Rust #3
"So what then?" Mack asks slowly. "We just pack up and leave? Where would we go? And what the hell do we do for work?"
"Construction." I lift a shoulder, cuz it’s that simple.
"There's work for guys like us in every city in this country, Mack.
Good crews are always short good hands. It might take me a while to get my own business back off the ground somewhere new, but I'm not worried about the three of us finding work.
" Then I look at Owen, and I soften. "It's you I'm worried about.
I know what that library means to you. What you've built there.
I don't want to be the reason you walk away from it.
" I hold his eyes. "But I don't think we can stay, carino. I'm sorry."
I brace for the beta’s anger to spike again.
But it doesn't come.
Instead, Owen sits back, and something shifts in his face. He pulls his glasses off, cleans them on his shirt, a thing he does when he's thinking, and when he slides them back on, there's an odd light in his eyes.
"There's a museum," he says. "On the coast. In Halvern."
I frown. "Halvern?"
"They called me a few months back." Owen's talking faster now, the way he does when something's caught fire in him.
"Out of the blue. They're mounting a permanent exhibit on pack dynamics.
Historical, cultural, the whole thing. They want it to be an open celebration of pack history.
" His mouth quirks. "They needed an archivist to build it, and apparently my name came up.
I told them no, that I was happy where I was. "
"You never mentioned that," I say.
"Because I didn't think it mattered." He shakes his head.
"But here's the thing. When I turned them down, the woman on the phone wasn't even surprised.
She said finding someone willing to work on an exhibit like that has been next to impossible.
Nobody wants their name on it. She told me to call if I ever changed my mind. "
Adrian's gone still, listening. Lyra lifts her head off his neck.
"Halvern," Adrian says. "Isn't that near—" He snaps his fingers. "There was a thing on the news earlier this year. Some pack festival. A whole city block, out in the open, with banners and everything."
"That's the one." Owen's grinning now. "The whole region's like that. Pack rights and visibility, they're decades ahead of everywhere else. It's practically the one place in the country where what we are wouldn't have to be a secret."
Mack sits back with an annoyed look on his face. "Lemme guess how the news covered that festival."
"Oh, they tore it apart," Adrian says dryly. "Called it a den of whores and harlots. Warned decent families to keep their kids away."
"A den of whores and harlots." Mack claps a hand to his chest, delighted. "Well, hell. Sign me up. Sounds like my kind of town."
A laugh breaks out of Lyra, small and wet, still half-buried against Adrian, and the sound of it loosens something in the whole room.
But then the guilt creeps back into her face.
"This is because of me," she says quietly. "You're going to leave everything because I showed up and—"
"No." I cut her off, gentle but firm.
She turns her face slightly, looking at me. I fucking hate that I’m not the one holding her right now.
"This is something I've been thinking about for a long time, Lyra," I say honestly.
"A place where my pack doesn't have to hide.
Where nobody flinches when I put my arm around one of my mates in public.
" I hold her eyes. "I've thought about it a hundred times.
" I let out a breath. "You didn't cause this.
You gave me the push I needed to finally get my family somewhere safe. "
She looks at me for a long moment.
And through our bond, that thin cold thread of fear finally starts to warm.
"Okay," she says softly. She still looks pale, but the panic has left her voice, and when she reaches for her water, her hand is steady again. "Okay. Halvern."
Around the table, I watch my pack settle.
Mack's already talking about the drive, whether we'd caravan or sell off what we can't carry.
Adrian's got his chin resting on top of Lyra's head, murmuring something that makes her mouth lift into a smile.
Owen's gone quiet and thoughtful, but it's the good kind of quiet now, the kind where he's already building something in his head.
We have a direction.
A place to plan for.
But I don't let myself feel too good about it just yet.
Because underneath the relief, the pit in my stomach hasn't gone anywhere.
Halvern is a plan, not a shield. It's weeks away at best, maybe even months, depending on how long it will take for me to wrap up my current job.
And every one of those days that we're still here, is a risk that Lyra’s parents might change their minds and come get her.
I look at my omega, laughing quietly now at something Mack said, warm and safe, and I make myself a promise.
Nobody is taking her out of this house.
Not her father. Not that PI. Not anyone.
I'll burn the whole city down first.