Chapter 9 #2
My fingers tightened over my stomach until they ached.
I could never know whether the people around me wanted me, or the price attached to my blood.
If Cassian was going to sell me, hand me over, or decide my daughter was worth more than my freedom, I needed to know before I trusted him.
Before I slept under his roof believing I was safe.
Better now, before I started believing in him, before Asha was born, while there was still some chance that I could get away.
I held his gaze, waiting for greed to replace kindness.
Waiting for him to reach for a phone, call someone, claim the reward, or lock the doors and tell himself he was doing the right thing.
Instead, he only stared at me, shock still stark in his eyes. “Pure,” he said, his voice low. I nodded. “But that’s… there’s… the only pure-blood omegas are from the Families…” He went still, and I knew exactly what he was thinking. What the hell had I brought to his door? I forged ahead.
“As long as people think I’m just another runaway omega, my family is the biggest threat.
” I drew a shaky breath. “But the second anyone finds out what I am, everything changes. I’m not some random omega who escaped Center 14 anymore.
I’m an investment.” I looked down at my stomach.
“And so is Asha. My family will want her for the same reason they wanted me. Another pure bloodline they can bargain with, another alliance they can make.” My throat tightened.
“That’s all we are to them. Something valuable they can sell repeatedly.
” Cassian didn’t speak for several seconds.
His jaw tightened, and when temper flashed in his eyes, fear punched through me.
I shrank back, one hand going instinctively to Asha.
I’d known this was coming. I’d known the truth would change everything.
“Soren—”
“Please don’t take my baby.” My voice broke, and I curled both arms around my stomach.
“You can have me. Sell me, hand me over, do whatever you want, but please, Cassian, not Asha. Ronan said you were a good wolf; please, take her somewhere safe. Somewhere no one knows what she is. Tell them she’s nobody.
Tell them anything.” I couldn’t stop shaking.
“Please. I’ll do whatever you want. Just don’t let them have my daughter. ”
Cassian stared at me, horror cutting through the anger in his expression.
“Soren, no.” His voice came out rough. “No one is taking Asha from you. No one is selling you. Goddess, is that what you thought?” He took a step toward me, then stopped when I flinched.
“You and your daughter are safe here. I swear to you.” Then he looked away, dragging a hand over his face, and I realized his anger had never been aimed at me.
“But you know what she’s worth,” I whispered. “What they’d do to get her.”
“I know what she’s worth to you, and that’s all that matters.
” He took a ragged breath, as if he was trying to pull the shock and horror back inside him to focus on the rest of this story.
“When you say a pureblood alliance,” he said at last, his voice quiet and controlled, “you mean one of the Families wants your baby.”
I nodded.
The Families had been around for generations, older than governments in some places, older than the laws that pretended to keep them in check.
They’d carved cities into territories and built empires on fear, money, blood, and loyalty.
Politicians took their calls. Judges looked the other way.
Police learned which doors not to knock on, and which names never made it into reports.
Businesses paid what they were told, and entire communities knew the cost of attracting their attention.
Good people stayed away from them. Bad people wanted what came with their protection.
And everyone feared them.
You didn’t refuse a Family. You didn’t steal from one. You didn’t betray one.
And you never, ever made them come looking for you.
“Which one?” he asked after a pause, but the answer caught in my throat.
A family name wasn’t just a name. It carried generations of power, money, favors, blood debts, and violence. It would tell Cassian exactly why I’d run, exactly how valuable I was, and exactly how dangerous the people looking for me were.
And it wasn’t just my family; it was the family of the alpha forced to impregnate me.
I shook my head.
“I can’t.”
For a long moment he stared at me, disbelief giving way to something close to horror. “You still won’t tell me?” The words came out rough. “After everything you’ve told me, after telling me one of the Families could be coming for you, you still won’t give me a name?”
I couldn’t.
Something in his expression shifted. The anger drained away, his shoulders dropping as resignation settled over him.
“Okay.” He rubbed a hand over his face. “You don’t have to tell me today. I won’t force it.” His gaze met mine again. “But if keeping that name to yourself puts you or your baby at greater risk, then you have to stop protecting me from it.”
“I will,” I said, then rested both hands over my stomach. Maybe if I gave Asha a name, made her real to him, made her more than a pure bloodline someone would pay for, he might see her as someone worth protecting. Someone he couldn’t betray. “Do you want to know about my baby?”
He nodded.
“It’s a girl. I’m calling her Asha. It means hope.” My throat pulled tight, and I didn’t fight it. “She is hope.”
“She’s a miracle,” he whispered.
“I know.” My cat pressed against my sternum.
“Fuck,” he said, and carded his hands through his dark hair. “I need Ronan to tell me what the hell he’s up to, and what plans he has now, and whether I can get you off this mountain, and over the border.”
“I said—”
“Or somewhere else, away from the Families, safe. While I’m still breathing, I won’t let them hurt you.” He rubbed his chest, right over his heart, and winced. “I don’t know what I need to do to help you.”
“I don’t know either,” I said. “If I can do this, if she’s born alive and I survive it, then she stays with me until I can get somewhere safe in the underground. That’s all I need.”
He held my gaze for another moment before giving a single nod, as though something had settled into place inside him. “Then that’s what we’re doing,” he said with certainty. “You’re safe here.”
A laugh caught in my throat, brittle enough to hurt.
“I’m not safe anywhere,” I said. “If there’s a way off this mountain—a snowmobile, walking, anything—I should leave before someone finds me.”