Chapter 23
Zane
The Starling Estate looms in the rain. Long gone are the sun and blue skies of Seamuse. I keep the Bentley steady, tires chewing gravel until I see the gates. Wrought iron swallows the light from the bricked gatehouse.
We’re late. Her father will be pissed, but Helena keeps her eyes on the long, winding drive.
There’s nothing Helena and I could have done about the traffic.
Besides, as excited as we are to get this over with and return to Seamuse Village, the conversation that needs to happen first looms as dire as the rain above.
The Starling family home is a fortress of stone and brick three stories high. The roof bristles with spires and a flag snapping in the wind. It’s definitely the kind of old money home her father would inhabit. But it never felt like Helena.
I park the car. Helena doesn’t wait for me to open her door.
“Leave your things,” she says. “He’ll want to see us right away.”
She’s halfway up the front steps before I kill the engine. Her hair is down, rain beading on the perfect gloss of it. There’s a light on in the upstairs library, but not in many other rooms.
Except one. Her father’s study. Light as bright as ever.
I catch up by the front doors and put a hand at her elbow out of habit. Helena doesn’t seem to notice. She opens the front door herself and walks in like she’s head of family, not her father. Marble echoes under her heels as she parades us toward the staircase and up toward her father’s study.
“Helena—” I keep my voice pitched for her alone, low and steady, but she’s already halfway to up the stairs. Seeing Helena on a mission is one of the sexiest things I’ve ever witnessed. Still, I’m acutely aware of all the ways in which this can go wrong.
She doesn’t knock. Her father’s study is behind two shut doors.
She sweeps them open and strides in with a confidence I’ve never seen from her before.
I follow, close the doors, and stand behind her left shoulder.
Not quite at ease. Not until we’re both allowed to walk out of here without consequences.
Lord Starling looks up from his laptop without so much as a smile for his eldest daughter. His black hair is dusted with gray but kept trimmed and slick, and he wears a midnight-colored suit. “You’re late.”
“Traffic.” Helena’s voice is flat. Polite, but not much else. “You wanted me home. I’m here.”
He steeples his hands on the desk. The smile he finally cracks looks like a shark’s smile under the lamplight. “You look… different.”
“I suppose I am.” She sits in the sole chair across the desk from him and crosses one leg over the other.
I stay standing. The room smells of old books and cigars. There’s nothing soft about this space filled with black leather, polished brass, and a wall of legal texts. Her father’s also got an impressive saber in a glass case on the wall behind his desk.
Helena’s father lets his gaze skate over me, dismissive, before settling on her again. Helena’s wearing a long-sleeved dress that covers the bite marks, but I worry he’ll see right through the fabric.
“Your mother is abroad,” he says. “She sends her regards. I trust you survived your little seaside experiment.”
“It was helpful,” Helena says. “Thank you for arranging it.”
He’s impatient. “And the preparations? You’re aware the Selection committee expects a statement of intent by Monday.
And there’s plenty of reputation repair work to be done after Royals Anonymous blogged about you.
” He inhales sharply. “Which, as it turns out, wasn’t your brother-in-law, but someone who decided to start a new blog with the same name. Utter fucking farce.”
“About that.” Helena’s fingers pluck at the seam of her skirt. Her confidence is slipping. “I’m not attending Omega Selection Day.”
The silence is immediate, a thick vacuum that sucks the oxygen from the room. Every muscle in my body tenses as I wait for her father’s reaction.
Her father’s jaw tightens. “You’re not?”
“No.” She leans forward, eyes locked on his. “I’ve decided against it.”
He makes a noise, part laugh, part growl. “That isn’t your decision to make, Helena. You are an unclaimed omega of the Starling line. Your responsibility is to—”
“I am not unclaimed.”
Her father glances at me immediately. As if I were possibly the only non-royal alpha who’d consider his daughter. And that gaze is hostile. “I see. So you let your bodyguard mark you.” His voice drips contempt.
Helena flushes but doesn’t look away. “Zane is not just my bodyguard, Father. He is my alpha. As are two others.” She lets that detonate for a few moments before pushing aside a dress sleeve to show off one of our bite marks high on her shoulder.
“Cole Johnson and Lucas Harkin as well. We’re bonded. I’m not negotiating that.”
He rises from his chair. The motion is languid like an old predator stretching, but I know that man is always ready for a fight.
“So the posts on Royals Anonymous were true. And here I thought all tabloids were fake.” He scowls.
“You’ve gone and disgraced yourself with a village lifeguard and a bakery commoner.
I suppose you think this is rebellion? You think I’ll just let you—”
“I think you don’t have a choice.” Helena’s hands come to rest steady in her lap again. “We’re scent-matched. Bonded. You can call the lawyers, threaten the pack, even cut off my trust fund. It won’t change anything except make me hate you.”
“Helena—”
Her eyes snap up to his. “Ranier made his own way; why can’t I? Because I’m an omega?”
Fires light in her father’s eyes. “This has nothing to do with your designation.”
“It has everything to do with that!” Helena finally rises. “You were an amazing father while we grew up. But we’re grown up now. You need to let us make the lives we want to have.”
He turns to me then, eyes narrowing. “You. What did you promise her? Do you know what happens to Ravenwood Shield Security alphas who seduce their wards?”
I let the accusation roll off, chin up. “With respect, Lord Starling, it wasn’t like that.
She chose. I followed protocol at every turn.
” But I can’t help but bring up more evidence.
“And I believe the last two Ravenwood alphas bonded with our prince and a popstar, so I believe there’s room for this, too. ”
He stalks around the desk, coming nose to nose with me. “You’re thirty years old, Hawke. You should know better than to let a bored omega play you.”
I could say a lot of things. That Helena is never bored.
That she’s the strongest, most clearheaded person in this room.
Or point out that he lost her the second he started treating her like a piece on a chessboard.
I say nothing because if he doesn’t leave my space within seconds, it won’t be my mouth doing the talking.
“Father.” Helena stands. “I’m not doing this for attention. Or to hurt you. Please stop attacking Zane.”
“Then why?” He whirls away from me—thankfully. “Explain to me, darling. Please. Enlighten me why my eldest daughter is spitting on three hundred years of Starling tradition.”
Again ignoring what his eldest son already did.
I should have called Ranier. Made him understand and be here. He’d have come for Helena.
She looks at him, eyes huge and bottomless.
“Because I want to be happy. I want to live my life without spending every minute waiting for someone to tell me what comes next.” She turns to me.
“And while I left here hoping to avoid pack life and Omega Selection Day, I finally met alphas worth fighting for.” She turns back to her father.
“They’re whom I want. They’re my pack. End of story. ”
He sags a little, eyes going suddenly old. The rage ebbs, replaced by something like heartbreak.
“I’m sorry,” Helena says.
Her father closes his eyes and takes a few slow breaths.
“I spent a fortune on that finishing school. On this entire—” He gestures at her, helpless.
“This project. You’re meant to lead. You could have any alphas you wanted.
Instead, you drag home a pack of… misfits.
What am I supposed to tell the family? The media? ”
“Tell them the truth,” Helena says. “That your daughter is off the market. That she’s happy.”
Lord Starling stares at her with lips pressed white. “Does your mother know?”
“I’ll tell her. She’ll understand.” A beat. “Or she won’t. I don’t care anymore.”
He sinks back into his chair. The fight is gone. “Ranier will support you in the media. I suppose his omega will, too.”
“Emery is my friend, yes,” Helena replies. I think a part of him will always hate “wild omegas who don’t follow the rules,” or whatever he once said about Emery.
After a long minute, he asks, “You’re not coming back, are you?”
She shakes her head.
He looks past her, through me, into the dark. “Then you should go.”
Helena hesitates. “Do you want to meet them?”
He barks a laugh, hollow. “No. If you want my blessing, you’ll wait a few years.”
She gives him a tiny, sad smile. “I won’t need it by then.”
He nods, and that’s it. In his way, he’s signed the paperwork, released her from everything.
But I know in his heart, he loves his daughter enough to change his mind.
I’ve no doubt that in a few weeks—once this has blown over and the media has had their say—Helena’s father will be down in Seamuse Village to have dinner with us all.
I follow Helena out of his office, but at the door, Lord Starling says, “Hawke.”
I turn. He looks at me, flat and cold. “If she ever comes to harm, if she ever regrets this, you and your packmates will wish you’d never left the beach. Understood?”
“Yes, sir.” I don’t break eye contact. “Understood.”
He waves a hand. “Get out of my house.”
We walk back through the echoing hall, up the stairs, to her old room. Helena moves like she’s underwater now, everything in slow motion. Her hands shake as she flips on the light.
I want to hold her, but I wait for her to invite me in.
“Zane?”
“Yes.”
“I thought it would hurt more,” she says, looking out the leaded glass at the rain. “Letting go.”
“It’s not really letting go,” I say. “You’re choosing what matters.”
She snorts a choked, little laugh. “You should write speeches for politicians.”
“I’d rather pivot to lifeguarding.” I rub my chin. “That is, of course, if Lucas will sign me up for certification classes. I’ll probably need a job too once Ravenwood finds out about this and fires me.”
She glances back at me. “You can’t stay on as my bodyguard?”
I shake my head and offer her a grin. “I think they’ll find it a massive conflict of interest. Besides, once the contract ends, I don’t want to be assigned elsewhere. So lifeguarding it is.”
It’s just like being a bodyguard, only I’ll be dodging seagull shit instead of paparazzi.
I check my phone. Four missed calls, two texts. All from Cole and Lucas.
“Do you want to call them?” I ask.
She shakes. “Can we just go? Now? We’ll be back before they know it.”
“Yeah.” I pick up her bag and sling it over my shoulder. “Car’s still warm.”
We head down. Neither of us looks back. At the bottom of the stairs, Helena pauses and squares her shoulders.
“He’ll be okay,” I say.
“I know,” she says. “But we’ll be better.”
The storm has let up. I tuck her into the car, close the door softly, and slide into the driver’s seat. With the engine started, I put the Starling Estate behind us.
Helena’s hand finds mine. “Take me home.”
I drive.