Page 13 of Claimed By My Exiled Alphas
What would she see if she looked at me? Another entitled alpha with too much privilege and too little conscience? Someone whose family name represented everything wrong with unchecked development and corporate greed?
Or would she somehow sense what Martha and the café owner had apparently figured out, that I was more complicated than my reputation suggested?
The breakfast arrived, scrambled eggs and local sausage and toast made from bread that tasted homemade. I ate slowly, listening to conversations around me, picking up the rhythms of community life. Who was dating whom? Which businesses were struggling and which were expanding. The kind of interconnected knowledge that came from people actually paying attention to each other.
By the time I finished eating, I’d made a decision. I wasn’t leaving Hollow Haven. Not yet. Maybe not for a while.
I had freelance work I could do from anywhere with an internet connection. I had enough savings to cover a few months of expenses if I was careful. And I had three months’ worth of pent-up need to be somewhere that felt real, even if that somewhere currently viewed me with suspicion.
Besides, there was an omega with auburn curls and a scent like caramelized honey who’d captured my attention in a way I didn’t fully understand yet. And while I had no idea what she was planning in that empty brick building, I was suddenly very interested in finding out.
You’re right - if he was living there during the development project three months ago, it wouldn’t be abandoned and dusty. Let me revise:
The café owner appeared to clear my plate. “Sticking around?”
“I’m considering it,” I said. “I still have the house on Ridge Road. Been deciding whether to keep it or sell.”
She studied me with that same direct assessment, then nodded slowly. “That’s the old Brennan place. You put some work into it last year.”
I had. New roof, updated plumbing, enough repairs to make it livable during my time here coordinating the developmentsurveys. The house had served its purpose as a base of operations while I’d gathered evidence against my own family.
“You’ve got a lot of fence-mending to do if you want to be part of this community,” she said, her tone matter-of-fact rather than hostile. “Money won’t buy you in here. You’ll need to actually show up and do the work.”
“I understand.”
“Do you?” She met my gaze steadily. “Because you’ve got the house, you’ve got the means, but what you don’t have is trust. That takes time and consistency. Can’t strategize your way into belonging.”
She walked away, leaving me with the check and the uncomfortable awareness that she was absolutely right. I’d spent my entire life in circles where money and connections could smooth over almost any problem. Hollow Haven didn’t work that way. Here, you earned belonging through showing up consistently and contributing genuinely, not through strategic networking and carefully calculated gestures.
I paid the check, left a reasonable tip, and walked back out into the October morning. I walked back to where I’d parked my car, my steps slowing as I passed the brick building across the street. It was quiet now, the auburn-haired omega apparently gone for the moment. But her scent lingered in my memory, warm and complex and full of possibilities I hadn’t known I was looking for.
The house on Ridge Road was waiting. I’d left it mostly furnished when I’d driven away three months ago, uncertain whether I’d ever come back. The utilities were still on, paid automatically from the checking account I’d set up before everything fell apart.
Maybe it was time to stop thinking of it as a temporary base and start thinking of it as home.
I climbed into the Explorer and headed out of downtown, following the winding road that led up into the foothills. The house appeared around a curve, exactly as I’d left it. Cedar siding weathered to silver-gray, wide windows reflecting afternoon light, the wraparound porch where I’d spent evenings reviewing environmental reports and building my case against the development.
The kind of place that had witnessed my transformation from corporate heir to whistleblower, even if no one else knew that story.
I unlocked the front door and stepped inside. The air was stale from three months of emptiness, but everything else was familiar. The leather sofa I’d bought from a furniture store in Denver. The coffee table still holding a stack of books I’d been reading. The kitchen where I’d made countless pots of coffee while analyzing data late into the night.
A house that had been a tool, a strategy, a means to an end. Maybe it could become something more.
Whatever happened next, I was staying. Time to find out if I could build something real in the place I’d saved but could never claim credit for protecting.
Time to discover whether belonging was something you could earn through honest work, even when you were carrying secrets that would complicate everything if they ever came to light.
Chapter 6
Talia
Istared at the text message on my phone for the third time that morning, already regretting my moment of weakness when I’d agreed to this.
Still on for 2 PM? Can’t wait to learn from a pro. - Jace
The butternut squash sat on my cutting board like a golden accusation. What had I been thinking, agreeing to teach cooking lessons when I had permit applications to finish, contractor estimates to review, and about seventeen other things related to opening the bistro that demanded my attention? The old bakery space wasn’t going to renovate itself, and every hour I spent on something else was an hour I wasn’t moving forward with the only plan that mattered.
But Jace had asked so hopefully at the farmers market last week, all earnest enthusiasm about wanting to learn proper knife techniques and seasonal cooking. And I’d been caught off guard by how his request had made me feel, competent andvalued, like maybe I did have something worth teaching despite my spectacular professional failure in Chicago.
