Page 43 of Knot Ruined

And I will never forget how the man on the other end of that call sounded.

The moment he answered, his voice was soft, hesitant—like he had already resigned himself to never hearing from her again.

I swallowed hard, choosing my words carefully. “Hi, my name is Fallon. My pack is the Rosetti pack. We recently…” I pause, searching for a way to say it that won’t break him. “Acquired something that was stolen from you. That we would very much like to return.”

There’s a beat of silence. Then his voice shifts. It goes from tired and broken to sharp and cautious, words carefully measured.

“The Rosetti pack?” A pause. “I’m aware of the company and their reputation for… acquisitions.”

I matched his tone, keeping it deliberately business-like. “Ah yes, we came across something that belongs to you while acquiring other missing assets.”

His breath shudders so hard that he suddenly breaks into a coughing fit.

And then Mary, leaning heavily against my shoulder, manages to whisper in the weakest, rasping voice—“Miles.”

The sound that comes through the phone shatters me.

A loud, gut-wrenching sob rips through the line, followed by chaos in the background. Desperate voices demanding to know what’s happening, people scrambling. That sound still haunts my dreams. I wake up in terror most nights. I’ve seen a lot of things since I became their wife, but that sound. It was the worst thing that I’ve ever witnessed.

After several more promises, I gave him the address and hung up. Less than thirty minutes later, her pack arrived. I was still helping Mary to the door when they stormed inside. She could barely walk, the sweats hanging too loose off her starved frame, making her steps uncertain. But the moment she saw them, she let out a broken, breathy sob, and her legs gave out.

I managed to keep her up and stepped aside as they grabbed her, cradling her like she was the most precious thing in the world.

Their reunion solidified everything for me.

This.

This is why we do the things we do.

The four of them came home that night exhausted and covered in blood. Jace was the first thing I saw, a fresh bandage wrapped tightly around his arm. His face was hard, pissed off, coiled like a predator still waiting to strike.

I felt my stomach drop, panic clawing up my throat. “Jace.”

Kingston barely glanced up from where he was rolling his sleeves back down. “It’s nothing. Just a graze.”

I whipped back to Jace, my eyes scanning him for anything worse. He let out a long, slow breath, shaking his head.

“A bullet just skimmed me. It’s more of a burn than a wound.”

I still fretted over him, hovering, hands hovering over his arm, but before I could really spiral, he grabbed me.

One hard yank and I was flush against his chest, my breath catching.

Then he buried his face in the juncture of my neck and shoulder, breathing me in, holding me so tight it felt like he was trying to anchor himself with my scent.

I melted into him, exhaling slowly.

They’ve done three more extractions since that night. Some of the omegas were taken and almost lost forever.

Violet’s voice brings me back to the call. “O, are you going to the gym because you want to or because someone made you think you were less?”

My heart aches when Odette falls silent, the screen still filled with her hesitant expression before she carefully schools it into something neutral.

Odette is stunning, yet I know she doesn’t see herself as we do. She’s curvy, full-figured in a way that screams soft, feminine power. She isn’t even overweight—just generously built, with plush curves that only add to her beauty. But because her waistline isn’t tiny, because she doesn’t fit into the rigid, suffocating beauty standards shoved down our throats, she’s endured more than her fair share of snide comments and cruel whispers.

Not from her family, thankfully. If either Violet or I had ever heard so much as a peep of that kind of bullshit, there would have been hands thrown immediately.

“Odette,” I start, my throat tightening, trying to find something, anything, to say that might convince her to see herself the way we do.

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