Chapter 28 #2
Her eyes narrow. "Your gross negligence could have cost an innocent omega her life.
As an alpha myself, it goes against every instinct I have to harm an omega.
An alpha's drive should be to protect, nurture, and love omegas.
Alphas should deserve their omegas, and you have demonstrated that you do not. "
Ragon doesn't even blink.
She turns to Jasper. "We are not as cold an institution as people assume.
We do care about the omegas in our system.
Watching someone suffer for the sake of evidence collection has its own moral weight that you'll need to reckon with.
I know you were acting on behalf of Alpha Chase and the board admits that we should have taken a closer look as the evidence he provided us weeks ago.
There is no one in this room that is devoid of guilt, but we can start making it right today. "
When her gaze finds me, I feel pinned in place.
"Yourself and Alpha Drake will need to complete extensive courses on alpha and omega dynamics before being permitted to take an omega in the future.
And only if you are no longer operating under Ragon's pack lead.
I don't believe you intended actual harm, but you let your weaknesses overpower your good common sense and living with what you've done to that girl is punishment in itself.
" She pauses, looking at each of us in turn.
"I hope you have all learned something today. "
I think: yes. Though the lesson cost more than I'd like to measure.
The board retreats to finalize paperwork. We file into the hallway.
And then I see it happen.
Ragon turns toward the board room door. His mouth opens. His eyes sweep to Chase, then to Jasper, then back to the door where the board members are still shuffling papers.
My heart stops.
He's going to do it… he's going to tell them. He's going to say that a flagged alpha has his omega. That Alex Castillo took her, that she's been living in violation of registry law for weeks. He has nothing left to lose. They've already taken everything. Why wouldn't he burn us on the way down too?
Jasper goes rigid beside me. He sees it too. His hand moves to his phone—ready to warn Chase, warn Arden, warn someone—but there's nothing anyone can do if Ragon opens his mouth in the next three seconds.
Ragon looks at the door.
He looks at his hands.
He closes his mouth.
He turns and walks toward the exit without speaking to any of us. The staff member follows him out.
The breath leaves my lungs in a rush.
Jasper's hand drops from his phone. He exhales slowly, but I can see the tremor in his fingers.
We stand in the hallway and neither of us says what we're both thinking.
That Ragon just had the power to destroy Vee's chance at the pack she's been healing with, and he didn't use it.
That the man who spent months hunting for her, who sat in parking lots, searched public records and nearly followed Arden home, chose in the end to let her go.
I don't know if it was decency or exhaustion. Or maybe something else entirely.
But he kept his mouth shut.
And Vee gets to keep her pack.
***
The house is quiet when we get back.
Ragon came home an hour ago and went straight to his study. Jasper is waiting in the car. I take my time with the suitcase—not because I need to, but because I want to do this part right. Fold things properly. Don't leave anything behind that matters. Don't take anything that isn't mine.
I've been in this house for a long time. I know which floorboard creaks in the hallway. I know which window in the kitchen doesn't close all the way when it rains. I know that the coffee maker takes an extra thirty seconds after it beeps before the last of the coffee drains through.
I'll know those things forever.
I zip the suitcase, pick it up and walk to the study.
I don't knock.
Ragon is in the chair by the window. The one he's had since before I knew him, leather worn soft at the armrests, positioned to look out at the front yard. He's looking at Alex's house—the one that's been empty since Vee left with them, dark windows, no cars in the drive.
His hair is scattered around his shoulders, the bun long since given up. There's a glass in his hand and the bottle is tipped over on the floor beside the chair, whiskey pooled dark on the hardwood, and he hasn't done anything about it. Just let it drain out.
He doesn't turn when I come in.
"I wondered when you'd come," he says.
He sounds wrecked. Scraped clean of everything except the fact of it.
"I'm sorry," I say.
"Don't be." He turns the glass in his hand. "You're doing the right thing. I know that."
"You didn't tell them about Alex," I say it simply.
"I didn't."
"Why?"
He pauses. "Because I hurt her. I know I did. I also know I can't undo the damage I caused. But if letting go was the last decent thing I could do, then I've done it. I hope they do a better job with her than I did."
"Ragon—"
"I'm not angry at you." He says it like it costs him something.
Like anger would be easier. "I should be.
I'd understand if you needed me to be, but I'm not.
" He's quiet. "The registry is right. I ruined two omegas.
I ruined my pack. Drake is gone. Jasper was never even mine.
" He exhales. "I'm getting what I deserve. "
I set my suitcase down by the door.
"I love you," I say. "Brother. I always will."
He's quiet for a long time.
"You love the man I used to be," he says finally. "But he's gone now. I'm all that's left."
He turns to look at me.
And I see it. Everything I've watched erode over the past year and a half—the certainty, the warmth, the pack lead who would have died before letting harm come to someone in his house—all of it gone, and what's underneath is just a man. Tired and wrecked and finally, finally out of fight.
"Do it," he says.
I don't make him ask twice.
I reach in and find the bond the way you find something you've carried for so long you've stopped noticing its weight. I pull it, and then I let it go.
Ragon doesn't resist. He doesn't grab back. He just opens his chest and lets me take it.
There's no snap, no violence. Just a door swinging closed, soft on its hinges, the click of the latch moving into place.
A tear cuts down his cheek.
"Goodbye, brother," he says.
I pick up my suitcase and close the door behind me.
Jasper is in the car with the engine running. He looks at me when I get in and doesn't ask, just waits.
"It's done," I say.
He nods and puts the car in reverse.
We pull out of the driveway and I watch the house in the side mirror until the trees take it. I keep waiting to feel anything decisive—relief, or grief, or the specific lightness people describe when they talk about leaving a bad situation.
What I feel is the absence.
Now there's just a quiet where something used to be. It doesn't hurt. It feels empty. Like a room after the furniture's been moved out. You can see the marks where it stood, the dents in the carpet, the slightly-less-faded squares on the wall where pictures used to hang.
I look out the passenger window at the dark road ahead.
"Jasper," I say.
"Yeah."
"She'd better be okay."
He's quiet. Then: "She is."
I nod and settle back into the seat.
Outside, the trees blur past. The road unspools ahead of us.
She'd better be okay.
That has to be enough.