Page 81 of Defiant Beta

“Why?”

He lifts his head to look at me. “Because that’s part of our deal.”

“I need more than that.”

One dark eyebrow arches. “More?”

“Yes. I’m not just going to agree until I know why.”

He takes chicken, peppers, and mushrooms from the refrigerator and places them on the counter next to a massive stainless-steel stove. “That’s a big question.”

“No, it’s not. It’s straightforward.”

“Perhaps,” he says in the tone of someone who disagrees.

I watch him dice chicken into thin strips. “What are you doing?”

“Making a chicken stir fry.”

“Why?”

“Because. Tell me everything you remember from the abduction.”

Terror clenches my heart, and a cold sweat covers me from head to toe.

I gulp. “Everything?”

He glances at me and adds in a softer voice. “Names, facial descriptions, things like that. Things I can use to identify and track a person.”

I hesitate.

He waits.

I want to say nothing, but I was the one pushing him for a deal. I’d help him, and he’d help me find the alphas who hurt me. His job is going to be significantly harder, if not downright impossible, if I don’t give him something useful.

“Okay,” I eventually say.

I tell him the names I remember and describe the faces of the men who took me. Even though he resumes chopping vegetables as he listens. Something about the way he listens makes me think I could ask him a week from now what I told him and he’d remember every word.

I watch him whip up a chicken stir-fry in minutes, loaded with veggies, chicken, and fresh egg noodles. My mouth waters and my stomach grumbles when ginger, garlic, and soy sauce hit the sizzling skillet.

My mind may struggle with the idea of food, but my stomach isn’t facing that problem.

I blink, surprised when he plates up a single dish and sets it in front of me. “What’s this?”

He presses a fork into my hand. “What does it look like? Chicken stir-fry. Eat.”

I take the fork, since he’s not giving me any choice. He scoops the leftovers into a glass container, placing the lid beside it, presumably to allow it to cool before covering.

“Aren’t you eating?”

He pours a glass of water and places it in front of me. “Here. I’m not hungry.”

I open my mouth to complain, only for him to walk out of the kitchen and return moments later with a file, which he places on the kitchen island beside me and flips open.

“What are you doing?” I ask, squinting at the paper.

Honestly, the first words are so dull that I’m instantly bored out of my mind by whatever corporate nonsense he’s reading.

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