Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
AVA
I couldn't stop thinking about what Leo had told me.
Both his arms. Three ribs. His jaw. A stranger. A man who had touched my hair at a coffee shop and said something about how pretty it was. A man I'd smiled at politely and forgotten five minutes later.
Leo had followed him home. Learned his name, his address, his habits. And then he'd beaten him nearly to death. For touching my hair.
The horror of it sat in my chest like a stone, heavy and cold and impossible to ignore.
Every time I looked at Leo, his easy smile, his dancing gray eyes, his playful charm—I saw something else now.
The monster beneath the mask. The violence coiled behind that pretty face like a snake waiting to strike.
They were all monsters. I'd known that. But knowing it in the abstract and knowing it in the specific were two very different things.
I sat in my nest, knees drawn to my chest, staring at nothing.
The afternoon light filtered through the curtains, casting long golden shadows across the bedroom floor.
The blankets around me smelled like all of them now, honey and pine and cedar and chocolate, layered together until I couldn't separate one scent from another.
Three days since the game. Three days of Leo's revelation rattling around in my skull like a marble in an empty room.
Three days of feeling their presence through the bond—their love, their certainty, their complete lack of remorse and wanting to scream.
Through the bond, I could feel them moving around the cabin.
Mason's steady warmth in the kitchen, the clatter of pots accompanying his presence.
Ethan's cool focus somewhere in his study.
Caleb's patient intensity by the front door, always guarding.
Leo's restless energy approaching down the hallway, getting closer with each passing second.
A knock on the doorframe. I looked up to find Leo leaning against it, one shoulder braced against the wood, his dark hair artfully mussed, that familiar smirk playing at the corner of his mouth.
The late afternoon light caught the sharp angles of his face, made his gray eyes gleam like polished silver.
"Dinner's ready," Leo announced, his voice light and casual, as if he hadn't confessed to nearly killing a man three days ago. "Mason made that pasta you like. The one with the cream sauce and the—"
Something snapped. I was off the bed before I knew I was moving, my bare feet silent on the hardwood floor, crossing the room in three strides. My hand connected with his face in a crack that echoed through the cabin, the impact stinging my palm, vibrating up through my wrist.
Leo's head snapped to the side. When he looked back at me, there was a red handprint blooming across his cheekbone, vivid against his tan skin, and something dark flickering in his gray eyes. The smirk was gone. What remained was colder. Sharper. More honest.
"Feel better?" Leo asked, his voice soft and dangerous, pitched low enough that only I could hear, his body utterly still in a way that made my instincts scream.
I hit him again. And again. My fists pounding against his chest, his shoulders, anywhere I could reach.
The fabric of his black t-shirt bunched under my fingers, warm from his body heat.
Screaming—I was screaming, I realized distantly, wordless sounds of rage and grief and helplessness tearing from my throat until it burned.
Leo let me. That was the worst part. He just stood there, solid as a wall, absorbing my blows without flinching, his gray eyes watching me with that patient intensity that made me want to claw his face off.
Through the bond, I felt his emotions, not anger, not pain, but something worse. Fascination. Appreciation. Love.
He was enjoying this.
"You monster," I shrieked, my voice cracking, tears streaming down my face and dripping off my chin, blurring my vision until he was just a dark shape in front of me. "You fucking monster, you hurt someone, you almost killed someone, for nothing, for touching my hair—"
"For touching what's mine," Leo corrected calmly, catching my wrists when I went for his face again, his grip iron-strong despite his lean frame. His fingers wrapped completely around my wrists, cool and dry against my flushed skin. "There's a difference."
"I wasn't yours!" I screamed, struggling against his hold, my whole body shaking with fury, my pulse pounding so hard I could feel it in my temples. "I was never yours, I didn't even know you were watching me, you had no right—"
"I had every right," Leo interrupted, his voice still calm, still patient, still terrifying in its absolute certainty.
His gray eyes bored into mine, unblinking, pupils dilated despite the bright light.
"You've been mine since you were young. Every man who looked at you wrong, every Alpha who got too close, every stranger who dared to touch you, they were all trespassing. I just made sure they understood that."
I spat in his face. The saliva hit his cheek, catching the light as it slid down toward his jaw.
Time seemed to slow. I watched his expression shift—the mask slipping further, the predator emerging from beneath the charming surface.
His gray eyes went cold as winter ice, his grip on my wrists tightening until the bones ground together and I gasped in pain.
"That," Leo said quietly, his voice soft as silk and sharp as a blade, each word precise and deliberate, "was a mistake."
Footsteps in the hallway, heavy and measured.
Mason appeared in the doorway, filling the space with his broad shoulders and golden presence.
His honey-brown eyes swept over the scene—my tear-streaked face, Leo's iron grip on my wrists, the tension crackling between us like static electricity before a storm.
He was still wearing the apron from cooking, a ridiculous domestic touch that somehow made everything more surreal.
"What happened?" Mason asked, his voice calm but with an edge beneath it, steel wrapped in velvet, his gaze flicking between us.
"Our Omega decided to test some boundaries," Leo replied, not releasing me, his eyes still locked on mine with that cold, patient intensity. "Physical violence. Spitting. General defiance."
"I see," Mason said, and something in his tone made my stomach drop, made the fine hairs on my arms stand up.
He pulled off the apron, folding it neatly, setting it aside with deliberate care.
Then he moved closer, his presence filling the hallway, his scent—honey and sunlight—washing over me and making my traitorous body want to lean toward him even as my mind screamed to run.
"Ava. Look at me," Mason commanded, his voice quiet but carrying the weight of an Alpha's authority. I didn't want to. But the bond tugged at me, pulled at something deep in my chest, a physical sensation like a hook behind my sternum, and I found myself turning my head to meet his gaze.
Mason's honey-brown eyes were soft but implacable, warm but utterly unyielding. "You know the rules. You know the consequences. Physical violence against your Alphas is not permitted."
"He deserved it," I snarled, my voice rough from screaming, my throat raw and burning. "He deserved worse than that."
"Maybe," Mason acknowledged, his expression unchanging, his voice patient and measured like he had all the time in the world. "But that's not how this works. You don't get to decide what we deserve. You don't get to lash out whenever you're upset. You're our Omega, and there are expectations."
"Fuck your expectations," I spat, struggling against Leo's grip, feeling the bruises already forming around my wrists. "Fuck your rules. Fuck all of you."
Mason sighed, a sound heavy with disappointment that somehow made me feel worse than anger would have. He looked at Leo, something passing between them in that silent communication of a bonded pack. "Bring her to the living room."
Leo released one of my wrists, keeping hold of the other as he dragged me down the hallway.
I fought, kicked and screamed and clawed at his hand with my free fingers—but it was useless.
He was too strong, his grip unbreakable, and through the bond, I could feel his complete lack of concern.
My struggles amused him. My fury delighted him.
The hallway seemed longer than usual, the hardwood floor cold beneath my bare feet, the walls pressing in.
I caught glimpses of the cabin as we passed, the kitchen with dinner still steaming on the stove, the study with its walls of books, the bathroom where Mason had held me through the bond-sickness.
Every room held memories now. Every corner of this prison was becoming familiar.
The living room was bathed in the warm amber light of late afternoon, dust motes floating lazily in the sunbeams that streamed through the tall windows.
Ethan sat on the leather couch, his long legs crossed at the ankle, his green eyes sharp and assessing behind his dark-framed glasses.
His tablet was nowhere in sight—unusual for him.
He'd been waiting. They'd all been waiting.
Caleb stood by the window, his massive frame silhouetted against the fading light, his arms crossed over his chest like bands of iron.
His ice-blue eyes tracked my every movement, missing nothing, his scarred face expressionless but somehow more terrifying for its blankness.
Leo deposited me in the center of the room, releasing my wrist but staying close enough to grab me if I tried to run.
The oriental rug beneath my feet was plush and expensive, a deep burgundy that reminded me absurdly of blood.
Mason entered behind us, closing the door with a soft click that felt like a gunshot in the silence.