Page 138 of Defiant Beta

“It couldn’t wait,” Vincent says.

He gestures toward his office. “Let’s go to the office. You’re lucky it was movie night. Otherwise, we’d have all been asleep.”

“Movie night?” I ask. Then I hear it—the faint sound of a man yelling coming from behind a closed door on my left.

Garrison’s lip quirks. “Resa learned about the weekly movie night tradition Everleigh has with her pack and decided she wanted the same.”

“We had one the other day. What are you watching?” Vincent asks.

“28 Days Later. Deadly virus wipes out everyone,” Garrison says, shaking his head. “And before you ask, it was Resa’s choice. You?”

“John Wick.” I grin. “Della’s choice, and a damn good one.”

Even Vincent is nodding in agreement, and I can’t remember the last time he sat down long enough to watch a TV show, let alone a movie.

Della fell asleep toward the end, so we covered her with a blanket and continued watching. We’re all looking forward to the sequels with popcorn, candy, and a couch that’s more comfortable than the one we have.

Garrison makes a face. “I’ve seen it and I’m not recommending it to Resa.” He looks at Vince. “You’re enemy number one around here. She’ll be stabbing you in the neck with a pencil before the week is over.” In the office, he closes the door behind us. “You said you needed information.”

“Everything you can find about Ms. Huffman. She’s the wellness instructor at Haven Academy,” Vincent says as I take in the now-empty whiteboard.

They must be taking a break before starting their next case.

“Wellness instructor?” Garrison frowns.

“Fancy name for a PE teacher,” I explain.

Garrison’s confusion clears. “You think she was involved in Della’s abduction?”

Vincent has information about the men who took her. We have a lead. A big one. When the time is right, we’ll act on it.

“Not that. Something else.” He hesitates, and I wait for my brother to lie and keep secrets, two things he excels at. “We lost someone important years ago.”

I swear my heart stops beating. I clutch it to make sure.

Vincent glares at me. “There’s no need to stagger around like that. I’m not that closemouthed.”

I grin at him as I drop my hand and stop pretending I’m two seconds from collapsing on Garrison’s table. “You say that like I don’t know you.”

Shaking his head, Vincent turns back to Garrison. “Our omega. Aly. Alyson Russ. That’s who we lost. Someone killed her.”

Garrison swears under his breath, his brow furrowed in sympathy. “Shit. I can’t even imagine…”

An alpha’s omega is everything. Irreplaceable. Unforgettable. Losing her felt like someone had reached into my chest and cut out my heart. It changed all of us.

“That was a lifetime ago,” Vince says. “We want closure so we can all move on.”

With Della. It’s time to let go of the past and embrace a future none of us imagined we’d ever have.

“And Ms. Huffman might have had something to do with it?” Garrison asks.

“There have been omega murders in the area for the last ten years. That’s how we narrowed the search to the school. We checked the teacher’s records, and there was no indication that she was married, so her name might be different,” Vincent says.

Garrison takes out a notebook and jots down some notes. "Is there anything more you can share with me? Names are helpful.”

When Vincent glances at me, I give Garrison a brief rundown of the limo that passed through our small town on the day Alywent missing, along with our belief that there may have been more than just a wealthy couple in the vehicle.

Vincent takes over. “We found out that the husband, Lincoln Bradshaw, had died in a car accident. He was a drunk. His socialite wife vanished to Paris, and we were never able to track her down. If Ms. Huffman hid her previous marriage, what else could she be lying about?”

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