32. Daniel
Daniel
I'm in the living room, my fingers tracing the faded floral pattern on the wallpaper. It's the same paper my mother hung the year they bought this place, a print of tiny blue flowers she still loves.
Every time I'm here, it's like stepping through a time portal.
The same crooked picture of a sailboat hangs in the hallway, tilted just a little to the left.
The air holds the faint, persistent scent of lemon wood polish and lavender sachets, a smell that means home and safety, but right now, it just feels like a cage.
I'm cataloging everything, a nervous habit I picked up in law school, a way to organize the world when it feels like it's spinning out of control.
A stack of my dad's woodworking magazines, the top one fanned open to an article on Japanese joinery.
A half-finished crossword puzzle on the coffee table, the clue for 7-Down circled in my mom's neat script: "A five-letter word for 'serene.
'" A ceramic figurine of a little girl with a pigtail that my mom has had since she was a child, its cheek smudged with a tiny fingerprint that could be mine or Tess's from decades ago.
My mind is a database, always running, always cross-referencing.
It's the same skill I'm applying to the Academy.
I hired a contact a few days ago, a discreet digital ghost named Silas I used on a corporate espionage case a few years back.
He's the best in the business, and for a hefty retainer, he's now my personal bloodhound.
I have tasked him with one objective: tear a hole in the Academy's firewall.
I want to know everything. How the arrangements between Omegas and Alphas are truly conducted. Who the hell even approves the matches.
I want the faculty and staff rosters, their financial records, their internal communications. I need to figure out what the hell is going on in that school… and who, exactly, benefits from selling Omegas like commodities.
And I need to find out more about that bastard that's messing around with my sister.
How did everything get so messed up?
The blizzard has muffled the world, creating a pocket of stillness that feels both peaceful and deeply ominous. I'm here, checking on the house, making sure the pipes haven't burst, fulfilling my duty as the responsible son. But all I can think about is the café.
Is Mara okay? Is she eating? Is she still hiding behind a wall of silence so thick I can barely see her through it?
My mind replays the bathroom scene on a torturous loop, the sight of her coming undone, the scent of her, the sound she made.
And then the immediate aftermath, the shame that washed over her face, the way she wouldn't look at us.
It's a bitter pill to swallow, knowing I'm part of the reason for that shame.
But the real poison is the institution that put it in her head in the first place. The Academy, with its pristine reputation and its secret, predatory practices. They're the ones who signed her away to Jonathan Hale.
That's the system I'm going to burn to the ground. For her. For my sister. For every Omega they've ever exploited.
I make myself a cup of tea in the cold kitchen, the gas ring the only thing in the house still willing to work, and turn on my father's battery radio.
The announcer is repeating the same bulletin he's been repeating all morning: the main transformer for the whole grid is down, crews can't get to it until the wind drops, stay off the roads.
My phone buzzes in my pocket, the vibration a loud, jarring sound in the quiet house. I pull it out. Leo. My stomach clenches, a cold knot of dread. I answer immediately. "Leo? What's up? Is everything okay?"
The line is terrible, a crackling mess of static and interference, like he's calling from another dimension. "—an… hear me?" Leo's voice is a distant, garbled sound.
"Leo? I can barely hear you. The connection is bad. Say that again."
"I said… we're in Glenwood Springs." His voice cuts in and out, a frantic, distorted message. "We talked to emergency management… but Mara…"
My blood runs cold. "But Mara what? Leo, what's wrong?"
"She's not okay," the line crackles. "Her pre-heat… it's back. Or maybe it never left."
I squeeze my eyes shut, my hand tightening on the phone until the plastic creaks. "What do you mean, it's back? Is she okay? Is she hurt?"
"That's the thing," Leo says, and I can hear the genuine fear in his voice, a sound that cuts right through the static and straight to my heart.
"This is different. It's worse. She looks…
she's in pain, Daniel. Real pain. She's pale and shaking, and she's sweating even though it's freezing.
This isn't like before. This isn't just… arousal. This is something else."
Pain. The word echoes in my head, a dull, sickening thud.
This is my worst fear realized. It's not just about her desire anymore; it's about her suffering.
My mind races, flipping through a mental Rolodex of medical conditions, of hormonal imbalances, of complications.
Suppressants that are failing, a body rejecting them, a pre-heat spiraling into a full-blown, untethered heat cycle without a mate to ease the transition.
The possibilities are a nightmare gallery, each one more horrifying than the last.
"Where are you now?" I ask, my voice sharp, all my lawyerly composure gone, replaced by the raw, primal fear of an Alpha whose Omega is in trouble.
"We just left Glenwood Springs," he says, the connection clearing for a blessed second. "We're heading back. Best case, we're three hours out. Longer if the wind picks up again."
"Shit." Three hours. Three hours of her being in pain, of her suffering. Three hours of me sitting here like an idiot, dusting ceramic figurines while she's out there in a storm, hurting.
"I'm going to bring her straight to the café," Leo is saying. "We need to get her somewhere safe, somewhere warm."
"Okay," I say, my decision made in a split second, a hard, absolute certainty. "I'll be there. Just… just keep her safe until you get here."
"I will," Leo promises, and then the line dies, swallowed by a final burst of static.
I'm already moving. I dump the tea in the sink, kill the gas, and head for the garage.
My dad's old plow truck is sitting where it always sits, under a canvas sheet, the blade still bolted on from last winter. He keeps the battery on a trickle charger for exactly this kind of day, because my father has never in his life met a storm he didn't want to be useful in.
I pull the sheet off, find the keys on their nail by the door, and haul the garage door up by hand. The cold wind hits me like a physical assault. The snow is still coming down, a relentless wall of white that obliterates the landscape.
I jump into the cab, jamming the key into the ignition. The engine turns over twice, coughs, and then catches with a reassuring rumble. I put it in gear and pull out into the drift blocking the driveway, the blade shoving a wave of snow aside, the tires spinning for a moment before they catch.
The drive is a white-knuckle nightmare. The world beyond the windshield is a swirling vortex of white, the road completely invisible in some places, a ghostly suggestion between towering banks of snow. I'm driving on instinct and memory, my hands gripping the steering wheel.
All I can think about is Mara. Her face, her scent, the sound of her voice. The way she looked at me in the bathroom, a mix of fear and desire. The way she looked at me in the car, her walls up, her eyes full of shame.
I should have been there. I should have stayed. I should have pushed her to talk, to let us in.
Guilt is a corrosive acid, eating away at my insides.
I should have known this would happen. I should have been more prepared.
I'm a lawyer. I'm supposed to be the one who plans, who anticipates every eventuality.
But I've been so focused on the legal battle, on the contract, on Jonathan, that I completely missed the biological war raging right in front of me.
I press the accelerator harder, the truck plowing through the deep snow. I don't care about the risk. I don't care about the storm. All I care about is getting to her. I need to get to her. And when I do, I'll do whatever it takes to make her safe. Whatever it takes to make her see that she's ours.
And I will burn this entire fucking town to the ground to keep her from hurting like this again.