Page 114 of Bonding the Band

The rest of the drive was easy, after I had passed most of the road construction and managed to find a decent hotel not far from where Clover lived. The entire drive, I had been watching Meadow’s location like a stalker. Once I’d figured out she was on a train, that made following her a lot easier, though I seriously regretted having to lose time to sleeping so I wasn’t a danger to anyone on the road.

Thankfully, once her dot had hit Seattle, she’d stayed mainly in one place.

Mere moments after I checked into the hotel room, the rest of my pack arrived.

“Did you only just get here?” Phin asked, taking in my unwashed state.

“Yeah, I thought driving would be faster,” I grumbled.

Hendrix looked rough as he sank down onto one of the beds. Poor guy had been detoxing from all the crap Gary had been giving him, and while I didn’t know what that would feel like, if it made Hendrix look likethat, it couldn’t have been fun.

“Go take a shower. We need to talk as a pack before we go see Meadow,” Beckett instructed.

“But it’s already getting late,” I pouted.

Beckett shrugged. “Then we will have to go see her in the morning. We have shit to discuss, and she hasn’t answered us once. We’re not going to knock down her door and force her to talk to us.”

I nodded. He had a point, even if I was unhappy that I couldn’t run straight to our omega and beg her to snuggle with us. I could suffer a while longer through the early phases of bonding sickness so Meadow didn’t get overwhelmed.

Twenty minutes later, we all sat around the hotel room, freshly showered and with a couple of extra large pizzas in front of us for dinner. Exhaustion weighed on all of us.

“We need to figure out our next steps.” Hendrix sighed, running his hand over his hair.

Beckett nodded. “We do. Gary and Ellie shouldn’t be problems anymore. Our lawyers are confident they can get enough evidence together, and we’ve got emergency restraining orders in case they make bail. Though, given some of the crimes were against a pregnant omega, the odds of either of them being granted bail are pretty slim.”

“All the band’s accounts are being investigated,” Hendrix added, presumably for my benefit, since I’d been all by my lonesome while they were sorting all this shit out. “We’re expecting embezzlement to be added to the list of charges.”

“So, how do we ensure this never happens again?” Beckett asked. “There’s no point in us going to see Meadow if we don’t have a plan. This happened because of us, because of our careers, and it’s our job to make sure she’s never in danger like that again.”

Phin sighed, his leg jiggling anxiously as he spoke. “Look, I’ll be real with you guys. I love making music, but I’m happy to walk away and never look back. This whole situation is fucked.”

“I agree.” I nodded. “It’s been fun, but if the cost is Meadow’s safety, I’m done.”

Beckett and Hendrix both agreed. It was a somber thought, leaving the band behind, but there wasn’t a single person in the room who wouldn’t do it in a heartbeat for Meadow. We could always look at it again in a few years if Meadow felt safe enough, and we could make music for ourselves without needing to go on tours or put out records.

“Can we back out of any company Gary was involved with?” I asked. “If we don’t quit the industry outright, I don’t want to work with anyone who’s been working closely with him.”

“I’ll get a list,” replied Beckett. “That’s going to be a lot of people and companies, but I’m not opposed to severing our contracts with all of them over this.”

“Also, we can’t keep treating Meadow like she’s our dirty little secret. I’m fucking proud of her and want to scream from the rooftops that I love her,” Phin said.

“I do want people to know about her, but in a way, I’m glad we kept it a bit quiet, so she never had to deal with having the paparazzi up her ass every time she tried to go outside. If we give the world her name, they’re going to harass her.”

“Yeah,” I said, “but that also meant all those women thought we were single. The VIP gals wouldn’t have been trying to climb all over us if they’d known we had an omega.”

Beckett pursed his lips. “I’ll add extra bodyguards to the list, so we can be doubly sure Meadow is safe once the world knows she’s ours. Assuming she wants us to tell them who she is.”

“That sounds fair,” Hendrix agreed. “They’ll find out who she is, eventually, and we all have to be prepared for that.”

Beckett nodded. “I…I may have asked our realtor about a property in Lakelyn Fields.”

My eyebrows shot up. “That place isfancy, one of LA’s best neighborhoods.Are you trying to woo her with pretty houses? I’m not sure that’s Meadow’s vibe.”

Beckett snorted. “It’s not, but when she sees the nests—plural—she may think otherwise. I picked it because it has the best community security in the region, short of us hiring a full team ourselves.”

“Damn, that place is like a fortress!” Phin was scrolling through his phone, turning it to me so I could snoop easier. “That’s where Hunter and his pack live, right? We needed toshow ID last time we visited, and even then, the security dude frisked Arlo.”

Oh yeah, I’d forgotten about that. Security had clearly decided that I looked shifty. In fairness, I did have a glitter bomb in my pocket to christen their new house…

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