Page 66 of Captive Omega

“That’s because she was and she didn’t want me to know it. Probably something about this new job she won’t tell me about, which makes me think it’s dangerous or illegal.”

“And the credit card?”

“Is mine. I let her keep it after she lost her last job. She went from constantly trying to return it to saying she needed it for a little while longer.”

I frown. “Do you think it’s drugs?”

Everleigh blows out a heavy breath. “Knowing Della, it’s something worse than drugs.”

“What could be worse than drugs?”

“Whatever it is, I’ll get to the bottom of it. Anyway, is everything okay with the baby? My mom…” Her voice trails off, and she swallows hard, looking away as she wraps her arms around herself. “Asylum took me from my mom and stuck her in a private hospital, then had another woman raise me. It was the man who I refuse to call my father. Sloane Eddiswood.”

I stare at her in horror.

Her eyes flick to me, and seeing my horror, she smiles faintly. “Awful, huh? All the time we couldn’t find you, I kept thinking that they would do the same to you and your baby.”

I curve an arm protectively around my belly as I try desperately not to imagine someone taking my baby. “I hear it, but I struggle to believe it.”

“I know,” she says. “I wrote a victim impact statement for the prosecutor to read to the jury. Maybe when people hear what Sloane did to my mom and me, it’ll mean he gets to experience, firsthand, what it feels like to be locked up.”

I was terrified when I first found out I was pregnant. Not for me, but what it would mean for my child.

The odds of me giving birth to an omega are sky high. When my omega mom and alpha dad found out they were pregnant with me, everyone expected I would be an omega. An omega and alpha union only ever result in an omega child, or very rarely, an alpha.

I kept thinking about what would happen to my child if I gave birth while caged by an alpha like Nathaniel Lang, who viewed me as his appreciating asset.

“We should get to the party,” I say, more so I have an excuse to stop thinking of such a horrifying future that could so easily have been a reality.

“Do you think he’ll go to jail?” Everleigh asks before I can walk out. Her expression is distant as she looks at me. “I try to imagine him in jail and I can’t. I keep thinking he’ll get away with it.”

So do I.

It’s why I’m so determined to get to Dexter Pieter. He will change things in the city. And if he’s involved? Then maybe when I meet with him, I should remember to take my knife.

Just in case.

Chapter 19

Resa

The party is in full flow when I step into the ballroom.

When I see how many people there are, I almost wish I hadn’t been in so much of a hurry to leave Everleigh, who might want to talk about things I’m not ready to talk about with anyone.

The party is to celebrate the soon to be open Ever Safe location. From the brief snatches of conversation I pick up, it’s in the last phase of construction. In under a month, the city will have another Pack Ashe owned free heat clinic, with another to follow two months later.

It’s like they’re planning to fill the city with Ever Safe clinics the way they’re throwing them up. If they’re doing it for Everleigh, and for omegas who won’t have to worry about an alpha sneaking into their heat suite like what happened to me, then maybe I might learn to like alphas after all.

No promises, but maybe.

Reporters sip on glasses of champagne as betas and alphas mingle. I’m not getting a whiff of omega scents, but with potent alpha pheromones dominating, there’s a reason for that.

Somewhere in this mass of bodies, Vaughn, Garrison, and Roman are weaving through the crowds. They must do this stuff all the time, yet they spent the forty-minute drive here talking it out like it was their first time.

Blaine would be in the back of the room, tucked in a corner, but still alert.

And hiding his scars, I’d thought when I caught him tugging the sleeve of his shirt down over the back of his right hand.

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