Page 176 of Sweetheart: Part One

“Afraid we wouldn’t want her?” Rook asked. “She’s fronting as a beta. It’s the only way we’d let her close—and she wasn’t wrong. We’d never have let her in here if we knew.”

Drake looked distraught as he lowered his phone. I could see his conflict. He was attached to her, I got that. We all fucking were. But for him, this meant more. He’d fought for her not to be here, and then he’d fallen hard.

“Why us, do you think?” Rook asked. “We’re known for donating to gold pack charities? Did she think maybe we’d…” He trailed off with a shrug.

Drake shrunk in his seat. “Does it… change anything for you guys?” his voice was weak, as he clearly warred with himself.

Changeanything? Fuck, I was still trying to detangle what was truth and what was lie.

“Even if it doesn’t, there’s the PR to think about,” Rook was saying. “It’s not that she’s gold pack, she lied to us and everyone knows.”

My mind flashed to Vex’s urgency as I scrolled up the article, to the photo of pills.

A heat suppressant.

Had she been going into heat?

No. She couldn’t have. I would have known, wouldn’t I?

But with ongoing suppressants, and…fuck. The fear in her eyes when I’d pushed her away.

And I’d…

I couldn’t focus, mind scattering a million places.

The contract, Eve had just fucked it.

A chill seeped into my bones as I finally tore my gaze from the phone and to the only person in the room that mattered right now.

And Ebony’s eyes were fixed on me, much too calm.

He had said nothing.

That was wrong.

He should be pouncing on this, using it to his advantage. But he wasn’t. He was still staring at me with the most chilling calm he’d ever offered.

He’d…known.

It was the truth that seized me. I believed it to my bones. Nothing else made sense. The news that Vex was an omega wasn’t news to him at all.

But… That didn’t fit.

Ebony despised omegas.

If he knew, he’d have used that truth to blow up Vex’s contract.

“We stay away from omegas because we can’t risk a scent match,” Drake was saying. “Butoneomega isn’t the end of the world.”

Icy dread slid down my spine at those words, the last puzzle piece finally slotting into place. Rook said something else, then Drake, but I didn’t hear it, my mind racing a million miles an hour.

Ebony had three states. Victory, action, and the prowl before the attack.

Right now, he was none of the former.

He was waiting for me, for my verdict, which meant he had stakes in the game. Massive stakes, by the tension of his body.

And that confirmed the nightmare I’d just found myself in.

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