Chapter 9 #2
“We do this a couple of times a week,” Grayson details, already plating burgers. “We’ve spent too much time indoors.”
“And it might be our last one outdoors, if our parole officer gets his way.” It’s out before I realize I could shut my mouth.
“For fuck’s sake, Wolf,” Grayson grumbles.
Lucy glances between us, then lets out a breath and pushes the hair off her face.
“Well, that’s part of the reason I came here.
I talked to your parole officer today, and he gave me an offer.
” She wraps her arms around herself. “He’ll put me on suppressants for the bond so I don’t have to feel the agony.
No charge, no fuss. But in exchange, the three of you go back inside to finish out your time. ”
The fire crackles into the quiet. Roman’s frozen with a burger half off the grill, while Grayson stops with the spatula in the air.
“That’s the deal,” she finishes. “Me, medicated and comfortable. You three, gone. Crazy, right?”
Nobody says a word, because there’s nothing to say that isn’t a plea or a threat, and she deserves neither.
I long to tell her the truth as I’ve lived it: that suppressants numb the body, but the mind keeps suffering.
And in my experience, the pills never fully mend the torn bond.
I watched what it did to Grayson when his Omega dumped him the week he went inside, watched a man built like a mountain wake up clawing at his own chest for a year.
He’d take suppressants to prevent him from dying from the broken bond, but it didn’t alleviate the agony and loss.
But saying it now would sound like a man pleading for his own freedom, so I hold it.
My gut knots, because our whole future is sitting in her hands, and the maddening thing is that I can’t even be angry at her.
“Okay,” she says. “You’ve all gone very quiet.”
“Yeah. That’s not what we planned for tonight, or expected.” Grayson sets the plate down. “Then again, Mr. Colby’s had it out for us since they handed him our file. Told us on day one he’d have us back in a cell as soon as he could.”
“Well.” Lucy lifts her chin. “We’ll see about that. And for the record, I really hate him.”
“We all do,” I state.
Roman moves to her side and shoulders me over, not roughly, just clearly staking his claim, and I let him, because he’s the one who bit her. My gaze drifts back to the fire.
The two of them bend close, going over what Mr. Colby said, and I keep half an ear on it while the rest of me goes dark. Four walls. A cell. After six months of this sky, it would gut all of us, and I don’t think Roman was joking about breaking out.
A cherry tomato suddenly bounces off my chest, and I glance over at Grayson, who jerks his head to join me. I head over toward him.
“If it’s our last night,” he whispers, “we go tonight. Woods run a hundred miles, and we know how to live off the grid.”
“Funny.” I keep my attention on the fire. “I said the same thing to Roman in the kitchen not twenty minutes ago.”
“Great minds.” His mouth curves. “So we take her with us?”
“Add kidnapping to our rap sheet, sure.”
“Still working out the scent-match part.” His gaze shifts over to her, and mine follows. She’s laughing at something Roman said. “Any other circumstances, we’d already be all over her. Instead, here we are, playing decent, while she decides whether to feed us back to the sharks.”
“Don’t let it live in your head. We deal with it when it comes.”
“And if we’re too late? Parole doesn’t send a letter. They just turn up to collect us.” His voice stays light despite the topic. “Tonight’s the only night we’re sure we’ve got.”
And for a moment, God help me, I go there. The three of us and her, bags on our backs, cutting over the ridge in the dark before anyone knows. Living rough and free, just us and our Omega. Something in that scene tugs at me hard.
I remember Eve saying once that her granddaughter left this mountain years back after losing an Alpha. And I think Lucy’s carrying more than any of us has seen. She hides it under her quick mouth, but it’s there in her when she thinks nobody’s watching.
Grayson shoves my arm, and I come back. “Saw you dive on her fast,” he says, grinning.
“Guilty as charged.”
“She’s easy to fall for. Even from over here, without her scent in my lungs, she’s got a hook in me.” He finishes off his beer. “Fuck, it’s been a long damn time since I had an Omega under me, or any girl for that matter. But this is more than that.”
“Fuck yeah, it is.” And I mean it down to my bones.
Grayson clears his throat and lifts his chin toward the fire. “You two planning to eat? Bring your plates. The burgers are up.”
We all move, plating the food, and I appreciate that Lucy doesn’t hang back. She dives in with the rest of us, snags her burger, bumps Grayson off with a hip.
We settle on the logs, Lucy on mine, Roman on the next one over on her side, Grayson across from me.
Two burgers on my plate. I watch her over the first one, the way she takes a bite, her tongue flicking to lap up the sauce at the corner of her mouth.
She swallows and drags her thumb across her lip, and I want to be that sauce so badly.
“So how much danger have you all actually faced out here?” she asks. “Logging’s one of those deadly jobs. Any close calls?”
Odd question, and very specific. I meet Grayson’s gaze, as he’s most likely thinking the same thing.
Roman clears his throat. “Honestly, we’ve been lucky. One time after a storm, though, a tree was uprooted in the huge winds and then finally fell maybe six feet from where I stood. No warning.” He shakes his head. “Shook us.”
“Taught us to do extra checks after a storm,” Grayson says. “You learn fast out here.”
She glances my way, waiting. “Well, I lost a toolbox once. Crushed flat under a pine.” I shake my head.
She laughs. “So did it make you want to quit after the danger? That would’ve run me right off this mountain.”
“No.” Because it’s true.
“Just made us more careful,” Roman adds.
She nods slowly. I recognize that expression on her face, the slight downturn of her mouth, the world spinning behind her eyes. Those questions had purpose beyond making conversation.
“That’s not the answer you’re after, is it?” I ask abruptly because I can’t hold back any longer.
Roman’s head snaps up, a warning in his frown, but I shrug him off.
“You want to hear we hated it, hey? That we’ve been miserable out here, counting the days, and a trip back to prison would be a mercy. Something to hang your decision on so it feels less like sending three men to a cage and more like doing them a kindness.”
“Fuck, man.” Roman throws his napkin down. “Can you ever, one time, shut your mouth?”
But Grayson’s smirking on his log. “Personally, I want to see where this goes. And, little bird, none of that’s on you, understand.
” His gaze lands on a startled Lucy. “It’s just that we’re all thinking about it with our necks on the block, and you’re holding the blade.
For the record, I don’t want to go back.
And it’s not only the box, the monsters, one hour of sky a day.
” He tips his head. “It’s you. You’re the reason now. ”
She blinks, then cuts a sharp look my way before setting her plate on the log, and the first jab of guilt sinks into me, because I’ve never once learned to hold my words.
“Very smart,” she murmurs, and there’s a wobble in her words. “You’ve got me all worked out. Happy now?” She gets to her feet, and I let her stand over the three of us because she’s earned it.
“You want to know why I asked?” There’s a rawness beneath her words.
“Five years ago, I lived on this mountain, and I fell for a man doing exactly what you three are. Working these woods, finishing his time on my grandmother’s program.
” She wraps her arms around herself. “We bonded, and after six months together, a pine came down on him on a clear morning with no wind and killed him. Then I spent five years so sick from the bond breaking me. So excuse me.” Her breath catches, her face reddening.
“Excuse the hell out of me for wanting to know what it feels like to be out here. For asking a real question. I wasn’t hunting for permission. I was trying to get to know you.”
The fire pops into the silence, and nobody moves.
I don’t regret saying it, and even now she won’t admit it, but that’s okay.
I’d rather cut to what’s real even when it burns than be fake.
I’ve had my damn share of fakeness growing up in a family who betrayed me.
But right, I aimed a hard truth at a place already broken, and that’s a different sin than honesty. And for that, I feel like shit.
“I’m really sorry, Lucy,” I mutter in a gravelly voice.
“Look, I didn’t come down here to get judged. I’ve had enough of living with regret, so I don’t need three more men to feel guilty about.”
She steps over the log, and then she’s gone, up the track into the dark, fast, before any of us gets a word out.
“You fucking ass,” Roman roars, on his feet, but I barely hear him.
Under the anger, one thing cuts through and stays.
She came down here already halfway to sending us back, and instead of giving her a single reason to think twice, I cracked open the worst thing that ever happened to her and used it to win a point.
She handed me her grief, and I handed her a reason to run. Fuck!
I stand quickly, a growl ripping from my chest. “I’m going after her. Roman, you stay here.”
“You sure you can manage that,” Grayson mocks with a sarcastic tone, “without fucking it up worse than you already have?”
I snarl at him, then sprint into the woods after our Omega.