25. Chapter 25
Riley
The bungalow creaked in the late evening cold, the knotty pine contracting. I sat in bed with my laptop open, pretending to review case files. A few minutes ago, the bond had flared white-hot, waking me from a dead sleep and sending my heart pounding.
Conall still hadn’t called or texted back. I wasn’t just jumping to conclusions at this point. I felt like I was free-falling.
My phone lay dark on the nightstand. I’d made myself stop checking it hours ago, along with that anonymous photo of the woman in the red skirt.
When I finally turned off the light and started drifting off, my phone lit up a few minutes later, Conall’s name glowing on the screen. My heart lurched. I stared at it for a few seconds before answering.
“Hey. Are you still awake?” he asked, his voice low and rough.
“Yes.” I opened my mouth to ask about the photos, but paused. Something was wrong.
The silence between us grew. “You texted me,” he finally rumbled.
“I did. A while ago. I called too.”
“Things blew up here. I need to go to the British Columbia Pack compound.”
I sat up and stared into the darkness. Anna was from that Pack. “What happened?”
“Anna had her baby earlier today.”
I gripped the phone. Why would he call and tell me about this? Did he know he was hurting me? The implant scrambled to analyze the incoming data as his news hit like a physical blow.
“Is everything alright? Is the baby healthy?”
“The DNA came back a fifty percent match to mine.”
My brain stalled. Fifty percent match, but not one hundred. Sibling, parent, or—
“It’s Owen’s.”
“Yes,” he hissed out.
Rage slammed through me, along with disbelief, and a sick, crawling vindication that made me hate myself a little.
All those months. The mate bond sickness and withdrawal that left me shaking and nauseous at three in the morning.
The way Conall cut me off and put his Pack under interdiction.
All because he thought that child was his.
But his own brother had known the truth all along.
Owen had watched Conall suffer, knew I was in pain too, but said nothing.
“Why?” My implant sent a pulse of cold clarity through my system, trying to help me think through the implications, but my rage was too hot and bright. “He let you go through that. He watched you rip us apart, and he said nothing. Does he hate us being together that much?”
Under his anger, I sensed something else. A raw wound that made my throat tight. “I don’t know, Riley.”
“Is the baby alright?” I asked again.
“Anna rejected her and refused to hold or name her.” His voice dropped lower. “She tried to hurt the fetus late in her pregnancy.”
So it was a little girl. A little girl whose mother didn’t want her. At least my father hadn’t abandoned me before I was born. Memories surfaced without warning of my mother and her beautiful, tight face. Of her energy, telling me exactly what she felt.
Conall’s voice brought me back. “Riley, will you come with me to British Columbia? I’m taking Owen to claim the child, and we both need to be there to officially accept and bring the infant into our Pack.”
I was in the middle of an active case here.
Viggo was still missing, and maybe the answers to my father’s disappearance were here too.
The British Columbia Pack was also Anna’s territory.
The implant ran the calculations and risk assessment, and informed me that the emotional risks were high and recommended extreme caution.
“Of course I’ll come.” There was never a question. Children intimidated me, and I was inexperienced and wholly inadequate around them, but they needed to be protected at any cost.
He exhaled a long, ragged breath. “Thank you. I’ll have Drew contact Freda with the travel details. Can you leave the hellhounds with Gunnar and Beau?”
We didn’t talk about the photos, the woman in the silk blouse, or the call and text he hadn’t answered that had reopened old scars.
Those things were still there, waiting in the dark, but they’d keep.
This one wouldn’t. Outside, the geyser basin steamed under a three-quarter moon as I rolled out of bed to find Freda.
Hours later, we walked out on the tarmac at the West Yellowstone Airport and climbed into the Pack’s private jet. Conall stepped out of the plane and hugged me, then kissed the top of my head. I tensed reflexively.
“Fair warning, Owen’s with me and he’s being an ass,” he murmured. The plane’s cabin smelled of leather and jet fuel and thrummed with Owen’s annoyed, combative energy.
Conall sat across from Owen, and I slid into the seat next to my mate. Conall’s jaw was so tight, I could count the tendons in his neck. Freda abandoned us and went to sit with the crew up front.
Owen ignored us and stared out the window. He’d lost weight since I last saw him, and he looked older. His resemblance to Conall was startling.
No one spoke, and my implant worked steadily, regulating my emotions and processing data with cold efficiency. The chip had been unusually quiet since the photos and Conall’s call, as if it sensed the gravity of the situation.
Forty minutes into the flight, Conall finally turned to Owen. “What happened?”
Owen didn’t turn from the window, but his hand fisted. “What do you want me to say?”
“The truth. Why you watched us suffer for months, why you sat across from me at dinner and said nothing, why you let Riley go through withdrawal alone, and why you didn’t open your fucking mouth.” His voice was deadly quiet.
My chest tightened as the implant sent vibrations through my system, as if trying to wall off the memory of those months.
Owen turned to me, his gray eyes were so like Conall’s, but harder and colder. “You want the truth? Fine. I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to.” His mouth twisted. “And because it didn’t matter. The baby wasn’t yours. Problem solved.”
“Problem solved?” Conall repeated slowly. “You watched your Alpha endure bond withdrawal. You knew Riley was suffering, and you watched me tear myself apart, believing I’d betrayed her. And you call that a problem solved?”
The bond flared white-hot, a surge of rage so violent it made my vision blur. I pressed my forehead against the cool window and breathed through it.
“It wasn’t about you.” Owen’s voice had lost its edge and sounded tired. “After you banned Anna, she was a mess. She felt so betrayed that you’d pick a Cog over her. We both did. She was crying and desperate, and I was convenient. I didn’t know she wasn’t using protection.”
I wanted to remind Owen that protection worked both ways, but decided that was a discussion for another day.
“Convenient,” Conall echoed.
Owen’s jaw worked. “When Anna told me she was pregnant, I didn’t believe her at first, but by that time the damage was done. Then you cut Riley off and declared an interdiction. Which was fucking stupid, by the way.”
Conall went very still. The gold in his eyes brightened. “Don’t put this on me. You had a responsibility. To your Pack, to your Alpha, and to the woman carrying your child. But you walked away from all of it because what, you were embarrassed? Scared?”
“I knew you’d find out when the baby was born.
And I don’t care that your mate suffered.
” Owen’s control snapped. His eyes cut to me, hatred and regret bleeding through his energy.
“She’s not Pack, not family. She’s a weird, awkward Cog with a government implant in her fucking spine.
And she’s turned my brother into something I don’t recognize. ”
The words landed like punches as something sharp bloomed behind my sternum. I knew how he and many other Pack members felt about me, and hearing it aloud was just confirmation.
Conall’s hand shot out and gripped Owen’s throat, hauling him halfway out of his seat. The bond went nuclear, a white-hot surge that made my teeth ache.
“She’s my mate,” Conall snarled quietly in his face. “I don’t care if you like her, but if you, or anyone else, hurts her again, I will kill you.”
Owen didn’t struggle. He met his brother’s gaze with that same cold defiance. “I don’t care what bond you share, or what you feel for her. She’s an outsider, and she always will be.”
The cabin went silent. Freda strode out of the crew area and stood next to Conall. Ash appeared in the galley doorway, his dark eyes assessing. He’d probably been co-piloting the plane when he felt Conall’s rage through the Pack bond.
Conall shoved his brother back into his seat. For a long moment, he stood there, his chest rising and falling, the gold in his eyes so bright it cast shadows. Then he turned and walked up to the front.
He didn’t look at me, but his energy roiled through the cabin. Chaos, grief, and maybe wounded pride. His brother rejected his mate, and in shifter culture, I knew it carried significance.
I gazed down at the rolling forest, dark green and endless. Somewhere down there was an innocent child in need of love and stability, and this cruel, damaged shifter across from me needed to understand what he had to do. I studied Owen, who stared straight ahead, his jaw tight.
“Hey,” I murmured to Owen. He didn’t look at me.
Freda shifted uneasily but stayed silent.
“Today isn’t about me. Or about you, your grievances with Conall, or your bigotry…
” I took a deep breath and reined in my temper.
“Today is about an innocent little girl who had the bad luck to be born to selfish, cruel parents who don’t seem to care about anyone but themselves. ”
“You think I’m going to let you talk to me like that?” he snarled and started to get up as Freda stepped forward.
Without hesitation, I raised my hand and zapped him in the chest. Freda startled, but Ash didn’t look surprised.
Owen groaned and doubled over as anger coursed through me. Even the device seemed to vibrate with fury.