Page 95 of Bonds of Fate

“How am I going to let him do this?”

“Just tell him he can’t,” Rowan begs. “You’re the pack alpha. The law saysyouget to set the proxy. Just tell him he can’t and that Gideonwantsto do it.”

Gideon had told Leo that day outside the hospital that Hayes would meet the devil by Gideon’s hand. Leo had never had reason to doubt him before and certainly wouldn’t start now. Gideon looks at Jay like he agrees—like he’s expecting to hear the assurance that he will get his chance.

Luca shoots up, fists clenched at his side. “You can’t just take his choice away! That fucker took everything from Nix.Everything. And broke him down to where we almost couldn’t find all the pieces. If Nix says it’s his right—then we have to help him.”

But it’s Gideon who breaks. “Luca, what does that boy know about murder? About killing? About causing pain? About making thatwolfpay with his life? Tell me.” Gideon’s voice is hard in a way it never is with his Luca.

“It’s not just about making him pay. What if Hayes hurts him? What if he’s in danger? It’s combat—to the fucking death.” Grayson says what Leo has been thinking, too.

Luca stomps his foot, his breath coming fast and sharp. “Listen to me! Fucking listen, all of you.”

His voice trembles, but his conviction doesn’t waver. He turns on Gideon, eyes burning. “You ask what he knows of pain, Gideon? It’s all he’s known. Loss and suffering.”

His hands clench into fists. “He doesn’t talk about it, but don’t you see him flinch when the door lock engages? Don’t you see how he avoids the fruit bowl? How he never, ever asks for fucking anything?”

His breath hitches, and he swipes angrily at his tears, but they don’t stop. Leo feels every missed clue like a dropped stone in his stomach.

“If you take this away from him, if you forget that he has paid for everything with his pain, and you choose for him, then he will never forgive us.” Luca’s voice cracks, raw and pleading. “And I can’t lose him, Gideon. I just found him.”

He shakes his head, frustration and desperation colliding in his chest. “I promised myself—him—that I’d make sure he always felt loved here. That I’d protect him.” His lips tremble. “He was sleeping when I said it, but it still counts.”

Luca turns to Jay and crouches down, eyes searching his. “Your family chose for you,” he says softly, voice laced withconviction. “They took something from you all those years ago, and we are all still reeling from that. Don’t you see?”

His breath shudders as he shakes his head. “We can’t think we know best. We can’t be as bad as they are.”

The fight in him deflates, and he plops down on his butt, the wind knocked from his sails. He looks down for a moment, pulling in a steadying breath—then lifts his head, jaw set.

Because if he has to fight his whole family to fight for Nix, he will.

“No. I will not fucking stand by and see him throw any more of his life away on that fucking waste of space. Don’t ask me to do that. Hayes belongs to me.To me.” Gideon turns, hurling the knife he has been holding this whole time straight into the living room wall. They all jump as it is embedded to the hilt. He walks quietly out, and then they hear his room door close almost silently.

The silence is deafening.

No one breathes.

Jay still hasn’t said a word, but when he rises to his feet, it’s like he’s aged a hundred years in the span of a breath.

“I need to think. I’ll be in the studio.” His voice is rough, dragging over the words. “I need some time. Just…don’t let him leave. Please.”

He exhales sharply, rubbing a hand over his face before turning to Leo. “Can you do that?”

Leo nods. He doesn’t envy their leader this decision. Not one bit.

Jay’s fingers ghost over Luca’s hair, lingering for half a second before he turns and heads for the right-wing—disappearing into their home studio.

Finn slips onto the floor and gathers the crying Luca up, whispering in the beta’s ear and rubbing his back.

Leo speaks for the first time since Riordan told them everything about his born omega—his very pregnant omega. About the four others they’d found scattered across the world—and the possibility that there were more.

When the room settles, when the weight of it all sinks in, Leo finally exhales and pushes himself to his feet. “I’m going to find Nix and give him the spare room. Should have done it days ago.”

He glances at Finn. “You got this?”

This. Meaning the now-heartbroken, sobbing Luca, whose soulmate had effectively shut him out. The first time that’s ever happened. Since the day they met, Luca and Gideon have always been in sync—never at odds like this, never on opposite sides of something this massive.

Finn nods. “Yes. Find Nix.”

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