She rolled her eyes. “Of course, they’re fine.”
“Then what the hell is this song and dance about?” Cameron demanded. His words sounded harsh but there was only concern in his eyes as he twisted his chair around and sat, resting his arms on the back of it and looking at our sister expectantly. “Don’t make me call, Mama.”
This at least got a laugh from her.
“She’ll be getting this talk next. So will my pack. But I had to come to you first because you were there,” she said, her smile dropping.
The way she was chewing on her bottom lip and fidgeting, told me I wasn’t going to like this.
“Just spit it out,” Maverick groaned. “You know I hate dragging things out. You’re stressing me out.”
“Wren is in town.”
Her words fell between us, rendering us all silent.
She had to be kidding.
“What the fuck is she doing here?” Cameron growled.
“Look, I’ve been awful about keeping you guys updated on everything that happened with the trial. I let my lawyer handle it and buried my head in the sand until he sent me updates. That’s on me,” she said, looking a bit guilty.
Just where the hell was this conversation going?
“Talk,” Mav grunted, sitting back and crossing his beefy arms across his chest. His glare was lethal but she was unfazed.
“To summarize, my exes went to jail. They were using several women as guinea pigs for the medications they were planning to use on me. It went far beyond the fake pheromones,” she admitted.
Bile rose in my throat. No man wanted to hear the nefarious plans someone had for his sister.
“It wasn’t just your friend?” Cameron asked, his anger falling away as the words sunk in. “And more drugs?”
“Yeah,” she said, blinking her glossy eyes as she dove into an explanation. “They were blacking me out during heats, but they were doing so much worse to the other women. Meeting them at bars, testing the drugs out and taking advantage. It, apparently, went on for literal years behind my back. Wren was the final phase. Someone close to me before they turned me into some blissed-out omega who was their every fantasy.”
“I’ll kill them,” I said in a low, icy voice. Prison wasn’t good enough. They needed to feel pain.
“Stop. They’re out of our lives and locked away for the rest of their lives for what they did. That’s not why I’m here.”
“Wren,” Maverick said, bringing us back to her original point.
“The poor girl has been through hell and back. She thought I’d hate her forever but I couldn't do it. Finding out the way I did was terrible, but look at everything that came from it. I don’t have it in me to hate her,” she admitted. “I told her she should stay in town and she went to the clinic to figure things out. So, she’ll be in town. She’s been traumatized enough by alphas, so this is my one and only warning; you will treat that girl with kindness only. No grudges. If I forgave, so will you.”
We shared a look before turning back to our sister.
“I’ll try,” I offered. If everything she said was true, then how the hell could I be mad about it? Especially if she was moving on. I hated that this omega was the catalyst for Avery’s life spinning out of control.
This was definitely going to be interesting. I knew damn well my sister would pull her former friend into their current group and she’d be around a lot. Hopefully when I finally meet her I’ll be able to separate the two.
At the end of the day, we had no choice.
The moment Avery was gone, Cameron looked at us and sighed.
“This isn’t going to end well, is it?”
“It’s not the omegas fault she was abused,” Mav pointed out. “Treat her like you would any other friend of Avery’s.”
“Yeah, yeah,” I muttered. “It’s just weird.”
“Imagine how Avery feels,” Maverick said. He’d always been the reasonable one and right now it was showing.