19. Liam
CHAPTER 19
Liam
Cassius glared at me but he didn’t say anything about the fact that I had a very pretty omega sleeping with her head on my bare chest. He didn’t say anything at all actually, which meant he remembered my threat from the night before.
My entire body was stiff from holding still so I wouldn’t wake her up. I barely even breathed just to make sure she got a few more minutes of rest. The only thing I’d allowed myself was reading through all of Gideon’s personal messages on my phone.
There was nothing out of the ordinary. I’d even say my brother was boring, but his personal drama with Melinda added a little spice I’d rather he didn’t have.
I set my phone on my chest and studied Cassius, who was sitting in the armchair on Lucy’s side of the bed. His eyes practically glowed as he stared me down, but he seemed fine despite how thick my pheromones were. It wasn’t just mine either. Hers drenched everything.
Including me.
Lucy had surprised me though. Asking me to take a nap with her was the last fucking thing I’d expected considering how pissed off she was about this whole thing. She rightfully blamed me for everything and I wasn’t sorry.
This was always how it was going to be.
Frankie suddenly getting pheromone sick wasn’t part of the plan though. She was a legacy alpha so why the fuck was she having such a hard time with Lucy’s pheromones when they’ve lived together for the last fifteen fucking years?
Honestly, it wasn’t my problem and I didn’t care enough to find out unless it had something to do with Lucy’s health.
“You left James at the office?” I asked, keeping my voice low enough not to wake her.
Cas nodded once, his eyes on me, not Lucy. He hadn’t looked down at her once since he’d come in. Only when he’d first entered the room. The muscle in his jaw had flickered, and then Cassius had acted like she didn’t exist.
For some reason, it made me want to see how far I could push him.
The fact that I wanted to see him hold her again was fucking with my head. I didn’t understand it, but I didn’t really have to. I just needed to be cautious because there was nothing I wouldn’t do for Lucy.
For her, I would slit his throat without even thinking about it and I wouldn’t even feel that bad about it. I’d miss him like crazy, but she wouldn’t ask me to kill him for no reason.
Doing that of my own volition meant his blood deserved to run. I’d paint this fucking room red right now if that’s what it took for her to accept my bond.
Thankfully, that wouldn’t be necessary.
“Do you really think it’s a good idea to leave Frankie there alone?” I raised my eyebrow in question. “What if something happens to her?”
“Liam, what if something happens to you?” Cassius finally blinked to hide the quick look he allowed himself of the omega still tucked into my side.
She hadn’t moved once except to throw her leg over mine .
“Nothing will happen to me.” Her scent was too calm and content to push me into doing something she wouldn’t like.
Lucky for her I wanted her healthy before I made her bleed for me.
“Did you finish planting the surveillance cameras?”
“There’s a camera in every room of their apartment including the bathrooms. I made sure to give them as much privacy in there as possible without losing track of them.” Cas pulled out his phone and selected an app, showing me all the various angles he’d set up. “Their entire apartment complex now has cameras planted everywhere. We can see every hall, every elevator, the parking garage, and the streets around the complex.”
“Perfect.” I had no plans to let her go back there if I didn’t have to, but I couldn’t be too careful. I’d even sent in an application for the apartment across the hall from hers. Even her phone was bugged now. Better safe than sorry.
I’d lost her once and I refused to ever lose her again.
Thank fuck for Cassius and his tech genius. If he wasn’t working for me, then he’d definitely be working for the FBI or some shit.
Getting her clothes and whatever else had been the perfect excuse to gain access to their apartment long enough to plant surveillance. Investigating it yesterday hadn’t given me much time to do more than take a look around.
No one ever asked delivery people where the fuck they were going or why, but it did mean I couldn’t linger.
Today I would get legal access to her medical files.
Yes, Lucy had told Frankie to give the doctor everything, not me, but Nathan was contracted to the Valor pack. When Lucy woke up, she would sign the agreement or she wouldn’t be treated by him.
That agreement gave the pack alpha and select members access to everyone’s medical files. How the fuck else were we supposed to make sure they were all healthy without having to speak to them directly?
They trusted the pack leaders to keep their secrets and we trusted them to see the doctor when they needed to.
Which was why I knew that Melinda was hiding something. No one knew what. Not even me. But she’d missed her usual checkup and hadn’t wanted to reschedule it. Ten years she’d been married to my brother and never once had she ever skipped an appointment without rescheduling it.
I smiled, wondering what my little omega would discover when I brought her over there. Maybe she’d be able to drag that secret out of my sister-in-law before I could.
The way Cas was practically looming over us without offering any information was starting to get on my nerves. “Why are you here, Cassius?”
“I want to look into Francesca Lopez.”
My eyebrows nearly hit my hairline.
Cassius almost never asked me for permission to start an investigation. His instincts were better than mine when it came to this kind of shit, but this time he’d asked for my authorization. Maybe not in so many words, but there’d be no other reason for him to be here in person instead of just calling me.
He thought I was going to say no.
“Is there a reason for that, or is this just the usual digging?”
“She’s from a legacy pack. I don’t trust that she’s not working the long game.” Cassius crossed his arms over his chest and practically glared at me. “She has access to everything now, thanks to you. What if she takes it to her father?”
The thought had crossed my mind, but it was extremely unlikely. “She won’t.”
“What the fuck, Lee. Why are you so goddamn sure about this?”
“Frankie would never do anything to put Lucy in danger.” It was the one thing we agreed on and one of only two reasons I was going to let her live when all this was over .
I don’t like sharing with other alphas. So sue me. I wasn’t the only fucking alpha like this, but I was probably the only one who wanted her to like another alpha enough she’d suck his cock while riding me.
But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
“I still want to investigate.” Cassius pursed his lips and looked away.
“Just say it, Cas.”
“It’s way too convenient she was the one assigned to Gideon’s case. I’d say it was just a coincidence if their agency wasn’t a subsidiary of Lopez Innovations.”
He did have a point there. We couldn’t write off any possibility until we knew for sure who was behind Gideon’s murder. Frankie might like Lucy, but there was no guarantee her father did. Why else wouldn’t he adopt her into the family?
Sure, he was a very well-known lawyer who had put her father away for life, but the public would have loved him for taking in the daughter of a serial killer. Honestly, I’m surprised he didn’t do that right away.
But then I would have known where she was, which meant her omega father would also know where she was if he ever managed to get out of prison.
Not that I’d ever let that happen.
“You have my permission to investigate her, but don’t take any action without asking me first,” I warned him. “And don’t let it interfere with the detectives’ work.”
Cas snorted instead of answering. Obviously, he would never make more work for himself if he could help it. “Did you read Parker’s medical files yet?”
“Did you?”
“I did. Before I sent them to you.” Cas didn’t look the least bit sorry about it either.
“I read them all,” I admitted. What the fuck else was I supposed to do with an omega sleeping on my chest for the last hour? “Do you have any opinions? ”
“Yes.”
My jaw clenched when he didn’t elaborate and Lucy sighed, her breath skittering across my bare chest. Pressing a kiss to her forehead was harmless. The urge to sink my teeth around her trachea though…
I wanted my mark to grace her skin in one of the few places she wasn’t tattooed to ensure everyone could see it.
“I’m curious if your thoughts match mine,” I admitted, smiling at Cas when I rolled into her. Pulling the blanket down didn’t wake her up and I grinned when his gaze flicked to her bare thighs before resettling on me. “Tell me what you think, Cassius.”
Pressing my hand to her lower back made the shirt she was wearing ride up and the curve of her ass cheeks peeked out. Cas didn’t look but the tendons in his neck tightened when he clenched his jaw.
“I think she perfumed too young due to psychological trauma. It affected her pheromone levels and made her recessive as a defense mechanism. No pheromones to detect means less danger from alphas.”
Cassius also knew her real name as he’d spent the last fifteen years helping me look for her. So, he knew exactly why she’d perfumed early, but that wasn’t enough to explain what was going on with her. Not really. Her mother’s death had been shocking, but I’d been there when that happened. Lucy hadn’t perfumed until a year later.
Which meant I’d missed something, or she’d perfumed because of me. It was the only explanation I could think of when she’d somehow scented oranges on me the day I’d been forced to tell her goodbye.
My pheromones and scent had given her body a reason to perfume so young. I felt bad about that since I was a few years older than her, but the doctors had been shocked when I’d presented as an alpha so early.
Most didn’t fully settle into their designation until they were almost done with high school which made me wonder if I’d been pushed to settle early because of Lucy.
There was something else though too. There had to be considering things with her father had never fully come to light. She’d never had any injuries when she was with me, but there was a lot that clothes could hide.
Maybe she’d perfected that marble mask far younger than I’d ever guessed.
“You don’t think the timing is odd?” I asked, sliding my hand up her back to drag the shirt with it until her very curvy ass was on display. She had to be doing some insane workouts for it to look so fucking round and juicy.
“It is odd,” Cas muttered. “But it’s narcissistic to automatically assume it’s because of you.”
“It could be you. Maybe you’re the one who triggered this change.” Cassius had squashed those cops with his pheromones until their foreheads had hit the floor. That was a lot more exposure than she’d had to mine up to that point. “Would you like to come lie down with us?”
“What the fuck is wrong with you?”
My smirk pissed him off enough he got to his feet and headed for the door, never once glancing at her ass. “Don’t leave, Cassius. I have work to do and she doesn’t want to be alone.”
“No, you don’t.” My smile dropped when the asshole closed the door behind him, refusing to play with me.
Technically, there was no work I had to do that required me to leave her side, but the time would come and the only person I trusted her with was Cassius.
One day, she’d demand to go off on her own.
If he wanted nothing to do with her, that was going to make my life more difficult.
I had to know that wherever she went, whatever she did, she was never alone. Even when she thought she was. I needed to know where she was at all times or I might just lose control of these legacy pheromones everyone loves so much and wipe out this whole fucking city for catching a glimpse of her when I couldn’t.
The tracker on her phone would have to do for now, but a bond would be better.
I sighed and released her shirt before covering her with the blanket. It was time to get up and get some shit done or she’d be fucking pissed with me all over again. The doctor had cleared her for work, and I had no intention of losing this small bit of trust I’d gained.
My scent told her to trust me, but I needed to back that up or she’d try to disappear again when this case was over and I couldn’t let that happen. I’d fucking drag her back and chain her to my desk if I had to.
Even if she hated me for it.