Page 80 of The Beta: Part Two
Jasper touches Talia’s shoulder and points to Mitchell’s body.
She nods and he goes to retrieve the keys.
Talia pulls one earbud from her ear, “where is Nathan?” Seth tries to answer, but she stops him, “I’m not ready to consider you a friend. After what just happened, and the state of you, I know enough to understand that we need to have a conversation. But as far as I’m concerned you’re still a piece of shit. Can I trust you to help get all of us out of here?”
Seth nods. And that must be enough for her.
“They took him. A while ago, probably a few days. I can feel him through our bond. He’s not doing well,” I say.
Jasper walks over with the bloody set of keys and starts trying them in the lock on my door. After what feels like an eternity he finds the one that works and then I’m free. He moves to Trent’s cell, and luckily the same key opens his door. He sticks the key in the lock, but Seth tells him to stop.
“I know this isn’t the time. I know that. But I have to say it now. I’ll say it a thousand more times. I’m so sorry, Talia. I knew it was wrong, but I didn’t know what else to do. If I didn’t let them see me do what I did, they would have kept on hurting you. Jay wanted to hurt you as much as he could, I think he wanted to rape you to death since he couldn’t make you be an omega. I’m so sorry. I’ll never be able to make it right. I did what I did so they wouldn’t. I tried not to hurt you, but it was still wrong. I don’t know what to do.”
Talia stares at him for a few breaths and then closes her eyes and takes several slow breaths. We all know we don’t have time for this, so she may be collecting her patience.
She isn’t, though. She was just collecting herself. “I understand. I don’t forgive you. Not yet. But I do understand. Where is Jay?”
“He’s up with the other rogues. He’s been with the rogues this whole time. His father is part of them. Derek, too. They were plants. This has been going on for so long. They were sent in when they were teenagers to get in with a powerful pack. It’s so fucked. And I had a pack bond with them. I killed Derek. I can’t feel the bond anymore. I killed him.”
Talia touches Seth’s chest through the bars, “I killed Derek. Not you. You kept him from hurting me while I did it. That’s all. Are you good?”
I watch Seth pull himself together, then he nods.
Jasper turns the key and we’re all out. “Do you know where they might have Nathan?” Jasper asks Seth.
“Probably in the other bunker. There are two, on opposite ends of the compound.”
The floor vibrates again.
“It’s Alex. He’s blowing the shit out of the perimeter,” Talia explains like she's reciting a grocery list. “Jasper, help me get these sleeves off. Still have the water guns?”
Water guns?
She takes out her other earbud and hands me the pair of them.
“What are these?” I ask her, turning them from side to side. They look like normal earbuds, just a little sturdier.
“Nathan made them,” Jasper answers, “they play sound at a frequency that blocks all other sound, especially alpha commands.” He wiggles his eyebrows at me. Of course he’s making me smile, even in a situation like this.
He starts unraveling the thin material of Talia’s sleeves, ending up with what amounts to a rope.
When I ask about it she says, “we couldn’t drag rope through the vents, and Jasper’s get up has all the fucking pockets. It’s bullshit, girls need pockets, too. Not the point. We’re going to set this place on fire. We didn’t know if there would be enough flammable material around when we found you, so Alex put this little ensemble together so we’d have enough to work with.”
She bends over and rips off the bottom part of her pants from the knees down, and proceeds to unravel them into the same ribbon-esque form. When she and Jasper are finished peeling apart her outfit, she’s left wearing what amounts to a sports bra and a pair of shorts. It’s just as hot to think of her fighting her way out of here with us dressed like that as it is horrifying. But, like she said, not the point.
Talia finds some papers in the drawers of the desk and rolls them together before she winds a bit of the end of her rope around it.
“Do you know if there’s a bed or a rug somewhere?” she asks Seth.
He nods, “yeah. When I first came here with the pack,” his voice quavers, but he shakes his head and continues, “when I first came here, they put us up in the barracks. It’s next to the room where they keep the omegas. It was so awful.”
“Omegas?” Talia clips, “what fucking omegas? Are they still here?”
Seth shakes his head again, “I don’t know. But we’ll pass there on the way to the other bunker. We have to get them out.”
“We will,” Jasper says.
Then we start the journey to the other side of the compound. Luckily, and strangely, we don’t come into contact with any rogues before we get to the barracks Seth told us about. Talia makes a little nest of blankets on one of the beds and puts her roll of papers in the center.
