Page 64 of Tangled in Knots

“That’s depressing,” Kane mutters. “Look, it’s late. If you really still want to go to the omega shelter tomorrow, I’ll take you.”

“Liar,” she says. “I don't believe a word that you have to say. Your father has this idea that he can use and abuse me over and over again until he’s ready to kill me.”

“It’ll never happen,” Kane says. “You will never step foot in an auction again. I swear on my mother.”

“Did you even know your mother?” Adira asks suspiciously, making me huff out a laugh.

“I didn’t,” I tell her. “We all have the same mother, but my father only kept her around until after she gave birth to me. Then he sent her back to the auctions.”

“It’s a cycle he knows well, which is why Duncan and Callum used it with Dad,” Jed adds on. “You can make our lives a living hell forever and I’ll cherish it. I know we deserve it.”

“I don’t want to be a closeted kept omega,” she tells him. “I want to be free. There’s so much I don’t know or understand. All you’re promising me is another prison. No thank you.”

“What do you want, Adira?” Morris asks.

“Other than to go backward in time?” she asks, snorting. “I wish I’d never met you. Everything in my life that’s shit revolves around the moment you kidnapped me and blew up my house.”

“Do you want to blow shit up?” Kane asks. “Seriously, you want to help us kill my father? Let’s fucking go. I don’t necessarily want to turn you into a killer and neither do my brothers, or Morris. That’s how we’re planning to keep you safe. Removing the players who want to hurt you.”

Adira sticks her hands in her pockets, gazing at Kane as she thinks. “That’s your plan? Murder?”

Jed sighs, and I know this isn’t something he necessarily wanted to talk about in front of the Kelly brothers.

“I’m not a fan of the man,” Callum says. “I would be more than happy to find out that he and his pack are pushing up tulips. They’re a menace, and everyone says so. People here whisper when they talk about Rock.”

“Here’s the thing though,” I drawl. “If he’s gone, there’s a vacuum in power that needs to be filled.”

“So fill it,” Adira says dully, rubbing her finger over something in her pocket.

“Let me see,” I say, hand stretched out. I want to know what is in her pants. Even though my hand is out, I don’t expect her to give it to me.

Pulling out a pocket knife, she shows it to me.

“Stabbing me isn’t going to get the reaction you expect,” Kane warns.

“I’m well aware,” she mutters. “You’re the only one I know that enjoys being strangled while masturbating.”

Duncan coughs as he covers up a laugh. “Keep the knife, Adira. Where are you boys staying?”

“Dad is headed back to Missouri,” Jed says. “I got the text on the way here. We’re going to get lost in the city while we regroup. So if you do decide that you want to try your luck at the shelter, Adira, I’ll drop you off there. We have a rental property I set up, so that’s where we’re going. There’s plenty of space, a nest, and several rooms.”

I can see the way she shivers at the thought of an actual nest, and I’m reminded again of how much we’ve failed her. Pushing myself up to my feet, I hook my thumbs into my pants.

“What’s it going to be?” I ask her.

“Shelter please,” she says without blinking, walking out of the kitchen.

“Well, you shot your shot,” Duncan mutters. “Rock won’t be able to find her there at least. I don’t know how this is going to end, but I’m invested. I plan to check in.”

“Really?” I groan.

“I don’t want her for me,” he states. “I see a girl who needs a friend who is surrounded by alphas who are thinking with their dicks. It may be the only way she finds her way through this.”

“I see her dead in a few months if not less if she continues like this,” Callum says, easily picking up the threat his brother left. “I put clothes on the table inside of the bathroom and she was just sobbing in the shower.”

“You went in while she was in the shower?” Morris asks, eyes wide.

“I didn’t look,” he says sheepishly. “There was so much steam, I could barely see the counter. Adira took a very long shower. I think Duncan is right about needing a friend in her corner.”

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