30. Chapter 30
Chapter 30
Abby
My new mattress was insanely comfortable, and it did me absolutely no good. I tossed and turned for hours, agitated and hot. My skin was damp and between my legs was slick and achy. Even my anger couldn’t dim the gnawing desire. I gave in once, sliding my hand under my panties in an attempt to ease the ache. If anything, it made me feel worse.
Sweat dotted my forehead, dizziness turning my stomach. The moment my finger found a sensitive spot, all I could see were images of him. I finally gave up trying to sleep at four am, stuffing a pillow behind my back and pulling out my phone. I scrolled mindlessly for an hour, watching dance videos and someone making low-fat dessert recipes I would never try.
Somehow I landed on videos from my local area. There were people touring Pike Place Market and sharing reviews of the best restaurants in Seattle. I almost scrolled away from a woman in booty shorts standing in a very expensive sports car when a figure in the background caught my eye. I scrolled to the beginning, pausing as a man stepped through a glass door in the background of the video. He was wearing a sleeveless shirt, putting his excess of tattoos on display.
I recognized him.
I recognized him because I’d spent the last three weeks staring at his picture, studying his background, and trying to find out where the hell he was.
Leo Adami, third in command of the Manchini pack. I took a screenshot, blowing up the picture as best I could. Then I switched over to the encrypted app Gage added to my phone for sensitive work material and saved a copy.
From there I dug deeper, searching through the caption, hashtags, and finally the woman’s page. She had three separate videos of herself on that street, each time posing in a different sports car. The first one had a location tag.
Pantera High Performance.
My fingers flew across the keyboard on my phone, typing the name into my maps app so quickly I misspelled it three times. Somehow, I wasn’t surprised when the little pin dropped onto the map just four miles from the office.
A high performance mechanic in Levi’s territory, and at least one of Manchini’s pack was working there.
No coincidences.
I found a listing for the business on a review page. It was from exactly a year ago.
I scrolled around, finding another one. Same date.
There were only a handful of reviews for the business—each claiming the owners were rude but good with cars—and not a single one of them went further back than a year.
Following one last hunch, I pulled the street view of the building up on my maps app. The image was from twenty months earlier. The garage doors were closed and there was a “for rent” sign taped on the door. I clambered from bed, phone still clutched in my hand as if all my findings would vanish when I put it down. I finally forced myself to set it on the bathroom counter, tossing my clothes aside and cranking the hot water on. A hot shower and viciously scrubbing my teeth did nothing for my bedraggled appearance. I glanced at my pale face in the mirror, sighing irritably when I realized I was wondering if Gage would think I was pretty in this state.
I wasn’t going to think about Gage anymore. I was going to think about this break in our investigation and how eager I was to bring my discovery to work.
To share with Gage. Dammit.
I tossed my work clothes on, tapped the code into the security system, and stepped out the door. For a moment I felt exposed, searching the staircase and the parking lot for anything out of the ordinary. I left with Gage every morning for three weeks in a row and walking to my car without the hulking shadow of a wolf shifter had me glancing over my shoulder constantly. I was halfway into my seat when I noticed a black truck parked by the dumpster in the corner of the lot. A familiar face was barely visible through the tinted glass. So much for getting to work before him and avoiding the awkwardness.
The door to his truck opened. I made quick work of slamming mine, stuffing the keys in the ignition and backing out before I had my seatbelt buckled. In the rear view I saw him pull out of his spot to follow me. What was he even doing here?
Nope. No. I was not going to spiral into overanalyzing Gage and his confusing behavior right now. I had a mission, and I was going to stay on track. This wasn’t for Gage. This was for the whole team. This was my job, and I was getting damn good at it.
Finding street parking for my car was easier than finding a spot for a truck and I took advantage of that, slipping into a tight space between compact cars and power walking down the sidewalk. I tossed a hurried wave to Nick at the front desk as I passed through the metal detectors.
When I reached the elevator, I smashed the button so hard my fingers throbbed. It was only a three-story building, what was the hold up? I pressed it four more times, mumbling, “C’mon, c’mon.”
“Abby.” I jumped at the sound of his voice vibrating behind me. Then I jumped again, this time into the elevator, eyes downcast so they didn’t have to meet his. There was no way he would follow me in here. It wasn’t the most mature response, but I was hurt, and I had to protect my heart at all costs. I knew from the very start it was a mistake to develop any kind of feelings for him and I was dumb enough to let myself do it anyway.
Kissing him was a bad choice. I didn’t know how to handle it yet, so I was going to pick the easiest option: Avoidance. Except I forgot about how dang fast shifters were. Gage was already at the top of the stairs, arms crossed, and scowl in place.
“Abby, I need to talk to you.”
“Can’t talk now,” I said, punching in the code for the door and flinging it open in his face. “Gotta see Levi about something important.”
“Just hold on.” He stumbled around the door, putting a hand out like he wanted to grab for me but stopping inches from touching.
Good, because I was still needy, skin prickling, and if he touched me, I might do something insane like kiss him right there in the office, maybe against his will. My head was swimming, my legs shaking, and I was pretty sure I had a fever. Was I horny or did I have the weirdest flu?
I walked past my desk, not stopping to deposit my coat and purse because it gave Gage another chance to waylay me. Whatever he wanted to say—that our kiss was a mistake, or that he had a good reason for literally running away in the middle of it—I didn’t have the emotional capacity to hear it.
Levi’s office was at the end of the hall and his brother stalked me the entire way there. I was practically panting by the time I made it through the open doorway. Levi was behind his desk. Mason stood on the other side of it, leaning over a map. They paused their discussion, looking curiously between me and the giant dark cloud hovering over my shoulder.
By now they shouldn’t be surprised to see Gage and me together. Lately I hadn’t spent more than ten minutes in the office without him.
I hadn’t spent more than ten minutes outside the office without him either. Maybe we were just spending too much time together. He was attractive and it was only natural to be attracted to an attractive man that was always getting in your space and attracting you.
“Hey, Abby, how’s the new place?” Levi asked with a too-friendly smile.
Mason was looking expectantly at me too, trying hard to keep his eyes from wandering to Gage. And suddenly I realized that my workplace crush turned obsession was much more obvious than I intended. Embarrassingly obvious because it was clear these two were asking about more than my apartment.
I took in a steadying breath only to wobble on my feet. The lights in here were too bright, and my vision was off. Blurry. Dizziness forced me into the nearest chair, hands resting on my knees as I caught my breath.
“Doesn’t matter,” I said in a clipped tone, forcing myself to sweeten it when I added, “You’re going to promote me after this.” Not that there was a position he could promote me to, but I deserved something for my sleuthing.
Levi’s smile only grew. “Am I?”
“I found Manchini.”
“What?” Levi stood, glancing at Gage for confirmation. When he didn’t receive it, his attention turned back to me. “You’re telling me that my assistant found an elusive alpha before my private investigator did?”
“Well, yes,” I said with a smirk. Served him right to have his ego checked a little. “I mean, kind of. I didn’t find Manchini himself. I found his third, Leo Adami.”
“How?” Gage demanded.
“Research,” I answered haughtily.
His eyes thinned. “What kind of research?”
I stood despite my lightheadedness, not wanting to let him tower over me. It was hot and him being hot was only making me hotter. I needed to pick up some daytime cold medicine after this. I felt like shit.
“Social media research.” I went on to explain the video and how I recognized Leo in the background.
“Four miles from here? That can’t be possible. We walk this area regularly. We should have scented them,” Levi explained.
“Working with cars was to their advantage. Unless you walk right by their building, you’re not going to know it’s them. It gets weirder,” I told Levi. “They set up shop exactly one month after you did. They’ve been here the whole time.”
Levi dropped back into his chair, leaning his chin onto his fist. “What the actual fuck is going on?”
“Cargill came to find you specifically. What if Manchini did too?”
“Why would he?”
I had the answer. It was there, just under the surface. There was this one little detail I was missing, something that was only eluding me because of the haze making my vision swim.
“I don’t understand how you found this,” Gage muttered, a little too bitterly for my taste.
“I just told you,” I said without looking at him. “This is personal for you, so you’re looking where you want to find answers. It’s clouding your judgment.”
“She’s right,” Levi agreed. “You’re too close to this. We all are. We need fresh eyes on this whole case. How much of the drive have you looked at, Abby?”
“That’s not her job,” Gage said.
Then why the hell did I spend the last three weeks working on it with him?
Levi smirked. “Maybe I’ll give her your job, since she’s so good at it.”
“I was thinking of getting my private investigator license.” I said it to poke at Gage but once it was out there, it felt right. I was good at this, and I liked it much more than answering the phone.
“I’ll pay for your classes.” Levi relaxed back into his desk chair, eyeing me seriously. “We need to get into that garage.”
“Legally, right?"
Mason laughed. “What would you do if he said illegally?”
“Confirm we have a criminal defense attorney on retainer.”
“Yes, we’ll do everything clean,” Levi confirmed. “But I need to know how many members of the pack are here and what they’ve been doing in my territory.”
The tricky part of keeping territory in a large city was that it was harder to monitor. That was why Levi was so busy tracking down neutral shifters and putting newbies in line. He couldn’t risk even one stray shifter causing problems for all of them.
Now there was an entire pack of extremists hiding right under our noses, getting up to who knew what kind of trouble. “I can do it,” I offered.
Some of my confidence deflated when Gage spoke up. “Hell no, she can’t do it.”
I resisted the urge to glare at him, keeping my gaze solidly fixed on Levi. “Give me the keys to your car. I’ll take it in for maintenance.”
The alpha assessed me quietly as his brother fumed behind me. “You’re seriously willing to go in there?”
“Why not? They would know you were coming the moment you turned down the block. I’m just a human. They don’t know who I am.”
Gage stepped closer to the desk, standing at my elbow. “Of course, they know who you are! Are you insane?”
“You don’t know that.” Really, Gage was probably right. Manchini and his pack could have been watching us this whole time. But I wanted to take back control, and this was how I would do it. He turned his ire on Levi. “You’re not seriously considering this. Dallas approached her on the street! She walks into that building, she’s not walking out again.”
“It’s her choice to make.”
“I’ll do it,” I said firmly.
Gage turned on his heel, glare so thunderous I felt like lightning was shooting from his eyes. “Like hell you’ll do it. It’s off the table.” To Levi he said, “Abigail is off the table. Period.”
I clenched my teeth, resisting the urge to punch him as I snapped, “Abigail is not off the table. That’s not your decision to make.”
The full force of the storm that was Gage rained down on me. “Yes, it is my decision.”
I lifted my chin. “I’m doing this.”
He moved in on me, looming over me as he snarled, “Fuck. No.”
I expected to see Levi and Mason bristling with tension. Instead, Mason stood with his hands behind his back, lips pressed tightly together. Levi looked…suspiciously pleased about this argument.
“Why don’t we give you two a minute to work this out?” he asked, shuffling around his brother, and dragging a smirking Mason with him. The door closed firmly behind them, leaving us alone in Levi’s office.
I stood, finally looking Gage dead in the face and glaring. “What’s your problem?” Everything that I’d been holding back came raving out. “Do you really think I’m that incapable? You dragged me into this.” I poked a finger into his chest. “If you don’t think I can handle it, why do you keep involving me?”
“This isn’t sitting in front of a computer with a fancy coffee, Abby. It’s different.”
“That doesn’t mean I can’t do it!” Truth be told, the idea terrified me. But I was done letting him boss me around.
“Yes, it does! You’re in way over your head. You said so yourself.” He pushed my finger off his chest. “End of discussion.”
“No, not end of discussion. You are such a bully! You stomp around telling people what to do and expect them to just take it. Well, I’m not taking it anymore. Just because I’m human—”
“It’s not because you’re human!”
“Then why? Why the hell does it matter to you?”
“Because you’re my mate!”
Suddenly there wasn’t any oxygen in the room. A strange whooshing noise drowned out even the sound of my own breathing. My vision focused and unfocused on his face, trying to judge the reality of his form in front of me. This had to be a dream.
“Mate? Like fated mate?” I whispered. I wanted to ask how he knew but that alarming ping in my chest was going haywire, thumping over and over, tugging at me, like a thread had come loose from my soul and it was stretching out to him. Desperate for him. Frantic to be made whole again.
And it all fell into place. The persistent need to please him. This strange, living energy in my chest.
I was his mate. All at once I was elated and devastated. I was his mate, but I could tell by the bitter slant to his brow that he didn’t feel the same elation I did. Before he ever opened his mouth to speak the words that would shatter my already fractured heart, I felt them coming. “Yes, which is why I can’t let you do this.”
“How long have you known?”
His silence was damning.
Gage swallowed, refusing to meet my eyes. “Since we met.”
“ Since we met ?” I thought about the way he reacted when we ran into each other at Deer Base. How he cornered me at the cabin, holding me like he was afraid I would get away. I remembered our conversation in his kitchen about mates and how he would move mountains for his.
He could have told me. During any of those moments, he could have told me. A thousand opportunities for us to have this conversation over the last three months and he kept it from me. I could only imagine his motivation, and I didn’t want to. I was afraid to hear the answer to my next question.
“Why—why didn’t you tell me?” It was more of an accusation than a question, and in his heated state Gage didn’t receive it well.
“How could I tell you? With everything else going on, how could I tell you?”
“How could you not tell me?”
“Because—” He started pacing. “Because I didn’t want you—”
I sliced the air with my hand, cutting him off. “Don’t say it.” Don’t finish that sentence. Don’t make me feel this again. Don’t stomp on my tiniest flower of self-worth when I’ve spent months tending it ever so gently, drawing it back from the brink of death.
The anger fled his face and his eyes widened, as if he only just realized what a horrible thing he was saying. I whirled, yanking the door open and moving as swiftly and confidently out into the hallway as I could. Gage didn’t follow me.
I felt like I was walking through water as I made my way into the break room. The remnants of a natural disaster clinging to me, dropping the pressure around me until I felt weak and empty.
Levi was resting against the table, his phone in front of his face.
“I’m going to need some time off,” I said quietly.
“Yeah, I imagine you are…” His smile immediately dimmed when he saw my face.
He knew. Levi knew I was Gage’s mate. They all knew.
Of course, they did. That was what the secret exchanges were about. That explained the cryptic conversations.
“You knew.”
“I felt the bond form when you met in the conference room three months ago,” Levi admitted.
“And you didn’t tell me.”
“It wasn’t mine to tell.”
“Bullshit!” I shouted. “Did you even care if I kept this job, or did you beg me to stay because you were just trying to get him laid? You told me to stay with him! In his home!”
“Because I knew you wouldn’t be safer than with your mate,” he said softly. “No one will protect you better than him.”
A single tear escaped before I forced them back. “Clearly, that’s not true.”
Otherwise, he would have protected my heart. He would have protected me from his own selfishness.
I didn’t shed any more tears. Not when I quietly left the break room to take indefinite sick days—I was sick, nausea turning my stomach and sweat beading on my forehead as a fever set in. I didn’t cry when I collected my things from my desk, alone but for the houseplants. I didn’t cry on the drive home as the radio blasted a teenage breakup song.
It wasn’t until I walked into my shitty apartment and sunk into the perfect, beautiful couch that Gage found for me that I broke.
What was so wrong with me that I was this unwanted? What fatal flaw was I walking around with that made me second choice? An afterthought?
He didn’t want me. That’s what he was going to say. He didn’t tell me because he didn’t want me.
Stop . I wasn’t going to go there. I wasn’t.
The problem was never me. Not in my marriage, and definitely not now.
You are lovable , I assured myself. You deserve to be adored.
I did. I deserved to be the center of someone’s world, not the bane of it.
So, why did I feel like he ripped a piece out of my very essence? There was this painful gaping hole in my chest where those soft little pings used to be. They were the sweetest little bells inside me, jingling happily every time he was near. Now, there was nothing but yawning silence, raw anguish, hollow pain.
I didn’t love Gage, but I cared about him. More than I’d been willing to admit until it all came crashing down on me last night. I didn’t love him, but I wanted to.
I wanted the daydream of a man created for me by fate. A man that would want me always. A man that would sacrifice for me. Be selfless for me.
That man was out there. He had to be. But I was surer than ever, Gage was not him.