Page 127 of Believe it or Knot

Carefully, I take stock of her body. Note each and every bruise and scrape on her skin. I growl when I find tender spots and sore muscles. There’s a bandage on the back of her thigh, and a shitton of tiny cuts on her hands and wrists. But overall she’s in relatively good shape. I push to my feet and carefully take her face in my hands, turning it this way and that, before sliding my hands into her hair. Another growl when she winces as I find a bump on the back of her head.

“You were checked for a concussion?” I ask, and the other men around me tense, waiting for her answer.

“Yes.” She rolls her eyes. “I told you a professional checked me out. If I had a concussion, I would be strapped to a gurney right now and on my way to the hospital.” She looks back toward the bustle of activity around the partially destroyed building.

“We should still take you to the hospital, lovely,” Liam murmurs, reaching out to run his fingers over her arm. She flinches away from him, and then steps away from me, putting distance between us. I guess now that I’ve verified she is, in fact, okay, she doesn’t want any of us touching her. She even sidesteps Gage when he reaches for her again.

Tucking her hands into the pockets of her ripped shorts, she looks at us with exhausted eyes. “You said you’d get me out of here. Can we do that now? Please.”

Gray nods slowly while I fist my hand at my side. The urge to hit something is strong. I’m so fucking… frustrated. And angry. I’m angry that this happened to our beta, that I wasn’t there to do my job and protect her. That I failed her.

I don’t think I’ll ever forgive myself for this.

Even though I know I’m not the one who kidnapped her, I left her vulnerable to attacks. Protecting people is my literal job. Making sure the people I care about are safe and secure, and I failed at it.

I failed her.

I failed my pack.

“Yes, of course,” Gray says carefully, turning slightly to motion back toward the police line. “Let’s get you out of here.”

Sorrel stumbles forward, and the rest of us fall into step around her, Liam on one side, Gray on the other, Gage and I flanking her rear. I glance at him and find his eyes focused on Sorrel, like he’s worried if he’s not watching her, she’ll slip away again.

I’m right there with him.

He must feel me looking at him, because he flicks his dark blue eyes at me and gives a nod. I nod back.

We’re in agreement.

No one is getting close to our beta ever again.

Track 31: Criminal

This is surreal.

Everything about tonight feels fake. Like some sort of hellish dreamscape, that’s morphing into something… good? Maybe?

The Cordova Pack came for me. Gage came for me. How they knew where to find me, I don’t know. Maybe that ‘interview’ with the reporter went live, and they figured out where I was from that. I have no idea how long I spent crying at the base of that tree, wishing like hell I had someone, anyone, to hold me. My parents, Gage, Liam, Gray, Rafe, Sadie, Sylvie. Hell, I would have even taken Swift or Logan.

But I was alone. I am still alone. Sadie and Sylvie have their own packs and their own lives. The Cordova pack doesn’t want me. I still don’t know why they even came. Maybe some amount of affection lingers in them, enough to want to be sure I didn’t die, but not enough to overlook my perceived crimes.

The only person I know have is Gage, and I’m still hurt and mad at what he said, at what he thinks of me. Like after years apart, he just doesn’t know me at all anymore.

I only let Liam hold me and Gage hug me because I needed the comfort in that moment. I’d been praying for it. They offered it to me. I wasn’t strong enough to turn them down.

But I have to be now.

I can’t let them do what they did to me again. I can’t trust them and then have them decide tomorrow, next week, next year, they don’t actually want me all that much. Or if I make another mistake and they toss me aside so easily.

I can’t go through that again.

The four men guide me back to the area around Apex where the paramedics and police are. I flinch away from the lights, my eyes aching from my bout of crying and my head throbbing from everything else. All I want to do is soak in a hot tub for an hour to ease my muscles and then sleep for the next three days.

Something tells me that’s not going to happen.

“Miss Forbes?” A man wearing a suit and a trench coat approaches us, badge in hand. Rafe slips in front of me, keeping the other alpha from getting too close. “I’m Detective Aiden Banks. We’ve been looking for you. We have a few questions.”

A low growl rumbles out of Rafe as the detective tries to move around him to get to me. “You can ask her your questions from over there,” he says.

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