3. Sloane
Sloane
I try Theo next, because the sight of his name on the screen hurts in a different place. Idris answers from Theo’s phone on the second ring.
“He’s right here,” Idris says.
“Put me on speaker.”
There’s rustling, then Theo’s soft breathing, shaky and close. “Sloane?”
I close my eyes in the middle of the sidewalk. The sound of his voice almost folds me in half. “Hey, sweetheart. I’m here.”
“Did you find her?” Theo asks it carefully, like the wrong answer might make his body crash all over again.
“Not yet.” I force the words out whole because he deserves a voice that doesn’t crumble on him. “Campus says she left, but they won’t give me anything else. I’m not done.”
Theo is quiet for a second. When he speaks again, his voice is smaller. “She’s not answering me either. I called twice. I left a message and told her I wasn’t mad.”
My teeth dig into the inside of my cheek until I taste blood. “You did good. She needs to hear that.”
“What if she thinks I wanted her gone?”
“No.” The word comes out too hard. I soften it fast, pressing my fingers against the bridge of my nose. “No, Theo. Listen to me. Whatever’s happening, Callie knows your heart. She knows you wanted her.”
“Garrett said she needed space because I got confused.”
The world goes very still.
Idris says Theo’s name softly in the background, but he doesn’t stop him. He lets him speak.
My hand closes around the phone until my knuckles burn. “When did he say that?”
“After you left. He was in the hall. He told Dr. Mercer he was concerned the attachment got reinforced too fast because I asked for her during the crash.” Theo’s breath wobbles, but the sentence stays whole. “I don’t want him to talk about her like that.”
“He won’t for long,” I say, and the promise inside it isn't soft.
“Sloane,” Idris says, closer to the phone now. “Come back to the house. I’ve got Theo in the library, and Mercer doesn’t want Garrett near him while his vitals are reactive. I’m not arguing with medical advice that gives me exactly what I already planned to do.”
Callie should be with him. Callie should be the one wrapping him in the blanket, tucking his hands into sleeves, telling him the world is loud but he’s safe inside it.
Instead, Idris is turning a corporate office into a triage room because our house has a head Alpha in it who might be the reason our Beta is gone.
“I’ll meet you there,” I say. “I’m calling the police from the car.”
“Do it on the recorded line and keep your voice calm.”
“I’m out of calm.”
“Borrow mine,” Idris says. “For ten minutes.”
I make myself breathe. “Fine.”
The local police line routes me through a dispatcher with a voice so neutral it feels made by a machine.
I give Callie’s full name, her age, the campus, the house, the bond status, the last confirmed contact.
I say she’s not answering. I say she’s bonded and the bond closed after a burst of terror.
I say there’s a protective medical context involving an Omega whose heat response crashed when she disappeared.
The words sound insane outside our world, too intimate and too biological for a police report, but the dispatcher types steadily through all of it.
“How long has Ms. Monroe been unreachable?” she asks.
My gaze snaps to the dashboard clock. “Hours.”
“Is there evidence of immediate physical danger?”
“Yes.”
“What evidence?”
“I felt her terror through the bond before she closed it.”
There’s a pause. I hear the faint click of keys. “Sir, I understand that’s concerning to you, but I need external indicators. Threats, witnessed abduction, statements of self-harm, signs of violence, medical incapacity.”
“She wouldn’t close the bond unless she was terrified.”
“Has Ms. Monroe been seen since you last spoke with her?”
I think of the woman at the desk. The careful face. Professor Monroe completed her scheduled appointment and left campus. “Campus says she left on her own.”
“Then at this stage, this may not meet the criteria for an emergency missing-person response. She’s an adult, and adults are allowed to stop answering calls.”
“She’s my bonded mate,” I say, and every word scrapes. “This isn’t her not answering after a fight. Something happened.”
“I can enter a welfare concern and route it for follow-up, but if Ms. Monroe has requested privacy or distance, officers can’t compel contact. You may also want to check with campus police directly.”
“Campus won’t tell me anything.”
“They may be restricted from releasing information.”
“Restricted by what?”
“I don’t have that information, sir.”
I almost laugh, but there’s no humor anywhere in me. Only the shape of Garrett’s hands all over another closed door. “File whatever you can file.”
“I can do that. Please understand that repeated attempts to contact someone who’s requested no contact can create additional complications.”
My breathing stops. “What did you say?”
“I’m speaking generally, sir.”
“No.” My voice drops. “Why would you say that specifically?”
Another pause. Longer this time. “I’m advising you to let officers handle the welfare concern once it’s entered. Do not continue attempting to locate her through restricted channels if you’ve been told information can’t be released.”
The line ends with a case number that means nothing, a string of digits I write in the notes app with hands that want to crush the phone instead.
The warning stays with me: requested no contact, restricted channels, complications.
Garrett has already touched police language.
Maybe lightly, maybe indirectly, maybe through campus, but enough that the shape is there.
By the time I reach the house, my hands are numb.
I park crooked beside Idris’ car and get out with my phone in my hand, the screen still open to Callie’s name.
No reply. No read receipt. No missed call.
The bond stays closed, a blank wall where there should be warmth, and for a second I can’t make myself walk inside because walking inside without her feels like accepting that I failed to bring her back.
I let myself in the side entrance.
The library has been turned into something between a medical recovery space and a war room.
The blinds are drawn and only the lamps are on.
Theo is on the long leather sofa wrapped in a gray blanket over one of Callie’s cardigans, his knees tucked close, his face pale against the collar.
Dr. Mercer is packing her bag near the table, speaking quietly to Idris, who has his phone, a legal pad, and three printed pages arranged in front of him with too much precision.
Theo looks up when I enter. The hope on his face hurts worse than the campus refusal.
I cross the room before anyone can say anything.
Theo shifts like he’s going to sit up, but I’m already there, lowering myself onto the edge of the sofa and wrapping around him as carefully as I can with all this violence still living in me.
He folds into my chest, blanket and cardigan and shaking bones, and I press my mouth to his hair because I need him to feel me choosing him even while every other part of me is running toward Callie.
“I didn’t find her yet,” I say against him before he has to ask. “I’m sorry.”
Theo’s fingers grip the front of my shirt. “You came back.”
Shame hits hard enough that I close my eyes. “I came back to you,” I tell him, holding him tighter when his breath catches. “And I’m still going to find her. Both things are true.”
Idris stops talking to Dr. Mercer and looks at me. His face is composed enough for strangers. I know him too well to miss the fracture under it.
“Campus?” he asks.
“Wall.” I keep one hand on Theo’s back and use the other to set my phone on the table because if I keep holding it, I’ll call Callie again until my voice gives out.
“They confirmed she completed the appointment and left campus. They wouldn’t say who with, wouldn’t show footage, wouldn’t tell me if Garrett was there. Security got close when I pushed.”
Idris' jaw tightens. “Police?”
“I called. They’ll enter a welfare concern.
It’s not a missing-person case yet. She’s an adult, hasn’t been gone long enough for them to move hard, and campus says she left on her own.
” I swallow the worst part, but it won’t stay down.
“The dispatcher warned me about repeated contact if someone requested privacy or no contact.”
Dr. Mercer’s hands still over her bag.
Idris goes very quiet. “She used those words?”
“Generally. That’s what she said when I asked why.
” I look down at Theo because his breathing has started to quicken again.
“I don’t know what’s in the system. I don’t know if Garrett filed something, or campus flagged something, or if I’m hearing ghosts because I want a throat to put my hands around. ”
“You’re not hearing ghosts.” Idris picks up one of the printed pages and turns it toward me. It’s the message from Callie’s number, enlarged until the cold words look even colder. I need a little more time. Don’t wait for me. Focus on Theo. “This isn't her.”
“I know.”
“This message came through six minutes after Dr. Mercer logged Theo’s interrupted heat response on her tablet and thirteen minutes after you felt the bond close.”
My body goes still around Theo. “Say that again.”
“I checked the time stamps while you were driving.” Idris taps the paper once.
“Garrett said she asked for time because the interview ran long. But this message came after the crash had already started here. After he would’ve known Theo was medically unstable.
It gives exactly the instruction that keeps you in place. ”
Dr. Mercer looks between us, then closes her bag with a decisive click.
“I’m going to document Theo’s interrupted heat response, his current reactivity to Garrett Crane’s presence, and my recommendation that Theo remain under the supervision of Idris Ward and Sloane Rivera until a follow-up assessment.
I’m not making a placement recommendation today. ”
“Thank you,” Idris says.
“It’s not a favor,” she replies, her voice steady. “It’s what I observed. But I’ll also be documenting that the household’s head Alpha attempted to override medical communication protocols during an active destabilization event. Bellwether will ask questions.”
“Let them,” I say.
Idris looks at me, warning in his eyes, but Dr. Mercer only nods once. “Be careful how you answer. Systems protect themselves before they protect people, especially when paperwork arrives before the truth does.”
She leaves through the side entrance a few minutes later, and none of us speaks until the side door closes behind her. Theo stays pressed against me, his face turned into my chest, his breathing slowly evening out. Idris sits across from us with the evidence spread over the table.
“I should’ve gone with her,” I say. The words are quieter now, which makes them worse.
“I keep going back to the driveway. She looked back. Did you see that? She looked back before she got in the car, and I thought she was nervous about the interview. I thought she needed me to trust her competence instead of hovering like an asshole Alpha who can’t let his mate drive herself.
So I stayed. I let her go because I was trying to respect her, and Garrett used the space I gave her. ”
Idris’ eyes close for half a second. “I told her to bring every version of herself home.”
Theo lifts his head. His eyes are wet, but his voice is steady enough to cut. “She would’ve.”
The phone on the table lights with nothing important. Just a spam email preview, some useless notification that isn’t her. I stare at it until the screen goes dark again, and the anger returns in a cleaner shape. Hot enough to burn, focused enough to use.
I’m done asking the wrong people for permission to know whether the woman I love is alive and safe.
Idris reaches for his phone. “We need someone Garrett doesn’t control.”
I drag my eyes from the dead screen. “Who?”
“A lawyer he hasn’t trained, intimidated, paid, mentored, or slept beside in pack meetings for years.
” Idris scrolls through his contacts, his face hardening into something I recognize from the old days, back before Blackline had polished offices and glass walls, back when he was dangerous because he saw five moves ahead and never mistook patience for mercy. “Zana.”
Theo’s fingers tighten in my shirt. “Will she help Callie?”
“She’ll help us find the truth,” Idris says, already lifting the phone to his ear. “And then we’ll use it to bring Callie home.”
I press my mouth to Theo’s temple and reach for my own phone with my free hand.
I open Callie’s contact again because I can’t stop, because somewhere my baby is scared enough to believe silence is all we have for her.
I type with my thumb while Idris waits for Zana to answer, each word chosen like I’m setting it into her hands.
Callie, I felt you get scared. I don’t believe you left. I don’t believe that message. I’m with Theo and Idris. We’re looking. Baby, wherever you are, hold on. I’m coming.