Chapter Twenty-three
Theo
The security room hummed with the white noise of electronics and climate control, a sound I'd grown familiar with over the past week.
I'd made these checks part of my routine since Jasmine had arrived, scanning through camera feeds with the methodical attention I'd learned during my years protecting the pack.
The monitors glowed blue-white in the dim space, casting shadows that made the cramped room feel even smaller.
My coffee had gone cold an hour ago, sitting forgotten on the edge of the desk while I tracked the usual flow of people entering and leaving the building.
Delivery drivers, residents returning from work, and the doorman's shift change at six.
Nothing unusual. Nothing that made my instincts prickle. Until it did.
Movement on the northwest camera caught my attention. Not of the movement itself, but something about the rhythm of it. The way two figures stopped at the corner, lingered too long, then moved on, only to reappear fifteen minutes later from a different angle.
I leaned forward, my chair creaking under my weight, and isolated that camera feed to the center monitor.
The image enlarged, grainy but clear enough to show two men in their late twenties, both wearing dark coats that looked too heavy for the weather.
One had his hands shoved deep in his pockets, shoulders hunched.
The other kept glancing up at the building's entrance, his gaze tracking in a way that suggested he was counting floors or marking exits.
My jaw clenched. This wasn't a casual interest. This was surveillance.
I pulled up the timestamp, rewound the footage. There, the same two men had walked past forty minutes ago, coming from the opposite direction. Before that, an hour prior, just one of them, standing across the street and staring up at the building while pretending to check his phone.
I zoomed in on their faces, and my blood turned to ice.
I knew that face. The one on the left, with the sharp cheekbones and bitter expression.
I'd seen it in the photos we'd pulled when we'd first started looking into Jasmine's background, trying to understand what she'd run from.
Pack photos from social media, group shots at pack gatherings.
This man had been in the background of several, always standing close to the Alpha.
Always watching with those calculating eyes.
My fingers moved across the keyboard before my brain fully processed the command, pulling up the other angles, the other cameras.
The building had twenty-three exterior cameras covering every approach, every entrance, every blind spot I'd personally verified when I'd upgraded the system two years ago.
There. Another figure on the south entrance, an older man this time.
He leaned against the marble wall that fronted the lobby entrance.
He held a coffee cup, but I'd been doing this long enough to recognize the posture.
He wasn't drinking. Wasn't relaxed. He was positioned exactly where he'd have a clear view of anyone entering or leaving through the main doors.
I zoomed in on his face, captured the still image, and ran it through my mental catalog of Jasmine's old pack members. The recognition came slower this time, but it came. He'd been in fewer photos, more peripheral, but definitely present. Definitely pack.
My heart rate kicked up, adrenaline flooding my system to prepare for action I couldn't take yet. Not until I knew more. Not until I understood the full scope of what we were dealing with.
I pulled up the last six hours of footage and began scanning through it at double speed, watching the patterns emerge like a constellation forming from scattered stars.
The older man had been there since noon, rotating positions every hour.
The two men had started their pattern around three.
And there, a fourth person, male, older, standing near the service entrance on the building's east side.
He'd been there the longest, nearly five hours, barely moving except to shift his weight or pull out his phone.
Four of them. Four that I could identify. How many more were there that I couldn't see? How many were watching from windows across the street, or sitting in cars parked just out of camera range?
I captured stills of each face, saved the timestamps, and began compiling a file that would show the pattern of their surveillance.
My hands moved with readiness, but inside, something primal was howling.
They'd found her. Jasmine's old pack had tracked her here, to our building, to our home. To where she was supposed to be safe.
The scar on my face pulled tight as my jaw clenched harder. I forced myself to breathe through my nose, slow and controlled, because rage wouldn't help her right now. Analysis would. Planning would. Action would.
But God, I wanted to go down there, to walk out those doors and make it very clear what would happen if they came anywhere near her. Wished to use my body for what it had been trained to do, and protect what was mine through whatever means necessary.
She was mine to protect now. Ours. The moment she'd accepted our help, the moment she'd let herself be vulnerable in our space, she'd become pack, whether or not she fully understood that yet.
I pulled up the facial recognition software we'd installed last year, and fed it the still images.
It would search through databases, pulling up names if these people had any kind of public presence.
Social media accounts, employment records, anything that might give us leverage or information about what they were planning.
Because they were planning something. People didn't conduct surveillance this carefully, this methodically, unless they were building toward action. The question was what kind of action, and how much time we had before they moved.
My fingers found the phone in my pocket before I'd consciously decided to call Kade. He needed to know. Now. We needed to lock down security, increase our coverage, and make sure Jasmine didn't leave the penthouse until we understood exactly what we were dealing with.
I stared at the monitors, at those four faces positioned around our building, and felt my protective instincts coil tight in my chest. They'd made a mistake coming here. Made a mistake thinking they could just take her back, or hurt her, or whatever the hell they were planning.
They didn't know what they were dealing with. Didn't understand that she wasn't alone anymore, wasn't unprotected. She had us now. Had me. And I would burn down the entire city before I let them touch her again.
The phone was already at my ear, Kade's number dialing, when I noticed the fifth person. Another camera, another angle, this one covering the rear loading dock that only service vehicles were supposed to access.
Male, thirties, with a build that suggested he knew how to use his fists. He wasn't even pretending to have a reason to be there. Just standing in the shadows where the loading dock lights didn't quite reach, staring up at the building's upper floors.
Staring up toward where the penthouse would be. I zoomed in, double-checked, and then triple-checked. But it was definitely him. He was here right outside our building last night when she was telling us about all the horrible things he did to her.
Bane.
Kade appeared in the doorway less than three minutes after I'd called.
His shirt sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, and his hair looked like he'd been running his hands through it, but his expression was composed in a way that meant he'd locked down every emotion behind professional walls.
That composure lasted exactly as long as it took him to cross the threshold and see my face.
“Show me,” he said, his voice level but carrying an edge that I recognized. Kade's anger was a dangerous thing, made more dangerous by how completely he could control it until the moment he chose not to.
“We have a problem,” I said, and my voice came out harder than I'd intended, rough with the violence I was holding back. “They're here. Her old pack. They're watching the building.”
I shifted in my chair, giving him space to lean over the bank of monitors. His oak scent intensified as he moved closer, mixing with my leather in the small room. Pack. The smell of us together had always been grounding, but right now it just made the protective fury in my chest burn hotter.
“I started noticing them about two hours ago,” I said, pulling up the first image. The two men on the northwest corner. “But they've been here longer. This one,” —I pointed to the man with sharp cheekbones— “has been rotating through positions since around three this afternoon.”
Kade leaned in, his hands gripping the back of my chair. I felt rather than saw his body go rigid.
“I recognize him,” Kade said, his voice dropping lower. “He was in the background in those photos. Close to Bane.”
“Bane's inner circle,” I confirmed, pulling up the next image. The older man by the main entrance. “He's been here since noon. Stays in position for about an hour, then rotates. Always maintaining a line of sight to the lobby doors.”
I cycled through the other images, showing him each face, each position, the pattern of their movements. Kade's breathing changed as he watched, becoming more controlled, more measured. His fingers dug into the leather of my chair until I heard the material creak.
“Then there’s this.” I showed him the video of the man in his thirties by the loading bay.
Kade growled. “Is that who I think it is?”
I nodded. “Bane.”
“I’ve seen five that I've identified,” I said, bringing up the split screen that showed all of them simultaneously. “There could be more I haven't spotted yet. They're not trying particularly hard to hide. It's almost like—”
“They want us to know they're there,” Kade finished, his voice hard. “Intimidation. Psychological pressure.”
Kade's hand left the chair and pressed flat against the desk beside the monitor, fingers spread wide like he was trying to ground himself. The tendons in his forearm stood out sharply beneath his skin, and I watched his jaw work as he processed what he was seeing.
“They know she's here,” he said, and it wasn't a question.
“Yeah.” I leaned back, giving him more space, watching his profile in the blue glow of the monitors. “Question is, how'd they find her? We've been careful. She hasn't left the building except for that one walk, and the newspaper—” I stopped, the realization hitting. “Fuck. The newspaper photo.”
Kade's eyes closed briefly, and I saw his shoulders tense even more. When he opened them again, his eyes had gone cold in a way that made me grateful I wasn't on the receiving end of whatever he was planning.
“They're planning something,” I said, stating what we both knew. “People don't conduct surveillance like this unless they're building toward action. We need to figure out what and when.”
“And stop them before they get the chance.” Kade's voice had gone soft again, that dangerous silence that preceded calculated violence. He straightened, his hands finally leaving the desk, and I saw them curl into fists at his sides. “Have you pulled background on all of them?”
“Facial recognition software is running now. Should have names and whatever public information exists within the hour.” I gestured to the secondary monitor, where the program was still processing.
“I've also compiled timestamps and movement patterns.
If they stick to their rotation, we'll be able to predict where they'll be.”
Kade nodded, his gaze still fixed on the monitors. His breathing had evened out, the initial shock and rage settling into something colder and more purposeful. This was Kade in planning mode, the same focus he brought to running the record company now directed toward protecting what was his.
What was ours.
“She doesn't know yet,” I breathed.
“No.” Kade's hands flexed, released, flexed again.
“And she doesn't need to. Not until we have a plan in place.
She's already been through enough today with the recording and—” He stopped himself, but I knew what he meant.
The breakdown yesterday, the nightmare last night, the emotional exhaustion that had been written all over her face even as she'd sung beautifully.
“Agreed,” I said. “We handle this quietly. Make sure she's safe without making her feel trapped.”
“She'll feel trapped anyway when we tell her she can't leave.” Kade turned away from the monitors finally, looking at me directly. “But better trapped and alive than whatever they're planning.”
The words hung in the air between us, heavy with implication. I'd seen what Jasmine's old pack had done to her. Seen the physical evidence in her skittishness, the way she flinched from sudden movements. Heard her sob about losing a child because they'd beaten her.
If these people thought they were taking her back, they'd have to go through me first. Through us. And I would make sure that was the last mistake they ever made.
“We need Lucian,” Kade said, already moving toward the door. “Full lockdown protocols. I want to know everyone who enters this building, every delivery, every service call. Background checks on anyone who so much as looks at our front door.”
“I’ve already started the protocols,” I said, standing and following him. My bulk filled the narrow doorway as we moved into the hallway. “Lucian was in the kitchen. I'll call him.”
Kade paused, his hand on the hallway wall, and I saw the moment where his control wavered. Just for a second, his shoulders sagged slightly, and his jaw unclenched enough that I glimpsed the fear underneath the fury. Fear for Jasmine. Fear of what might happen if we failed to protect her.
Then the moment passed, and he straightened, his expression hardening back into determined focus.
“My office,” he said. “Ten minutes. We plan this properly.”
I nodded, understanding everything he wasn't saying. This wasn't just about tactical response. This was about making sure the woman sleeping upstairs, the Omega who'd finally begun to trust us, stayed safe. Whatever it took. Whatever we had to do.
Kade met my eyes, and I saw my fury reflected back at me. The promise of violence if anyone tried to take her. The absolute certainty that we would give our lives to protect her.
He gave a single nod, sharp and decisive, then turned toward his office.
I pulled out my phone to call Lucian, but my gaze drifted back toward the security room, toward those monitors still glowing with images of our enemies positioning themselves around our home.
They'd made a mistake coming here. They just didn't know it yet.