Page 87 of The Beta: Part One

Chapter 31

Devon

When Kaleb returns with Nathan and Trent, Jasper is in full heat. I am barely able to keep focus enough to keep from losing myself to rut. Talia is not with them, and one look at Kaleb's eyes, burning with rage and regret, tells me that they couldn't get to her in time. The rogues have either taken her or killed her. Either way, she's lost to us.

Guilt is rolling from the three of them in dark, heavy waves. I'm just grateful that Jasper isn't coherent enough right now to know Talia isn't coming. I start to say something, but Trent just shakes his head and scoops up Jasper's limp, sweat-slick body from his makeshift nest on the frigid floor of the freezer, and we follow them upstairs. Nathan stops in the security room to set the new alarms and other protocols in place and then joins us in Jasper's room. I already called the extra security team I had on standby, they're one of Elizabet's teams. I hired them just after Jasper's last heat. Talia was a perfect sentry, but we need more now.

Jasper whimpers and asks Kaleb if he will bring Talia to the nest. I haven't seen Kaleb's cool demeanor drop since we were barely into puberty but it drops now, if only for a second. “As soon as I can, angel. Let's take care of you until then.”

Then he does. We all do. We focus so intently on wringing pleasure from Jasper that he doesn't have time to beg for her. We know what to expect this time, and the unspoken goal is to exhaust him past the point of missing her. He still begs for her, though, just before he falls asleep between waves of insidious need.

Two days later one of the new alarms goes off, alerting to two different breaches on opposite ends of the property. I'm shoving a shirt over my head when I get a message from the security detail telling me that the front door will be momentarily vulnerable while they investigate the alerts. I force my legs into a pair of sweats and walk to the front door, grabbing my gun from my dresser on the way. Thank fuck Jasper's heat is dissipating, otherwise I may not have been able to break away from him long enough to fill the crack in our defense.

When I get to the door I hear wheels tearing down the driveway and I yank open the door. The stink of blood, semen, piss, and whatever else hits my senses like a freight train, and I trip over something when I try to step out onto the porch. I look down and see Talia, or what used to be.

She is naked, covered in blood and bruises, dirt and cum. There's too much blood covering too many places. Her legs are smeared with it, among so many other awful things. I can't bring myself to look below her waist in any detail, not yet. I can't see her front, but I can tell by just looking at her that she's been broken.

I look out into the yard as far as I can but all I see is the dust that was spread when the vehicle tore down the driveway. I bend down to check for a pulse but before I can touch her she takes a hissing breath and chokes out, “Inside. Get inside. Hurry.”

I pick her up, ignoring the filth she's covered in, and lay her on the kitchen table. “Don't move.” I order quietly, gently, “I'm going to go get Kaleb. Don't move.”

She blinks at me with her eyes nearly swollen shut and gives the tiniest nod.

I try not to run back to Jasper's room, but I end up running anyway. I open the door just wide enough to hiss Kaleb's name. He looks over his shoulder from where he's knelt in front of Jasper. Whatever he sees on my face has him pulling away from our pouting omega and shoving Trent in his place as he stalks to the door. He opens it barely wide enough to get out, but it was a mistake.

Jasper smells Talia even through all the mess coating her, and calls out for her. Then his face falls in wretched despair, “What's wrong with her?” He looks at me, “What happened? What happened to her?”

He's going to panic soon, and then there will be two catastrophes to handle at the worst possible time.

“Stay with Trent, Jasper. Stay in this room. Do you understand me?” He nods, but he's looking past me into the hallway.

“Jasper!” I bark, inserting every ounce of alpha authority I possess into my voice, “Do not take one step outside of this room. Do you understand?”

He balks, we never use the alpha tone with him, but he nods.

“I'm afraid,” he whispers, and Trent and Nathan sandwich him between them, purring hard to try to calm him.

“I know you are, baby, I know you are. But right now I need you to do what I say. Talia is alive, and she will be well. She's in the kitchen, but you can't go in there yet. I need you to listen to me, just for now.”

He nods again, and his eyes are huge; made to look even bigger because his heat-gone pupils are blown so big I can barely make out the thin ring of green around them. When the door clicks shut behind Kaleb he whispers, “Is it bad?”

I nod, “It's really fucking bad.”

Talia didn't move an inch, not that I think she could anyway. But as Kaleb and I approach the table where I left her she tenses and I can hear what that movement cost her by her sharp, little gasp.

Kaleb starts purring for her. I don't think he realizes he's doing it.

“I'm going to touch you now, Talia. Do you know if anything is broken?” I ask and wait for her acknowledgment before I put my hands on her.

She takes another small, ragged breath, “No bones. Maybe my nose, I don't know. A lot of tearing, I’m ripped apart. Everything hurts. Don't let Jasper see. Please don't let him see.”

I’m startled to find that I'm also purring, “I won't let him see,” I tell her. Then she blacks out.

Kaleb and I both move our hands over her exposed side and flip her onto her back. Her front is a raw mess. There are bites and claw marks covering her skin, bruises staining pale flesh. Her pubic area is a swollen ruin of caked blood and semen. We have to get her to a hospital.

I look up to find Kaleb's eyes waiting for mine, “We'll clean her up first. Then take her.”

I hate myself then, because I have to refuse, “No, we can't. They need to do a rape kit. You know they left proof inside her.”

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