completely off the hook.”
I’m grinning like an idiot. “You never cease to surprise me, man. I thought you were going to need more time to process.”
“I do need time,” Slater admits, settling back into his chair and picking up his abandoned whiskey. “But that doesn’t mean I’m going to let her face Reed alone. Or let her think we’ve completely given up on her.”
On the radio, Anita is back to her host voice, though it’s still a bit shaky and emotional. “Okay, listeners, I need your input here. What do you think? Should I take him up on that offer, or shouldn’t I? Am I crazy to even consider it after what I did?”
The first caller comes through immediately. “Oh my God, who was that man? That voice? I need to know everything. Is he single? Does he have a brother? Can I have his number?”
Anita laughs, and it’s the first genuine, unforced laugh we’ve heard from her all night. The sound wraps around my heart and squeezes. “That’s classified information. And no, you definitely cannot have his number.”
“But seriously, though,” the caller continues, her tone shifting to earnest. “That was clearly someone who cares about you deeply, to extend a hand even after you hurt them. That’s rare.
That kind of forgiveness, you don’t find that every day.
Take it, girl. Don’t let pride or shame or fear stop you from accepting help when it’s genuinely offered. ”
“You make a really good point,” Anita says thoughtfully.
“I don’t know the details of your situation, and I don’t need to,” says a male caller next.
“But that voice? That man sounded like someone who’s willing to work through difficult things.
Like someone who values you enough to look past mistakes and see the person underneath.
Don’t waste that opportunity. Don’t let it slip away because you’re afraid or ashamed. ”
“Thanks for calling in,” Anita says, her voice thick with emotion. “I appreciate that more than you know.”
We’re all grinning now, listening to caller after caller tell Anita to take the help, to reach out, to not let this opportunity slip away.
“I’m so fucking glad you did that,” Dylan says to Slater. “Otherwise, I might have ended up driving to her place tonight like some kind of stalker and camping outside her building to make sure she didn’t try to leave town.”
“Hey, that was my plan,” I protest, and everyone laughs, the tension that’s been choking the house all evening finally starting to ease.
“Great minds,” Jasper says, reaching over to clap me on the shoulder. “She might need to grovel a bit more, though,” he points out, but he’s grinning as he says it, clearly not actually upset about the prospect.
“Oh, definitely,” Slater agrees, and there’s a hint of amusement in his voice now, breaking through the earlier pain. “She’s going to have to work for it. Prove she’s serious about being honest going forward.”
“I can live with that,” Dylan says, flopping back in his chair with obvious relief. “As long as the end result is her in our pack. In our home. In our bed. In our lives.”
I sit back in my chair, still listening to Anita continue her show, taking more calls, her voice growing stronger and more hopeful with each one. And I can’t stop smiling at hearing her as if she were right next to me.