Page 123 of Believe it or Knot

“Fuck!” I scream, pushing them ahead of me. If anyone is going to get shot, it’s going to be me. We move faster, harder, arms pumping, ducked low to be smaller targets. I never in a million years dreamed I would experience something like this. But apparently survival instincts are a real thing.

My legs move faster than they ever have before, the pain in my knees fading to nothing as I push and push and push.

“Left!” I shout when I see our turn. We skid around a corner, and there are more pops of gunfire behind us. “Right!” I command, even though the two omegas are already turning. And there is it, the door to the outside, metal and glass. The sky is lit up with red and blue flashing lights, though we can’t see any cars or people. Ethan must have guided us to a back exit.

“Go. Go. Go!” I chant as we all put on a burst of speed. The door is unlocked, just like Ethan promised, and we explode into the night, right as the building behind us explodes, too.

Track 29: Hold On

“Oh, fuck,” Sadie breathes as the building behind us explodes. Not the whole thing, but a section of it damn close to where we just were. “They almost killed us.” She sounds dazed. Really fucking dazed.

Even though my head is throbbing and my ears are ringing, I drag myself over to her, carefully running my hands down her body, lingering on the bruise on her forehead that I think matches mine. Sylvie is on the other side of her, breathing heavily, muscles trembling.

“Did we make it?” she asks shakily, eyes closed. “Are we out?”

I nod and give her the same examination I gave Sadie. “Yeah, Vee. We’re out. We made it.”

Sadie rolls toward us, sliding her hand down my arm to lace her fingers with mine. “You have the drive?”

I reach around and pat where it’s shoved in the back of my pants. “Yep. I hope Ethan could get something useful off the computer.”

Sadie presses up to sit and nods. “Oh, I’m sure he did. He’s a genius.” She reaches down and drags Sylvie into an upright position. “Come on, let’s move. We gotta get this shit to the cops before Apex can make a statement about how we’re the terrorist bad guys who blew up their totally legit business.”

That makes my stomach sink. “You think they’ll do that?”

Sylvie snorts as she leans on me and Sadie, the three of us stumbling to our feet together. “I wouldn’t put it past them. It’s no secret that both of our packs have been not so subtly trying to bring down the corporation.”

“They’ll probably say we staged this whole thing to further our agenda or something.”

My stomach clenches even further as we make our way around the block and toward the flashing red and blue lights. “Fuck. They could try to sue us, couldn’t they?”

The smaller women look up at me, squeezing me tighter. “They can try, but they won’t succeed,” Sadie reassures me. “I know Ethan got what we needed to keep that from happening.”

I want to ask how she can be sure. I want her to reassure me again that I won’t get convicted of some kind of crime here. But I don’t think she can. Sadie and Sylvie both have powerful packs that will fight to keep them from being incarcerated. I don’t.

Even if all three of us were convicted of a terrorist act, they’re omegas. They’d go to some soft security prison that had things like meditation and painting to rehabilitate them… whereas I’ll just go to prison. Probably maximum security for life, because that is my freaking luck.

But they don’t need to hear any of that, so I smile and nod. “Yeah, of course. You’re right.”

Vee gives me a look like she knows I’m lying through my teeth, but she doesn’t say anything. Or maybe she would have, except at that moment we round the building and a cry goes up from the crowd of people there. Sadie and Sylvie stumble forward as I stay put, lingering as ten men rush toward us. Or rather, toward my two friends. They split into groups, the white-haired Swift a few steps ahead of everyone else.

My friend lets out a little sob as he slams into her.

Swift smacks a kiss onto Sadie’s lips, lifting her off the ground. Her legs part around his waist as her hands clamp on his cheeks. “Told you I’d never lose you again, Cherrybomb,” he murmurs against her mouth. The rest of the Falcones slam into them, running hands over her body to check that she’s okay. The tenderness with which they handle her makes my chest ache, both in a good way and with jealousy. I’ll never have that.

I look away to find Vee surrounded by her pack, all of them purring and petting her. The ache grows. Tears spring to my eyes, and I take a deep breath, focusing on the tips of my shoes.

Police and guards and paramedics bustle around me, and I stay exactly where I am, hands fisted, counting in and out to regulate my breathing. I have to take care of myself. No one else is going to do it.

If some part of me hoped the Cordova pack would come for me, that Gage would come for me, I squash it. They didn’t. I’m alone.

They probably don’t even know someone kidnapped me. Why would they? They washed their hands of me, couldn’t get away from me fast enough. Or even if they do know, why would they care? In their minds, I’m a master manipulator.

I wonder if it had only been me that was taken, if Sadie and Sylvie had thwarted their kidnappers, if they remained tucked up safely with their packs, how long would it have taken for anyone to even notice I was gone?

Hours at the Snack Shack have been sporadic at best since I started seeing the Cordova pack. It’s likely that our normal customers would have just assumed I was back together with them… or maybe that I took a long vacation to escape everyone’s judgment. Either way, it probably would have been days before anyone reported me missing.

“Excuse me, miss?” I lift my eyes with a forced smile on my lips. It’s a habit more than anything. I find a beta paramedic in front of me, brown eyes running over me from head to foot. “You were in the facility when the explosion happened?”

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