Page 14 of Knot All is Crystal
“Me too, I guess,” grumbles Princess Alpha.
Crystal smiles warmly in a look she reserves for what feels like everyone but me.
Tyler comes over with their drinks balanced on a tray. He’s smaller than the other Alphas, but his unusual dedication to Crystal makes him dangerous to customers. I have no doubt he could bark these guys into submission if he needed to. I know something happened between them, and I did my best to cover their tracks to ensure Kieran didn’t catch wind of it. It makes me feel better knowing Crystal always has him by her side.
“Here we go,” he says with a forced smile. “Queenie, do you have the bubbles?”
She waves her hand over the glasses, the drugs falling so quickly it’s nearly impossible to catch, and the drinks immediately fizz up. “Here we go,” she says with a flourish. “Enjoy, gentlemen. Please do not hesitate to let me know if you need anything.”
With sleight of hand worthy of a magician, she passes off an extra dose to the Alphas who requested it and steps to the side. She beelines for me, and I push myself further against the wall and deeper into the shadows.
Not to hide from her, but to hide my reaction to her.
“Puck, to what do I owe the pleasure of your supervision?” she snaps. For such a tiny thing, she’s got an attitude. She also seems to forget that I outrank her significantly here and could make her life hell if I wanted to.
Not that I do.
“It’s not on you to question mine or Kieran’s decisions,” I remind her. “Just say thank you for the extra protection and move along.”
Or don’t.
But she probably should.
“I’m not going to thank you for anything.” Her lip twists into a sneer, and she crowds me further, making me hold my breath. “I wouldn’t be here if not for you.”
We never talk about the fact that it was me who showed up looking for the spouse of a Beta gambling addict and ended up signing an Omega onto Kieran’s roster. I still feel guilty about not putting up more of a fight to keep her out of this. At the time, I was nothing more than a grunt, and that incident is one of the reasons why Kieran’s trust in me has grown significantly since that day.
“I asked you if you were sure,” I remind her in a low voice. “I didn’t force you to come here.”
“What other choice did I have?” she spits at me with a level of vitriol that feels like a physical attack. “It was either me or my sister. There was no other option.” She sighs, rubbing her face with her hand, careful not to smudge her makeup.
“I’ve tried to look out for you. You know that, right?” She stares blankly at me. I doubt she believes me. “You’ve got it pretty good, Crystal,” I remind her. “Kieran takes care of you.” If I say it enough, maybe I’ll believe it.
She winces at my words before schooling her face into a scowl. “Sure, I guess he does. For a jailer. But why? Why does he treat me so differently from the others?”
I can’t tell her that. No one can.
Because no one knows but Kieran.
Instead of reminding Crystal of that, I shake my head and gesture back to the patrons. “It seems your subjects need you, Queenie.”
She huffs and spins around so fast I worry those sky-high heels will take her to the floor, and she returns to the obnoxious Alpha, who is snapping his fingers in her direction.
My phone buzzes in my pocket, Kieran’s name flashing across the front. “Yep?”
“I need you to meet me in interrogation.”
“I’m with Queenie,” I remind him.
“Isn’t Tyler there? Let him keep an eye on her for a bit. I need you here. Now.”
It’s a direct order, and I can’t ignore it.
Storing my phone, I head to the bar to talk to the blond Alpha. “I have to head out for a bit, and I need you to look out for Crystal. These guys set off a few red flags.”
“What kind of flags?” he asks, talking out of the side of his mouth and not taking his eyes off of Crystal. I think he cares for her as more than as a coworker, which works out for me now.
“They wanted to make sure they were alone with an Omega.”
