Page 11 of Knot Playing Fair 2

“Luca,” Mia said. “This can’t keep happening. I know it’s my fault Emiel went back to the fights, but—”

“It’s not,” I told her, my voice a hoarse rasp.

“It is, though,” she said firmly. “But my point is, there’s always going to be something stressful happening. That’s just life. After last time, Zalen told him not to do this again, right? And Emiel still went there.”

“Yeah,” I said on a sigh.

I knew what she was saying. Emiel’s method for dealing with his demons was dangerous in ways beyond the obvious. It was bad enough that he might take one too many hits to the head and end up with a serious brain injury. But it was also opening a door that should’ve stayed locked forever—forging a pathway between my old life and my new life.

Changing my last name might have worked to keep anyone looking for me from making the connection between a used-up omega gang toy, and the grant writer for an East St. Louis youth center. But it was no defense against people physically following our vehicles.

The worst part was, I thought I recognized the shape of Emiel’s broken edges. And I really, really wanted to be wrong about that.

“We have to talk to him,” Mia was saying. “I mean, I knowIneed to talk to him about what happened when I was in heat. But I don’t mean just that.”

“He’s not interested in talking,” I said, because it was true.

“And I’m not interested in finding out he got killed in a cage fight!” Mia flared. “Other people are getting sucked into his problems! It’s not just about him anymore!”

It’s not just about him anymore.

It was all too easy to apply that same sentiment to myself, and the idea sent a fresh wave of chilly dread trickling down my spine. If I hadn’t escaped from Blaze, if I hadn’t accepted Zalen’s help and let myself make a home here, none of this would have happened.

Well, Emiel might still be punishing himself in the fighting ring... but he wouldn’t have had to defend us from Blaze’s thugs. SSG wouldn’t care about him. They wouldn’t care about where he lived or who he associated with. He’d just be another scary-as-hell cage fighter with a badly hidden death wish. They’d placebets on him to win or lose, and then immediately forget about him afterward.

“You’re right,” I told Mia. “Maybe after tonight, he’ll see that he can’t keep avoiding the issue.”

Mia subsided, still looking unhappy. The minutes crawled by in heavy silence. Princess, who’d been curled up on the kitchen counter where she technically wasn’t allowed to be, lifted her head and made a little trilling noise. A moment later, she leapt down with fluid grace and scampered deeper into the house, toward the side door leading to the garage.

“Guess they’re back,” I said, wishing the wait had done anything to ease my low-level background thrum of panic.

Mia pushed away from the table with intent and stood up, her expression grim. I followed suit, because what the hell else was I going to do? Somehow, I didn’t think this was going to go down the way she was envisioning it.

We intercepted the returning alphas at the landing on the main floor hallway. My attention fell on Byron, who was stalking toward us with barely leashed anger evident in every step. As it always did, the presence of an angry alpha anywhere in the same zip code as I was triggered an instant flight or freeze response, and I almost stumbled over my own feet.

Then Mia came to an abrupt halt in front of me, a gasp escaping her lips. For an instant, I thought she was fighting the same instinct I was... but then I caught sight of Emiel. He was wearing bloodied boxing trunks and nothing else. Every square inch of visible skin was bruised or scraped; some areas were already grotesquely swollen.

I had no idea how he was upright and walking.

“Emiel!” Mia said, her tone appalled. “You need to be in a hospital!”

Emiel didn’t pause or even look at her. “Leave me alone,” he growled, and did an abrupt about face, pulling open the door tothe basement and disappearing through it. A gray blur darted through the gap just before it closed, and a second later, the sound of a lock being engaged echoed around the hallway with a decisive click.

Byron stalked past us without pausing or looking back, heading for the kitchen—and, I suspected, more specifically the booze cabinet. Mia, Zalen, and I stood frozen in place, three points of an exhausted and bewildered triangle.

“He’s seemed lucid ever since he woke up from being knocked out,” Zalen said, when the silence threatened to grow too heavy. “I don’t think any bones are broken, amazingly enough. We all need rest. Let’s give him a few hours to decompress, then I’ll try talking to him again when I’m not so tired I can’t see straight.”

Misgivings fluttered around me like a flock of startled sparrows.

“I don’t like this, Zalen,” Mia said, in the understatement of the decade.

“I know,” Zalen said. “I don’t like it, either. I’m sorry, you two.”

I wanted to ask what the hell he had to be sorry about, but actually forming the words felt like an insurmountable task.

“Get some rest,” he repeated. “Maybe things will look different in the morning.”

He didn’t sound like he believed it. With a final long look at the door, he turned and headed up the stairs toward his bedroom on the second floor. Mia stared after him helplessly, then turned toward the locked door with a look of betrayal.

---