Good Girl by Sam Hall

Chapter 40

“You need to let us in.”

That came out as a volcanic snarl, dragging me back up to the land of the living. That hurt, as someone was evidently using my weakened state to stab me repeatedly in the head with an ice pick. When I whimpered, the noise just got louder, hurting more. I curled reflexively, pulling the covers completely over me, burrowing deeper. Danger, hide, nest. The impulses throbbed deep, eradicating any need for why, those primal instincts needing to be satisfied first, but the pressure of the bed linen was quickly supplemented.

“It’s OK, omega. You’re safe now.”

I heard a voice so rich and deep, it felt like dropping in a warm bath, relaxing muscles just like one would. The voice didn’t describe my current state, it insisted, and because it said so, I was. I uncurled slowly, found the boundaries of my body where theirs met mine, and then pulled the sheets back.

“Jesus, Cyn,” Rhys said, the contortions of his face pricking at the edges of the calm he’d induced. He didn’t look fine, so it made me feel less so, but quickly, his expression softened. He reached out and stroked his hand down my face, his eyes softening, the desperation receding, and so did mine. There was something there, something ready to rise up and swallow me whole, but the beast inside was held at bay for the moment.

Until he came over.

Thin faced and wearing a white labcoat over his clothes, he frowned at the two of us, making me shift against the sheets.

“You can’t be in here,” the doctor said. “The omega has been assaulted and had what appears to be a date rape drug in her system. The police don’t want any alphas in here, tainting her testimony, before they—”

Then he broke in. Brendan took up position by the man, pulling a weapon from his denim jacket and flashing it at the man, then said, “How about you talk to me about your concerns outside and I relieve you of them.”

“I can have security down here in five minutes,” the man snapped back.

“You’ll be dead on the floor in two if you keep us away from our mate. We didn’t hurt her. We found her drugged and beaten, and with your knowledge of our biology, you know exactly what that does to an alpha,” Bren replied in a low growl.

“Fine. The alpha who is her mate can remain, and the rest of you can wait outside until the police arrive.”

“Orion Ratcliffe.” Orion strode into the room, dumping the takeaway cups of coffee on a nearby table and holding out a hand, which the doctor took reluctantly. “My father was on the board of this hospital, hence why we insisted our omega be brought here. At his untimely demise, I, of course, will take on that position. I’ve heard very good things about your skills when treating traumatised omegas. I personally asked for you to see to mine and my mates’ omega.” He smiled, some of his father’s politician smile, but he did it to smooth the ruffled feathers of the beta doctor, not propose murder. “Our relationship is an unconventional one, but I assure you, it’s a happy and consensual one.”

The smile faltered, a steel rising in Orion’s eyes.

“We would do anything to ensure that she is safe and feeling secure. She was assaulted, and this was to be followed by rape, if the released recordings are to be believed. My father was the perpetrator, and if you need to see the evidence yourself, I can arrange that, but no one is getting between us and our omega again.”

“Of course, Mr Ratcliffe, my apologies. I knew Cynthia was your omega, but—”

“Cyn,” Orion corrected. “She prefers to be called Cyn.”

The doctor left, and they clustered close, looming over my hospital bed, but the wall of bodies was exactly what I needed. This was my nest right here. Something about that thought made them smile down at me.

“Fuck, Cyn, we’ve seen all of it, everything that bastard tried to do. The video footage was released to every news outlet that night somehow,” Rhys said.

“The Ratcliffe name is dirt. The share price for Ratcliffe Industries has plummeted so precipitously, the Exchange has frozen trading on the stock,” Orion said, shaking his head ruefully. “I thought I’d have a fight on my hands, trying to take over the family name, but most of my relatives are distancing themselves as far as possible from Ratcliffe Inc and dealing with their impending poverty.” Then he let out a breath that felt like it’d been coming his whole life. “We’re safe.” He looked at each and every one of us, one by one. “Fuck, we’re safe.”

Bren reached over, slinging an arm around Orion’s neck and pulling him in to place a kiss on his temple. Rhys grabbed my hand and rubbed it, a kind of bliss on his face I’d only ever seen once, when we were mated. His brows creased and smoothed until my hand gripped his tighter.

“Ari?” I croaked out, Rhys moving to get me a glass of water. I took a sip before asking for the next person. “Mum?” Then one more. “Marcus?”

“Ari’s fine. I’ve moved her back to her mother’s place with some added security. I offered her the family home, but she wasn’t keen. My mum… I dunno if she’s who I’d want around Ari right now. I’m busy locating the other siblings, making sure they are safe as well and have options. The board at Ari’s academy has been summarily dismissed. Evidence of their hijinks has been released.”

“Your mum?” Bren said. “She wasn’t at your place, nor the safe house Marcus had set up. Feints within feints. We got an automated email from Marcus that said it would tell us where she was in the subject line, but it’s password protected.”

“Always,” I said.

“What?”

“Password is ‘always.’”

He snorted, then smiled. “Of course it fucking was. We were punching in ‘Cyn’ or ‘Omega’ or… Fuck, I’ll get the boys on it now.”

“Marcus?” I prompted again, and the smiles faded.

“He’s locked up, arrested for executing the sperm donor,” Orion said grimly. “We’ve got our lawyers on it, but…” He shook his head, his jaw tightening, then looked down at me. “It should be a clear-cut case of an alpha defending his mate, but… There was a reason why I didn’t want you to know what was planned—so you were completely untainted. When the police came around to question you, you’d be able to say clean and clear that you knew nothing about it because we knew the process wouldn’t be simple. Dad had a network of allies that protected his arse every time, so if someone was going to go down, it’d be me.”

Orion shook his head slowly.

“I thought it was going to be me who got to do the whole noble self-sacrifice thing, but Marcus…”

“The newspaper and TV reports on what went down are helping. Stuff gets released every day, so I’m hopeful,” Bren said in a gentle tone. “We’re getting him out, even if we have to pull a great escape and nick off to Brazil or something.”

“Marcus always looks after himself,” Rhys added, “so don’t go worrying after him. We’ll get the doctor in here and work out when you can be released.”

Not before I’dbeen looked over closely, a barrage of tests both for me and the police completed, and then my statement taken. The coppers hadn’t liked my mates being in the room, but as they listened to my halting story, they settled. It all came out, tearing and scratching, one word after the other, until it was all done.

“Marcus was defending me,” I said. “He didn’t want it to be my hand that delivered the killing blow, didn’t want me to chance it in my state at the time. He shot someone who was going to tear me asunder and send his fifteen-year-old daughter off to be raped by an ally! How does that warrant him being arrested?” I cried, strong hands on my shoulders, rubbing big circles, but the officers just nodded, packing away their notebooks.

“We’ll be in touch, Ms Rhodes.”

“C’mon, love,” Brendan said. “There’s a bunch of people dying to see you, but there’s one in particular you need to see.”

“Mum?” I asked, my voice quavering in a way I didn’t like but it tended to now.

They just smiled and drew me out of the hospital room and down the hall.

“Cyn…”

There she stood, looking a little thinner, her face a little drawn, wearing old jeans, a T-shirt, and a cardi, her arms wrapped around her ribs until she let go for me. She frowned as she took a step forward, but her lips curved into a smile, then she raced over, swamping me in her embrace. My hands went around her slowly, Mum’s shows of affection so few and far between, I didn’t know what to do, but eventually, I hugged her back.

“Mum—”

“He kept me safe the whole time, love. I know you didn’t know that. It was necessary, but you…” She pulled back, her eyes brimming with tears. “My Cyn, I saw it all, screaming at the CCTV screen, pounding on the door of my room in the compound, begging them to let me out. He tried to make me see how it had to go, but…” Her grip grew tighter and tighter. “We’re leaving that damn house behind, getting something with a state-of-the-art security. Damn those fucking alphas.”

I turned within her grip to see my mates hanging back, looking at her warily.

“Well, not all of them, Mum.”

“Yes, all of them,” she snapped, then held me at arm’s length. “High-handed, controlling bastards who benefit from structural inequality and will do anything to maintain it, including assaulting my daughter. I know we talked mating an alpha but…”

Her words trailed away as I pulled my shirt away from my neck. Bren’s mark was there, Rhys’ on the other side, and I was going to add to them, I knew that. If I had to stick my head through prison bars for Marcus to mark me, it was going to happen.

“Mum, I’m theirs—”

“No, no, Cyn. You don’t have to do this. Marcus helped me out. I won’t be able to sever the business relationship I have with him, but there’s no reason why you should have to put yourself in this danger again. Alphas are overbearing, controlling—”

“Mates,” I finished for her. “They’re my mates. I know you don’t understand, but…”

My voice trailed away, and I frowned, the guys doing the same, clustering closer.

“Business relationship?” Orion asked sharply.

“Marcus has been a silent partner and contributor to R&D in my company. Our company,” she said, eyes dropping. “I met this kid at a renewable industries convention not long after Cyn finished school. I was trying to sell the idea of batteries, but no one was biting, except for him. Initially, I brushed him off, thinking he was too young, and then he showed me the numbers. What he had to invest, his previous dabbles in business, his share portfolio.”

“His share portfolio?” Orion said. “Are we talking about the same person? I’m pretty sure we’re broke.”

She shook her head slowly. “Marcus, he’s a genius, that goes without saying, but he’s no ivory tower intellectual, pondering the mysteries of the universe. He is a devil at the stock market, his instincts are unparalleled. He just kept reinvesting those returns in the company, allowing it to grow beyond anything I would have managed on my own. Journalists say I’m coy when it comes to talking about my success, because I have to be. The batteries, they’re a good invention, but we would have gotten nowhere without him.”

Her eyes came swinging back to me.

“But that doesn’t mean you need to have anything to do with him. I’ll sell the company and the IP off to the highest bidder, let some alpha step into the newly created vacuum.” She rubbed at her temple. “It’d be almost a relief. I thought it’s what I needed, to keep you safe, Cyn. He made me see that. He knew that a helluva lot of money would open doors for you I couldn’t, allow you freedoms that you wouldn’t normally have, but—”

“When did you start this company?” Rhys asked in a low, deadly tone.

“When I turned eighteen,” I said, “or just before.” But I wasn’t seeing them, Mum, the hospital foyer, or anything. I saw him, that golden figure in the forest, right before I left, but this time, Marcus drew a deep breath in, turning his head in my direction, following the trail of my scent home.

“Mum, are you going to be OK?”

“Me? How about you? You’ve just suffered through—”

“I need to go,” I said, kissing her quickly on her cheek, then dancing back when she tried to grab hold of me. I felt bad for that, but I knew now what I had to do. “We need to go to the police station.”

“What?” Bren asked, but I shot him a look. “OK, the car’s out front.”

“Mr McCallum has been releasedwithout charge,” the police clerk at the front counter said stiffly, not meeting our eyes.

“What? When?” Orion asked, pushing forward. “Our lawyers weren’t notified.”

“He didn’t want them to, so we left him to leave under his own steam. Now, if that’s all?”

We stepped away from the counter, clustering close.

“What the fuck?” Rhys asked, raking his hand through his hair. “What the actual fuck?”

“It’s like… Did we even know him?” Bren said with a frown. His hands were shoved deep into his jeans pockets, but I worked mine in beside them. “So where is he now? Apothecary?”

“Maybe. Like is he going to run or…?” Orion said.

“I know where he is,” I replied. “You can drive me there, but I need to speak to him first.”

Rhys snorted his appreciation for that idea, but Bren stared at me.

“Where?”

“The forest.”