Chapter 14
Chapter fourteen
Itried to sleep.
I paced my room until Ivy threatened to tie me to the bed, then I paced the hallway instead. My mind wouldn't stop spinning—Cole's confession, his mother, the heat, the eyes that changed, the decades of hiding. All the pieces that everyone had kept from me, thinking they knew better.
By morning, the anger had settled into something cold and hard.
I found James in the dining hall. He was alone at a corner table, pushing eggs around his plate, and his head came up the moment I walked through the door. The bond between us flared—he felt my fury before I said a word.
"Lumi." He stood. "What's wrong?"
"Did you know?"
"Know what?"
"About what I am. About Omegas. About any of it."
His face went blank with confusion. "What are you talking about?"
I told him. All of it—Silas's explanation, the purges, Emory's extermination campaign, Cole's mother hiding with her pack. I watched his expression shift from confusion to disbelief to something that looked like anger.
"No." His voice was tight. "I didn't know. None of that."
"You're sure? Nothing Cole said, nothing Rae mentioned—"
"Lumi." He caught my hands. Held them firm. "I swear to you. I had no idea. The word Omega means nothing to me. I've never heard it used before."
I searched his face. Looked for any sign of deception, any flicker that might suggest he was holding back.
There was nothing. Just shock and growing outrage on my behalf.
"Cole knew," I said. "This whole time. He knew what I was and he didn't tell me."
"Then Cole and I are going to have a conversation." James's jaw tightened. "A long one."
"Get in line."
I found Neal in his office. He was reviewing patient files, glasses perched on his nose, and he looked up with a warm smile when I entered. The smile faded when he saw my expression.
"What happened?"
I told him too. Watched the same journey play across his face—confusion, then understanding, then a quiet fury that manifested in the way his hands clenched on his desk.
"The data I collected," he said slowly. "The patterns I found. They weren't anomalies. They were markers. Signs of something that's been erased from every shifter medical text I've ever read."
"Signs of an Omega."
"Yes." He pulled off his glasses. Rubbed his eyes. "God, Lumi. If I'd known—if there had been any documentation—"
"You would have told me."
"Immediately." He stood, came around the desk, pulled me into his arms. "I would never keep something like this from you. Not about your own body. Not about who you are."
I let myself lean into him. Just for a moment. Let the bond between us steady me.
"Cole knew," I said against his chest.
"I gathered." His arms tightened around me. "I'm going to need some time alone with him when this is over."
"James already called dibs."
"We can share."
Despite everything, I almost laughed.
The pack gathered in Cal's room that afternoon. Not because anyone called a meeting—they just showed up. James first, then Stone, then Neal. Ivy came too, because Ivy always knew when something was wrong, and she wasn't about to be left out.
I told the story again. Third time now. It got easier with each telling, the words smoothing out, the sharp edges dulling.
When I finished, the room was quiet.
Stone spoke first. "The facility where they made us feral. The white rooms." His voice was rough. "They were trying to replicate something. Create stability without—"
"Without an Omega," I finished. "Yes. That's what Silas thinks."
"They failed." His hands clenched on his knees. "Obviously. All they created was destruction."
"Because they killed the thing that could have prevented it." Neal's voice was bitter. "Typical council logic. Destroy what you can't control, then scramble to replace it with something worse."
"The new council isn't Emory," James said carefully. "Rae wouldn't—"
"Rae didn't know either." I shook my head. "Not until the twins brought back those documents. This was buried so deep that even people we trust had no idea."
"But Twilson might." James's expression was dark. "He was Emory's little minion. If anyone remembers the old ways, it's him."
"Which means I'm in danger."
No one argued.
The silence stretched. I looked around at them—these wolves who had become my pack, my mates, my family. They didn't have answers. None of them could tell me what was coming or how to prepare for it.
"Okay." Ivy clapped her hands together. "So you're some kind of super-wolf. That actually explains a lot."
I blinked. "It does?"
"The way the ferals follow you around like lost puppies? The fact that you've got like seventeen mates and counting? The whole 'everyone stares at Lumi' phenomenon that I thought was just because you're pretty?" She ticked the points off on her fingers. "Yeah, it tracks."
"I don't have seventeen mates."
"Give it time." She grinned, but there was something fierce underneath. "Look, I don't know anything about Omegas or councils or whatever. But I know you. And if being this thing means people are going to come after you, then they're going to have to go through all of us first."
"She's right." Cal's voice was quiet but firm. "Whatever this means, you're not facing it alone."
"We protect our own." Stone's eyes met mine. Gold flickered at the edges—his wolf, rising to the surface. "You protected me when I was at my worst. When I almost killed people. You didn't run."
"I won't run either," James said.
"None of us will." Neal reached for my hand. Squeezed.
I looked at them. My pack. My people.
The anger was still there—it would take more than one afternoon to forgive what Cole had done. But underneath it, something else was growing. Something that felt like strength.
"Thank you," I said quietly.
"Don't thank us yet." Ivy's grin sharpened. "We haven't even gotten to the part where we make Cole's life hell for keeping secrets."
I went back to Cole that evening.
He was in the same place I'd left him—the security office, surrounded by monitors, looking like he hadn't moved in hours. Maybe he hadn't. When I walked in, he turned immediately, and I saw the hope and fear warring on his face.
"Lumi."
"I talked to the others." I closed the door behind me. "James and Neal. They didn't know."
"I know. I never told them."
"Why? If you knew what I was, why not warn them? Why not tell the people who are bonded to me that something was coming?"
"Because telling them would have changed how they treated you. They would have started watching for signs, adjusting their behavior, trying to manage the timeline." He shook his head. "I wanted you to have as much normalcy as possible before—"
"Before my life stopped being mine."
He flinched. "That's not what I meant."
"Isn't it?" I stepped closer. "You made decisions about my body, my bonds, my future—all without asking me. You decided what I could handle and when. You treated me like something to be managed instead of someone to be trusted."
"I know."
"Do you? Because from where I'm standing, it looks like you saw me as a problem to solve. A ticking clock to slow down." My voice hardened. "Not a person who deserved the truth about her own life."
Cole was quiet for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was raw.
"My mother spent forty years hiding. Lying about what she was.
Watching over her shoulder every day, terrified that someone would find out and come for her.
" He met my eyes. "I didn't want that for you.
I thought if I could control the information, control the timing, I could give you a better path than she had. "
"That wasn't your choice to make."
"I know."
"You don't get to decide for me." I closed the remaining distance between us. "Not when it's my body. My life. My future."
"I know." His voice cracked. "Lumi, I'm sorry. I was wrong. I thought I was protecting you, but I was just—I was taking away your power. The same thing the council did to every Omega before you."
The words hit harder than I expected. He was right. In trying to protect me, he'd done exactly what he feared others would do—controlled me, managed me, decided what was best without ever asking what I wanted.
"You can't do that again," I said quietly. "Whatever happens next—the heat, the change, all of it—I need to know. Even if it scares me. Even if you think I'm not ready."
"I understand."
"And you need to tell me about your mother. Really tell me. Not the vague version, not the protected version. Everything she knows that might help me survive this."
"I'll try. She's not—she doesn't trust easily. But I'll talk to her. Explain." He swallowed. "She might be willing to meet you."
"I'd like that. When the–"
The door burst open.
James came through like a storm, his eyes locked on Cole, his whole body radiating fury. I barely had time to register what was happening before he was across the room, his fist already swinging.
"You knew this whole time—"
"James, wait—"
Cole didn't dodge. He saw the punch coming and just stood there, accepting it. James's fist connected with his jaw, snapping his head to the side.
"James!" I lunged forward, grabbing his arm before he could swing again. "Stop!"
My hand closed around James's wrist at the same moment Cole straightened, his hand coming up to hold me back.
All three of us. Touching.
The bond exploded.
It wasn't like the others—this was lightning. A searing, white-hot connection that ripped through me so fast I couldn't breathe. I felt Cole slot into the web of bonds already anchored in my chest, felt the final piece click into place like a key turning in a lock.
My knees buckled.
Cole caught me before I hit the ground. His arms wrapped around me, pulling me against his chest, and suddenly his scent was everywhere. Cedar and iron and something deeper, something that called to every primal part of me.
I didn't think.
I grabbed his face and pulled his mouth to mine.
The kiss was desperate. Hungry. Weeks of tension and distance and wanting finally breaking free. He groaned against my lips, one hand fisting in my hair, the other pressed flat against my lower back, holding me so close I could feel his heartbeat against my chest.
When we finally broke apart, we were both breathing hard.
James laughed.
I turned to look at him, still half-draped in Cole's arms, expecting anger. But he was grinning—that sharp, knowing grin I'd come to love.
"Well," he said. "Welcome to the pack, I guess."
Cole blinked. "You just punched me."
"And I'll punch you again if you hurt her." James shrugged. "But the bond's done now. She chose you. That means you're ours whether I like it or not." He paused. "I'm reserving the right to still be pissed about the secrets, though."
"That's fair," Cole managed.
I was still trying to catch my breath. The bond pulled. Tight.
Something shifted inside me.
A warmth bloomed low in my belly. Not arousal, not exactly. Something deeper. More fundamental. Like a pilot light catching, a flame that had been waiting for the right moment to ignite.
I pressed my hand to my stomach, startled.
"Lumi?" Cole's eyes widened. "What is it?"
"I don't know. I feel—" I searched for the words. "Warm. Different."
His face went pale.