Chapter Thirty-One
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
OVER A WEEK has passed since we left Starburgh and I can still taste Bea’s fucking slick on my lips. I growl, pacing outside of our van. The temptation to climb back inside and clock Ridley grows stronger with every lap I make. If he hadn’t wiped her release on my lips, my inner alpha wouldn’t be constantly tearing apart my insides, trying to get me to go back to her.
“You look stressed,” Jericho, our FCDA partner for the week, says as he steps out of the back. He stretches his arms over his head and I find myself once again wondering if we haven’t met before. When I asked, he said we hadn’t, but he looks familiar.
“Alpha shit.”
“I understand. I miss my omega like crazy when I’m working a job. It gets a little easier after a while. Just keep telling yourself this is protecting them. That always helps me.”
“I don’t have an omega,” I grunt, resuming my pacing. I should probably go for a run to wear off the rest of this frenetic energy.
Jericho laughs, eyeing me critically. “I’ve been in this line of business too long for that kind of lie to work on me. Every agent recognizes the signs of alpha agitation. You’ve been gone for too long, and your body is making you pay for it.” His head tilts, a thoughtful expression crossing his face. “You haven’t bonded yet, have you?”
Scowling, I ignore his question and stretch for my run.
“That always makes being separated a hundred times worse. Good luck keeping yourself in check.”
Flipping him off, I sprint into the trees. The van doors stand open when I return half an hour later. I grab a towel and wipe the sweat from my face and neck before I step inside. Ridley and Jericho are watching the monitors from our surveillance cameras. We placed them outside of a port side warehouse in Jacksonville, North Carolina, late last night. Another spot suspected to house breeding ring victims during their transition from inland camps to shipping containers carrying them overseas.
“Anything?”
Ridley grins when he sees me, but it is brittle. Being away from Bea is affecting him more than it is me. This idiot never should have agreed to go on this mission. The DAU would have sent someone else instead. “Nah, no movement.”
“Great, another fucking dead end!”
Jericho tosses me a bottle of water from our stash. “Might be an old stop, or they don’t have anyone to move yet. We should give it a few days, just in case.”
My fingers tighten on the bottle, crinkling the plastic. Our hunt for the madman, Doctor Harrison, has been fruitless. He’s slipped through our fingers, leaving barely a trace behind. When we had raided his labs in New Hampshire, we had found irrefutable proof of his cooperation in the abduction and torture of omegas on Grant Montgomery’s order. The photo logs and blood evidence logged in his system are enough to send him away for life.
If we can catch him.
His company has additional laboratories in Georgia, Florida, Pennsylvania, and Arizona. All locations we, or other FCDA teams, have already swept. Harrison is too smart to hide somewhere with his name attached. It is more likely another anti-designation group is hiding him.
Which is what brought us to North Carolina. If we follow the breadcrumbs, we may eventually find him in one of their compounds.
Tires crunching on gravel have me on high alert. I grab a gun and duck beside the van, watching as a black sedan pulls to a stop behind us. Their headlights flash twice and pause, then flash another four times in rapid succession. A signal that lets me know it is another FCDA or DAU agent.
Lowering my weapon, I stand guard as Ridley waves them out. When I see Lukas Dromir climbing out, I relax. What the fuck is this asshole doing here?
“Gentlemen.”
“What’s up, Dromir?” Ridley asks, leaning against the van door.
The other man scrubs a hand through his hair, glancing between the two of us. “Donovan sent me. There’s been a development.”
My thoughts immediately drift to Bea, imagining the worst. “Spit it out already.”
“Someone tried to break into the apartment belonging to Sabine and Omen Powell.”
A growl rips from my throat, and I plant my fist against the side of the van, denting the metal.
“Not the van!” Jericho shouts.
Growling louder, I stalk to the closest tree and land several quick blows to its trunk. My knuckles split from the heavy hits against the rough texture of the tree bark, but I could give a shit about a little blood and pain. Someone tried to take my omega, and I wasn’t there to protect her!
“What happened?” Ridley asks, smothering a growl of his own.
Lukas takes a wary step back, sitting on the hood of the car. “Police arrived before the intruder could gain entry, but escaped before they could be apprehended. As a precaution, both omegas were placed in temporary residences with higher security.”
“Together?” I ask, already knowing they split them up. It would be the best way to mitigate the threats against them. Split them up and monitor their locations.
“No. Omen Powell was moved to the home of her Fate matched mates while Sabine is staying with her boss, Shiloh Acherley.”
Ridley gives me a hard look. “Find out who tried to get to our omega.”
“You can’t leave your current mission-“ Dromir starts, but I ignore him as I step inside of the van. Digging through our bags, I find my phone and power it on. It’s a risk to use personal devices during a stealth mission, but the danger it could bring is worth having access to the cameras I planted at the girls’ apartment.
“What time did the break-in occur?” I ask.
He hesitates, shifting from foot to foot before he admits it’s been several days. These motherfuckers hid this from us for days ?!
Scrolling back, I find the date and time he mentioned. The camera above Bea’s door gives me a clear view of the hooded alpha, who walks by several times before taking tentative steps toward their small porch. His shoulder slams into the frame, but he bounces off of the reinforced wood. He repeats his attempts several times. One of which knocks the hood covering his face. I growl, squeezing my phone hard enough it creaks from the strain.
“Fucking Benjamin Montgomery.”
Ridley snatches the phone from my hand and curses when he sees the Montgomery heir on the screen. “I’ll fucking kill him!”
Dromir takes the phone, screen shotting the image and forwarding it to himself. “We will take steps to track him down. The two of you are to remain here. Catching Doctor Harrison is still a priority.”
“You expect me to sit in this damned van when my omega is in danger?” I snarl, taking a step toward him.
Ridley’s hand lands on my shoulder, stopping me from beating the shit out of our boss. “Bea is with Shiloh. He won’t let anything happen to her.”
“I can’t trust-“
“He’s her mate too.”
Jericho gasps behind us, a whispered ‘no fucking way’ slipping from his lips. “Ah, Ridley is right, Lex. Even if this Bea isn’t his mate, Shiloh won’t let anything happen to her while she’s under his care.” I glare at the other alpha, and he shrugs. “He’s my brother.”
“Wait, that makes so much sense. I thought you looked familiar!”
Worry and possessive need have my hackles up. It shouldn’t be this Shiloh asshole looking after my omega, even if he is another of her Fate matched mates. I should be protecting her.
“Give us two weeks,” Dromir says as he opens the door to his car. “If we don’t have an update on Benjamin Montgomery’s location by then, we’ll pull you from this mission.”
Grunting my reluctant agreement, I power off my phone and toss it back into the van. I need to go on another run.
“You stupid fuckin’ brat!” My father roars as I slip into the house. He grabs a handful of my hair, dragging me into the kitchen. I cry out from the pain in my scalp, fighting to escape his ruthless grip. “I told you to clean this shit up.”
I’m slammed against the counter. The blow rattles my head, making stars dance behind my eyes. When I can focus, I spot the cup I had used this morning, still dirty, in the sink. I must have forgotten to rinse it and put it away.
“If you aren’t going to listen and clean up after yourself, you can get the fuck out of my house. It’s bad enough I have to see your ugly ass face every damn day; I won’t be cleaning up after you too.”
His words cut deep, but the alcohol on his breath reminds me this isn’t really how he feels. I am the spitting image of my mother, which is why he claims to hate me so much. Momma died a year ago this summer. Lung cancer. They say losing a bonded mate can ruin an alpha, and my father is proof of that.
“Wash your dishes and get the hell out of my face for the rest of the night.”
A sigh of relief slips through my lips when he walks away. Not wanting to face his wrath, I quickly wash my cup and put it back in the cabinet. Homework will have to wait until the morning when he leaves for work and I can sneak back inside.
The alley behind our house smells terrible, so I head toward the end, aiming for a nearby park. The two dollars I’d earned from fixing Mrs. Fitch’s front gate weighs heavily in my pocket. I had hoped to spend it on lunch at school for the rest of the week, but I might have to use to buy something for dinner tonight.
Sitting on a bench, I watch the families playing with their kids at the nearby playground. That used to be me. All smiles and love and light. Then Mom had to die and everything fell apart. The same thing could happen to these kids, too. We’re all one nightmare away from a terrible situation.
When the sky is dark enough for the street lights to kick on, I head back to the alley. It is tempting to hide on the playground and sleep in the slide or a crawling space, but local police wander the area too often for me to take that risk. If I’m dragged home by the cops, my father will beat me senseless.
Sinking onto the pavement by our back gate, I ignore the smell of trash and urine as best as I can. Noise from inside my house draws my attention after a few minutes. I peek through the cracks in the wood, frowning when I see several men standing in our kitchen. They’re too loud for this late at night, but they don’t seem to care.
Who are they? My father doesn’t have any friends, and the only family we had won’t talk to him now that he’s become the town drunk.
Light flickers as someone passes the back door, making me shrink down in my hiding spot. They shouldn’t be able to see me over the gate. They step aside, giving me a clear view of the kitchen table. My breath catches, burning in my lungs as I stare at the packages of drugs sitting in plain view. Alcohol was bad enough, if he’s going to start doing drugs too-
“There you are, little shit.” I scream, jolting backwards, but a hand clamps on my upper arm. Dad drags me through the gate toward the house. I stumble beside him, banging my knee on the steps as I try to keep up with his long strides.
Kicking the door open, he tosses me onto the floor. I scramble away from him, terrified of the rage on his face. His guests laugh from the living room, enjoying my fear.
“I told you to clean this shit up.”
Pain lances through my skull as his fist connects with my jaw. My vision blurs, giving him the opportunity to haul me to my feet and slam me against the counter. Through hazy eyes, I see new dishes piled into the sink. Their dishes.
I jolt awake, rattling the empty water bottle in the van’s cup holder. My chest heaves and sweat coats my skin. Fucking bullshit. It’s still late, maybe three or four in the morning, but I know I won’t be able to go back to sleep. Not after reliving that memory in my dreams.
“You good?” Jericho asks when I climb into the back. He’s sitting at our surveillance set up taking his shift to monitor the building we moved to. We’re outside of Augusta, Georgia now, tracking another lead on the breeding ring. Still no sight of the doctor either.
“Can’t sleep. Want to swap?”
He studies me for several minutes before agreeing. I plop onto the metal seat we use and groan at the ache in my body. It’s been four days since we learned about the attempted break in at Bea’s apartment. Four days of me running myself to exhaustion, so I don’t lose my shit at the thought of her being hunted by another alpha.
Four days of dark memories rising to the surface of my mind and haunting my dreams. This is exactly why I can’t bond Bea. I have no control over the phantom pain that ignites in my body when I fall into spirals like this. She deserves better than to be burdened by my trauma, especially with a shared pain bond.