Page 118 of Scent of Home

Erin stands up and turns very slowly. Her face is mercurial, glacial. The atmosphere is dangerous and crackling with electricity. I push to my feet, turning to face the people I’ve lived with all my life.

I can’t lose him. I can’t.

So who the fuck just lured our omega away from our pack?

Chapter thirty-five

Erin

The diner is chockfull of people. Old, young, faces I’ve seen before and faces I haven’t. They are talking amongst themselves, but I can feel the tension in the air. There is a pack missing an omega, and that can be felt, no one can still easily when an alpha goes to war.

I turn my back on it all, fury swimming through my veins. I clear my voice and look around me before I make a decision and turn to face them.

“Hey!” I shout.

The silence is immediate.

“You don’t know me well yet. But you will. My name is Erin Bradley. I’m a contract lawyer from Chesterfield. My parents died years ago, but my aunt raised me alone. I like chocolate and live and breathe coffee. I was dating a man who lied. It turns out he was married, had a whole family in another town. Well, I got my revenge and dumped his ass. I was told to come on a vacation to clear my head. I am ruthless, I don’t let slights pass. If you fuck me, believe me when I tell you, I will fuck you back. That man has now lost everything: respect, his wife, his child, his job, his reputation. Because that’s how I roll. On the second week of my enforced holiday, I got on a bus and met the most incredible man.”

I glare around at all the people staring back at me.

“That omega is my scent match. I will destroy everyone involved in keeping him from me. If I can destroy a man I don’t care about so thoroughly, imagine how bad it’s going to be if something happens to the love of my life. Someone told someone something, and that information is keeping my omega out of my hands.”

Alma steps forward. “Are you threatening us?”

I shake my head, smiling. “Oh, no, this is a promise. I will burn this town and all your quaint little river shit to the ground. Bring me my omega!” My voice thunders into the room. The force of my bark making a few people step back.

“Finn?” Alma whispers.

Finn glances at her and shakes his head. “I’m sorry, Alma. Locke needs a hero. He needs it more than this town needs me. Someone told the people who hurt him where to find him. Someone from this town.”

She blinks in amazement and looks to Brayson, who has just stormed into the diner.

“Where is my omega?” Bray shouts, his hard expression sweeps over everyone and stops on Erin. “I can feel it!” He says and lays a hand over his chest.

“You don’t know me well,” Shane says softly. “But he is my reason for living. If I don’t have him, there is nothing.”

Alma cries out and steps back. She turns to the crowd, her hand gripping the base of her throat. “Who told people Locke Raines was here?”

The diner is so silent that you could drop a pin and it would be heard.

“Tell me now!” Alma cries out. “Finn and Bray are one of us! Shane is one of us. These are their people. That makes them ours, and we protect our own! Who told people that Locke Raines was here?”

The silence is thick. For a long time, I think no one is going to answer her, and then the crowd parts, and Jess is dragged forward. Her face is red, but it’s the guilt I read there that ignites my temper.

“What did you do?” I ask coldly.

She shakes her head. She looks so damn pitiful with that broken leg. Her eyes are enormous, and she trembles.

“Tell them,” the older woman says. She could be Jess in twenty-five years.

Jess gulps and shakes her head. A tiny movement that turns my temper into an inferno.

“Tell me who you told!” I bark out, my voice almost ringing in the small space.

She whimpers but opens her mouth, and the words pour out.

“I didn’t mean to do anything bad. Erin, please, I was embarrassed. I recognised him as soon as he got off the bus, and I snapped a photo and uploaded it to my social media. It was awesome to have Locke ‘Razor’ Raines in our little town. I thought it would be fine. Everyone does it. I kept adding more and more to it. Every time I saw him, I added a new photo. I didn’t tell anyone. It wasn’t a big deal. People do it all the time.”

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