"Everything else?"
"The Carter’s online campaign against you." She meets my eyes, and there's real concern there, real warmth. "It's obviouslycoordinated but that doesn't make it easier to live through. Someone's spending real money to make you look bad "
I sit back in my chair. It’s weird. I know that this is what they’re doing, but having someone like Laura Day confirm it out loud somehow makes me feel better about the whole thing.
The people who matter know exactly what the Cranes are doing.
"I'm managing," I say.
I think about Carter, standing in some Crane family meeting, reviewing the latest attack lines. Approving them. Maybe writing them himself.
Then I think about Carter last night, in that hotel room, his hand over my mouth to muffle the sounds I was making while he fucked me from behind.
Laura nods slowly. Her eyes are sharp. She's been doing this too long to miss the signs of someone struggling, but she doesn't push.
"If you need anything," she says. "Time off, security support, whatever. Just ask. We protect our people here."
We protect our people.
I take a sip of water. My hand shakes slightly. I set the glass down before Laura notices.
Would you protect me if you knew?I want to ask.Would you still call me 'your people' if you knew what I've been doing?
The answer sits heavy in my stomach.
No. She wouldn't. None of them would.
They believe I'm a principled journalist who took on a corrupt dynasty. Someone with integrity. Someone worth defending.
They have no idea what I really am.
I make it to five o'clock.
"Go home," Laura says, catching me at the elevator. "First days are exhausting. Get some rest."
I smile and thank her and push the button and wait for the doors to open. The cramps are getting worse. There's slick gathering between my thighs—not much, not yet, but enough that I'm hyperaware of it with every step. My temperature is spiking. My skin feels like it's been rubbed with sandpaper.
Tomorrow,I think.Maybe the day after.
That's all the time I have.
The subway is a nightmare.
Its rush hour and the cars are packed with bodies pressed together, heat and noise and too many scents competing for space. I wedge myself into the corner by the doors and try to breathe through my mouth.
It doesn't help. I can still smell them—all of them—alphas and betas and omegas layered over each other, sweat and cologne and perfume. Every inhale makes my head swim.
An alpha standing near me shifts his weight. His arm brushes mine.
The contact is accidental. He probably doesn't even notice.
I notice. My whole body notices. Heat floods through me, pooling low in my belly, and I have to lock my knees to keep from swaying toward him.
Not him, my body says.Wrong. Wrong scent.
But it's responding anyway to the simple presence of an alpha in my space.
This is what they mean, I think, staring at the grimy floor of the subway car.This is exactly what they mean when they call me an obsessed omega.
