Page 99 of Reckless: Chaos

Jinx’s emerald beanie sits on my pillow like an accusation.

I reach for the beanie, fingers tracing each precise stitch that speaks of chaos contained. Of love expressed through craft. Of a sister’s legacy I’ve been trusted to carry.

“Don’t let the chaos win,” I whisper Emma’s words like a prayer as I pull it on. The weight settles like armor and accusation combined.

Six minutes now. Every second burns with memories of their lessons. Ryker’s voice mapping infiltration routes. Finn’s patient explanations of security blind spots. Jinx’s wild grin teaching me to embrace the fall. Theo’s gentle guidance through shadow and silence.

They taught me everything about survival. About fighting. About escape.

Never realizing they were teaching me how to break them.

Five minutes. Theo’s music shifts to something that sounds like goodbye, the notes falling like tears through the darkness. My fingers itch to run upstairs, to curl into his nest and forget about Sterling and his vaccine and everything except belonging.

Instead, I slip from bed with the silent grace he taught me. Every movement measured, precise. A dance of deception choreographed by lessons they never meant to give me, but ones I’ll use to protect them anyway.

Four minutes. Time to begin.

The tunnels were Theo’s first gift to me—his secret for helping omegas escape. The irony of using them for this isn’t lost on me, but they’re also the safest route. The one path even Ryker doesn’t have completely mapped. When this is over, maybe I’ll help him improve the security. Add my own touches to what they’ve built.

Three minutes. I shoulder my go-bag, every movement calculated for silence. The entrance hidden in my closet clicks softly—another piece of Theo’s genius. His voice had been so gentle then, showing me how the mechanism works. Teaching me an escape route I swore I’d never need.

Two minutes. The hidden door slides smoothly on tracks—something else he designed. Always creating, always planning escape routes. My fingers find the catch exactly where he showed me, and the panel opens with a soft click that sounds like a promise.

One minute. I pause at the threshold, letting myself feel the full weight of what I’m about to do. The USB drive sits heavy in my bag, Ryker’s note still folded alongside it. The beanie warms my head, Jinx’s protection settling like armor for what’s to come.

Thirty seconds. Finn’s footsteps pass overhead, right on schedule. Always so precise, our beta. Always so careful to maintain the patterns that make the pack feel safe.

The patterns I’m about to use to keep them that way.

“I’ll come back,” I whisper to the room, to the life I’m leaving perfectly arranged. “When it’s finished. When you’re safe.”

Zero hour.

I step into darkness, letting Theo’s tunnel swallow me whole. “Breaking out of a pack house full of supernatural predators using their own security training against them. There’s probably a merit badge for this somewhere,” I mutter, allowing myself one last moment of inappropriate humor before the mission begins. Old habits die hard—especially the snarky ones.

The air tastes like secrets and salvation, like every omega he’s helped escape while I’ve been playing it safe above. My fingers trace the walls as I move, remembering how he showed me each turn, each marker. Pride swells in my chest—not just at executing the perfect exit, but at how I’ll use these same paths to end Sterling’s game once and for all.

The soft emergency lights guide my way, marking a path toward victory. His Mustang waits exactly where he showed me—that gorgeous machine he drives too fast while blasting classical music. Another piece of his brilliance I get to borrow.

My fingers find the hidden key exactly where he taught me. “Everyone needs an escape plan,” he’d said that day, not knowing he was giving me the tools to save them all.

The Mustang roars to life, but it’s too recognizable. Too easy to track. Every lesson Ryker drilled into me about tactical retreat screams that I need something untraceable. Something they won’t expect. I can almost hear his voice in my head, approving of my strategic thinking.

Three blocks east, I find what I need. An old Honda, invisible in its ordinary-ness, left running while its owner grabs late-nightcoffee. The kind of opportunity Ryker taught me to look for without meaning to teach me how to save them all.

I leave Theo’s Mustang in its place—a calculated move, using his escape vehicle to enable someone else’s mission. His lessons about protection and escape merging perfectly with Ryker’s tactical training.

The emerald beanie sits heavy on my head as I point the Honda toward the city limits. My thumbs tap out a rhythm that only exists in my head—or maybe in Theo’s. One of his compositions from this morning, the notes all wrong but the feeling perfect.

The last few days have felt like a fever dream. Too everything. Too mundane. Too easy. Each moment weighted with purpose they couldn’t see coming.

“Alright you son of a bitch.” I pull over five blocks from Sterling Labs. My pulse hammers against my ribs like it’s trying to break free of my chest. A metallic tang floods my mouth, sharp and electric, each swallow thick with the chemical cocktail of fear and determination my body’s dumping into my bloodstream.

Hell, I’d even jump out of another plane with Finn. Or... my chest aches remembering the soft conversation I’d overheard between Theo and Ryker this morning. Their discussion of heat arrangements, of waiting, of including “Their beta.The way Theo’s scent had carried notes of both hope and hesitation when he returned to the kitchen.

I’m a part of them but not with them.

Never really with them. Even Theo’s heat—they’ll wait, they say, but in the end they want that time alone. Sacred, Ryker called it. Just another reminder that I’ll always be on the outside looking in. Maybe that makes this easier. Maybe that makes what I have to do next hurt a little less.

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