“I’m Alexandra St. Clair, and I own the leases on several of these buildings. I need to know what’s going on.” I feel the warmth of her arm press against mine, but I’m still scanning the crowd, looking for anyone that I know. My heart clenches as I spot a familiar dark-haired police officer standing near a cruiser.
“Lee! It’s Lydia!” I shout over to him, waving.
Officer Nyueng does a double take before striding over to the barrier. He looks tired, but he still has a small, polite grin pulling up at the corner of his lips.
“What are you doing here? Did the detective call you already?” he asks when he’s close enough.
“Detective? No, I don’t–Gabby Fitzgerald. Her and her grandmother live above Wila’s. Have you seen them?” I ask, feeling almost frantic.
Lee shifts his weight from one foot to the other, looking behind him. He nods to the firefighter, who just shrugs and moves off a little way down the line.
“Come with me. You, too, Ms. St. Clair. You’re going to want to see this,” Lee says, dropping his voice to barely louder than a whisper.
I look at Lex, and her face is drawn, her mouth pulled down in a frown. Unease settles into my gut as Lee helps Lex and me around the barrier and leads the way farther down the block. We weave around EMS and firefighters, trying to keep up and out of the way as they rush back and forth. The air gets hotter as we approach Wila’s and I dare to glance up at the row of buildings on the block. There are ladder trucks parked nearest to the building with their baskets extended, several figures silhouetted against the flames from below. Many of the windows are broken, and figures move on the roofs, appearing and disappearing between plumes of smoke.
Nothing could have prepared me for what I would see as we reach the stretch of sidewalk across the street from Grandmother Wila’s Flower Shoppe. The retail area is bright orange with fire, the front window displays consumed. The second-floor windows glow from within, but not as much as the ground floor. But what strikes me the most is the paint still visible on the plate-glass windows.
OMEGA WHORE
My next exhale comes out as a sob, and my vision blurs with tears for a moment before they slide down my cheeks. Guilt drops on me like a piano, discordant and crushing and splintering. This is my fault. This is all my fault. I don’t know how. I don’t know why. But someone did this awful thing because of me.
“Lydia!”
I turn at the sound of my name, just in time to catch a flash of dark braids before a body crashes into me. I breathe in my best friend’s scent, clutching her tightly as she sobs into my shoulder. My legs feel like they’re about to give out at any moment, but I manage to stay upright.
“I’m so fucking sorry, babe. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” I babble through my sobs.
“No, don’t do that. It’s not your fault—”
“Yes, it is. This is my fault, all my fault—I’m so sorry,” I gasp out, dissolving into tears again.
“Mrs. Fitzgerald, I’m so sorry,” Lex says from beside me.
I glance up to find Wila standing just behind Gabby, her face an unreadable mask as she stares at the building that has been her home and livelihood for decades. There’s a sadness in the depths of her dark brown eyes that I pray I’ll never have to experience. She nods in response to Lex’s sympathy, but doesn’t speak. And then a single tear slides down her wrinkled cheek, and what little strength I had left in me gives way. Gabby and I sink into a heap on the sidewalk, sobbing and shaking as we watch the fire burn.
Even with the soaking rain from earlier, it takes several hours for the fire to be declared under control. My back aches, and my ass is numb from sitting on the concrete for so long without moving, but I’ve lost all connection between my mind and body. Gabby’s limbs are intertwined with mine, and I can feel her slow, even breathing. My eyes have been fixed on the front window of Wila’s, the painted accusation somehow still there.
Lex has been in full business mode, making calls and speaking with emergency services. Mateo has been moving among the crowd, and I’ve seen him put a few groups into taxis. I don't know where Rhett and Lucas are, but I haven’t seen them around. Which, right now, isn’t such a bad thing after that disaster at dinner.
I snuggle into Gabby a little, trying to chase away the acrid burning building scent in my nose with her caramel candy apple essence. Something, anything, familiar and safe. But we’re both covered in ash, and I only manage to make myself cough. I let my head hang, trying to breathe through the weight crushing down on me.
My mind has been working in fits and spurts, trying to find the logic or reasoning to this senseless act. But I can’t find the missing link. What did I do for someone to get angry enough to commit arson? I try to replay the last few weeks, going over every moment to find some transgression that would be bad enough for someone to destroy a stranger’s home and livelihood.
Movement on my free side pulls me out of my thoughts, and I turn to Lex settling on the curb beside me. Her hair is frazzled, with flecks of white and gray throughout. There’s a smudge of something across her forehead, and her normally placid features are tight. The last of the flames reflect strangely in her eyes, the color dull and gaze a thousand miles away.
“I just got a call from my public relations team. The Review got a submission a few minutes ago,” she starts in a hoarse monotone.
I swallow, the smoke coating my mouth turning my stomach.
“It’s a video, some nutjob in a ski mask rambling for forty minutes about how Seth is the most victimized omega to ever walk the planet. They would have trashed it as just another crazy trying to get their fifteen minutes of fame, but he kept talking about some blog post. The editor looked into it, and, well…”
Lex scrolls for a moment before angling her screen for me to see. My heart drops as I read the bold headline and photo. I only skim the text, but phrases like ‘unworthy slut,’ ‘faithless, lying disgrace,’ and ‘omega whore’ jump out the most. The author goes on and on, painting me as this homewrecking liar hell-bent on destroying the lives of Pack St. Clair. And apparently, my plan involves conspiring with Lucas to drive Lex and Mateo away from Seth.
They paint Lucas as this mastermind, as Pack Enemy Number One, and I’m his agent of destruction, and anyone who supports us is against all things good and pure, or some other bullshit. All of this is accompanied by a pair of photos, one of me and Mateo outside of Wila’s, loading flowers into the back of his SUV, and another with me in the same outfit, this time kissing Lucas outside of Wila’s. I know those photos were taken several weeks apart, but the editing is deceptive enough to imply I went right from making eyes at Mateo to being intimate with Lucas.
I look away when I feel my stomach clenching, and the back of my throat burns.
“The video doesn’t show the fire, but you can see Wila’s window displays in the background near the end,” Lex drones, putting her phone away.