Page 104 of The Gamma's Second Chance

My phone rings as she walks away, and I sigh as I remove it from my pocket. I want to ignore it, but with everything that’s happening, I can’t.

“Hello?” I say, answering it without checking who it is.

“Hey. It’s Ben.”

Cassandra perks up a little and I sit up straighter, too. “What’s going on?” I ask.

“I wanted to check on my sister,” he says.

I glance at her. Her eyes water at his words and the genuine concern that is clear in his voice. I embrace her waist and kiss her shoulder. “She’s healed.”

He lets out a sigh of relief. “That’s good.” He’s quiet for a moment, then he swallows and says, “I also have some information. I wouldn’t bother you with it, since I know you’re focusing on taking care of Cassandra, but I forgot Wes and Haven don’t have phones right now, and I couldn’t get ahold of Reid or Sebastian.”

“Reid and Seb are checking on the remaining pack members who were at the ball with us,” I say. “What’s the information?”

“It’s about the fire. They found evidence of a bomb in Haven and Wesley’s room.”

Cassandra’s spoon clatters against the side of her bowl, and she almost drops her dish before setting it on the table. “A bomb?” I repeat. My parents’ eyes widen and a heavy silence falls over the dining room.

“There was a trip wire attached to the door, so when it opened, the device ignited. The room was drenched in lighter fluid or gasoline or something incredibly flammable, which is how it grew so hot so quickly,” Ben says.

I frown and glance at Cassandra, whose face is as pale as snow, her eyes distant. “So the fire started when I opened the door? It wasn’t going already?” I ask.

“No,” Cassandra says, shaking her head slowly. “I saw it. Right before it happened. That’s why I pushed you out of the way.”

“But who would do that? And why?” I ask.

Her jaw ticks, and her distant eyes burn with anger, her hands curling into fists. “Kimberly,” she says, her voice a growl and her lip curling.

My mouth goes dry. “How do you know?”

Her nostrils flare as she keeps glaring at nothing. “I saw that too. Just now. When Ben said there was a bomb in Haven’s room.”

Anger fills every muscle in her body, and I know she’s fighting every instinct in her to stay here instead of racing to the packhouse to give Kimberly a piece of her mind and her fists.

“You can’t attack her unprovoked,” I remind her in a low voice. “She still has her chosen mate’s mark. She’s still a luna. It’s against our laws.”

She snarls and slams a fist on the table. “She attackedourluna!”

“The only proof we have of that is your split-second vision. It’s your word against hers,” Ben says.

Her jaw drops open. “But—”

“We believe you,” I clarify, lifting my hands and gesturing at my parents and nodding at the phone, where Ben is still listening to our conversation. “But until we find solid evidence or she confesses, that won’t be enough.” I place my hand on her hip and give it a pulsing squeeze. “Trust me, I want to tear her apart just as bad as you do for attempting to hurt our luna, but we have to do this correctly.”

“Nolan is right,” Ben agrees with a sigh. “For now, you need to tell Wes and Haven and get ahold of King Malachi so he can get the truth from her.”

I nod and Cassandra does too, albeit a bit reluctantly, and she jumps from my lap as I end the call with Ben and reach out to Wesley through the pack mindlink.“Where are you?”

“At the packhouse,”he says.“What’s up?”

“I’ll tell you when we get there.”

I get to my feet after I reply to him. “Thank you for the food,” I say to my mom, ducking to kiss her cheek, even though I didn’t even eat a bite of it. “We’ll be back soon.”

I wave at both her and my dad as I leave, following a speed-walking Cassandra out of the house.

A million questions run through my brain as we rush towards the packhouse, but all of them start with the same word: why?

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