Half the shifters lowered their eyes to the second-most dominant one in the room, while the dragon just smirked.
Not for the first time I was glad to be scent matched into such a strong pack. The four of us were enough, we didn’t even need the omega.
I settled in beside Kellan, who avoided looking my way. It bothered me that he was still pissed, but I would make it up to him later. For now, I focused on Hunter as he detailed the series of events from the attack.
“Emme was woken just before five by a call from Beta Jones Shaw, one of our security guards. He told her that Chelsea had left a bag at the guard’s hut for her, and since Emme had been expecting books from the omega, she thought nothing of it. We were in the gym, so she hurried down in the hopes of getting back before we finished. It was our guards who called her, and she trusted that they wouldn’t hurt her. The fact that a traitor came into our employment will be dealt with swiftly, but for now we need to figure out who else was involved.”
Emmeline just stood there, her body tense even as her face remained expressionless. I didn’t know anything about the omega, but I’d seen trauma in the mirror before, and it was clear that while Hunter relived her attack, she had retreated into herself.
“Another of our guards, Beta Harry Stilson is dead,” Hunter continued, and I felt a pang at the loss of life from such a young shifter. No matter what else happened here, he was the one who deserved justice and retribution. The omega was fucking fine. “His death will not go unpunished,” Hunter echoed my thoughts, “even if it takes us months to track every last one of them down.”
Kellan nodded. “Yep. We only made it in time to save Emme because he called us after he was ordered away.”
With that statement Emmeline gasped, her face crumpling as she rubbed her hand over her eyes. I hadn’t noticed until now, but her hair hung in wet strands around her face, and she was dressed in ratty old sweats. “Harry saved my life,” she choked out in a soft voice. She was generally filled with sass and attitude, but today she appeared dull and transparent. “Jones was one more hit from crashing through the door, and I wasn’t strong enough to fight him off. I hit him as hard as I could with a tree branch, and he was only down for seconds.”
The council started to shout questions, but Slade’s rumble silenced them all in an instant. “My team will investigate any shifter who was in the area at the time of the attack,” he said. “We have many new alphas and shifters here for the Summit, which will make it difficult to trace those out of place. Everyone is out of place.”
Warrick started to pace close to where we stood. “Clearly whoever is behind this attack wanted to take advantage of the confusion of the Summit.” A snarl ripped from his chest that made it sound as if he was taking this quite personally.The fucking alpha she chose over us.“I promised to keep Emme safe, and I’ll be patrolling the streets with my squad for the next week to ensure nothing like this happens again.”
Emmeline shot him a grateful smile, and it pissed me right off that she offered such a kindness to an alpha that wasn’t even hers. She’d fallen right into their pack like they were her scent matches, while simultaneously rejecting us. There was a reason I believed her to be toxic to our pack dynamic, and she had proven it time and time again.
Hunter wrapped his arm around the omega, and I was surprised when she let herself rest against him. Their scents were intertwined, and upon closer inspection I could see faint remnants of bites and hickeys across her tanned throat.
Kellan had warned me that our entitled alpha had laid his claim after her attack. If his wolf went wild, he wouldn’t be sated until she was safe in his arms. No doubt Emmeline took advantage of that situation, lapping up whatever Hunter offered, while walking away with no promises for a future.
They weren’t bonded, that much was clear. She wore only superficial marks, which would fade soon enough.
“Is there a reason you haven’t bonded her into your pack yet?” Sissily piped up, her voice dripping in condescension. “You’d save us all a lot of trouble if you kept youromegasafe, and not a free wolf wandering around for all to scent.”
If she bonded into our pack, our scents would mix and she’d wear our bites to warn all other shifters that she was off limits. We’d also be able to feel her through the bond and know when she was in trouble. Not that Emmeline gave a single fuck.
Kellan’s voice grew uncharacteristically hard. “The fact that she’s living in our house should be warning enough, and it needs to be known that we will destroy any shifter who touches our mate.”
I hated the threads of sorrow in his voice. I needed Kellan’s upbeat nature to keep me from drowning in my past, which was another reason to wish the omega had never ventured into our lives.
Almost everyone ignored Sissily, choosing instead to discuss their next course of action. I forced myself to breathe through my annoyance, hoping this wouldn’t impact today’s game. That had to go ahead, kicking off the season, and returning us to our normal routines.
“We will bring Harry’s body to his family,” Alpha Geralson said, his voice breaking. “He was a good kid, and I will be promising them that this will not go unpunished.”
The scent of chocolate and honey grew stronger and deeper as Emmeline’s sadness seeped through the room, and whiletechnically she didn’t do anything wrong, I wasn’t about to cut her any slack. She might not have tried to run, but she should have let one of us know she was heading out on her own. She’d been warned of the dangers of being an unmated omega.
I wasn’t about victim blaming, but it was hard not to argue that some fault rested with her. She was an omega and knew the dangers. Knew and ignored.
At some point Emme would be forced to choose her future, but it’d be too late for me.
I’d never bond her into the quintet.
Fucking never.
Chapter
Thirty-Eight
Kellan and Hunter refused to leave my side.
After the other council members left, Slade took his squad out into pack lands to trace scents and investigate, and a company arrived to repair the gates. New guards came on to keep the street safe, but I never lost my personal bodyguards.
It only really hit me hours after how close I came to being taken and sold off. My years in the human world had diluted my instincts to the point that I’d forgotten how serious it was for an unmated omega in the cities. I’d feared my pack, yes, but had grown too complacent about everyone else.
