I kept my mouth closed. Whenever he was agitated, I usually let him get it out of his system. He tended to rant and rave before retreating to the gym, or fucking Kai. Neither of which was currently an option.
We had another serious problem we had to take care of.
Because we had left our omegas alone in the clutches of beasts, and we were wholly unprepared to deal with it.
Caspian was aware that Zania had sent the Hiscoxes to Camille, and it was probably the unwisest decision I could make to bring Caspian with me to the restaurant.
From the way he shook, staring wide-eyed into nothing as he processed, I couldn’t imagine he could hold himself together without our omegas. But no one else was suitable to manage him.
At least we could pull Kai and Melanie away from the restaurant and find peace amidst the chaos.
“Sin, you need to explain what the fuck is going on here.”
What was the best way to tell him without him assuming it was his fault? His guilt had kept him tethered to Camille, and I allowed him to behave as if he were Camille’s alpha for far too long. I should have put a stop to it when Kai entered our lives, or when Flint entered hers, but I entertained him because Kai rarely complained.
I wouldn’t say we were the worst alphas alive, but the fact that it took Melanie’s appearance for me to realise how we had mistreated Kai was enough to say we had failed as his mates.
“Camille’s aura has been unstable since she presented. We assumed it was because of her weak body, but it can erupt in any alphas and omegas who have died and returned.”
“I don’t understand… Then…” He sucked in a breath. A silent Caspian was more unnerving than his full-blown rage. I navigated the traffic, racing as fast as I could. Another minute passed before he spoke again.
“Sin.” His voice was low as guilt dragged him down. “Was it because of what happened at the lake? Did she actually die?”
His pain tore through the bond as I nodded, and I forced myself not to groan as the ache burned fiercely.
“She died briefly, and the boundary of her aura, her body, broke. There is nothing to contain her energy, and so it regularly erupts rather than maintaining a constant flow, like ours.”
“But she’s had to endure all of that alone? How many times has that happened? What’s been going on with her?”
I didn’t want to confess to him that Camille’s aura had been so unstable that we had to lock her in a cell made of 6ft of steel whenever she went into heat to stop her from destroying the house.
She had spent most of her life in the countryside for exactly that reason.
Camille had killed too many of her nurses and doctors for us to hide it efficiently anymore. From the sheer effort it took to cover it up, it was a miracle no one outside of our family, except Flint, Lily, and Michael, had discovered what she could really do.
We couldn’t call what happened to Camille going feral. It was far beyond that. Because a single brush of someone else’s aura could set her off. She was so tense and nervous around most people because one sudden move could result in her becoming triggered.
“Since Flint arrived in her life, she has been stable enough for us to bring her back into society. Unfortunately, she caught Michael Farringdon’s eye.”
“So, it’s really true? She’s going with him?”
I paused, flinging him a brief glance. He appeared to have calmed down somewhat, though he was too pale for my liking.
“How do you already know about that?” I asked.
His face twisted as he snarled again. “Are you fucking kidding me? It doesn’t matter how I fucking know! Why the hell were we worrying about the Hiscoxes when Michael is the one taking her away?”
“Because the Hiscoxes would have pumped her full of enough drugs to push her into a vegetative state before they impregnated her. At least Mother and Zania pretended to offer us a way to protect her.”
“So you’d rather send her to the alpha who runs fucking sex clubs and rents out whores!”
“May I remind you that without those clubs, we would have never met Melanie.”
I couldn’t quite believe I was defending Michael after the effort I made to stop him from reaching my sister, but Lily was right. I believed I could protect the people in my life from our mother’s manipulations, but I had put my head in the sand.
Another low growl rumbled from Caspian as he gathered his thoughts.
I had distracted him from the harsh fact that Camille had obliterated the three men who were sent to bite and rape her with her aura, but it was not a conversation we could avoid.
