“No!” Lucas barked, sneering as if he found the entire idea disgusting. “I don’t know what happened. My heats usually last the full three days.”
“Stress can cause an omega’s heat to shorten,” Fenn explained like the expert he was. “Especially if you’re not particularly enjoying the whole experience.”
Lucas snorted. “I mean, you’re good, but you’re notthatgood,” he told Fenn.
I wanted to strangle the little twerp. He had the nerve to get all of us involved in this mess and then to insult my brother on top of it.
“Seriously,” Lucas went on. “I don’t understand why you won’t just let me call Wally and tell him to do the pick-up some other time at some other location. Give me my phone back.”
My brow went up slightly as I glanced to Fenn. I couldn’t see Lucas’s phone on him, but I didn’t doubt it was secure.
Fenn looked back at me like it was time to let the cat out of the bag. I wanted to talk the whole thing over, but he sighed, rubbed his forehead, then stared at Lucas and said, “You can’t call them and tell them not to come because the police are counting on the Dumfries gang showing up so they can arrest them.”
Lucas stopped suddenly. “What?” he demanded, his eyes going wide with horror.
I was surprised when Linus took a step toward his brother and said, “The police are coming to arrest the Dumfries gang when they try to do the hand-off.”
Lucas whipped around to glare at him with a look of absolute fury. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
I felt Linus flinch internally, but he did a damn fine job of looking strong and unmovable. He checked quickly with Fenn, who nodded, before taking a deep breath and saying, “Fennick isn’t just Saint’s brother and an ESA, he’s a cop.”
“You’re what?” Lucas shrieked, jerking around to stare wide-eyed at Fenn.
“I’m a policeman, yes,” Fennick said, crossing his arms. “I’m assigned to the North Barrington precinct, but I have connections at the Special Investigations unit. I contacted them as soon as Saint called me about everything going on here.”
“I thought you were an ESA,” Lucas growled, balling his hands into fists at his sides.
“I’m also an ESA,” Fenn said. He shifted his weight, then went on with, “The BSI has been tracking the Dumfries gang for ages. They were thrilled when I told them what we have here,and they’ve been rushing to put things in place to arrest your friends once they arrive.”
“No! No, you can’t!” Lucas gasped. “They’ll kill me if they find out. These are not nice people.”
I felt a rush of fear from Linus and reached out to him. As soon as he felt my touch, confidence filled him, but he was still painfully disappointed in his brother. “If you help us catch the bad guys, I’m sure the cops will give you some kind of immunity,” he said.
I could tell that he wasn’t sure of that at all. I wasn’t sure of it myself, and judging by Fenn’s expression, neither was he.
“What, so I’m supposed to pick who I want to kill me?” Lucas blurted, rocking back and forth like he wanted to run. “Either I get murdered by Wally or locked up by the fuzz?”
“If the police are able to catch the Dumfries gang and arrest them all, they won’t be around to murder you,” Linus reasoned.
“Yeah?” Lucas snapped, marching over to glare at his brother face-to-face. “Well, what about the Westfield family? Those are their guns I’ve got out in that van. They’re expecting the drugs.”
“I’m not going to lie and say the BSI won’t be investigating and going after them, too,” Fenn said. “But for the time being, there isn’t anything implicating them directly in this exchange. They’ll probably be more inclined to deny everything and pretend none of this happened.”
“Until they decide to come after me to permanently silence me,” Lucas said, gripping a hand around his throat.
“You’d be safe in jail,” Linus sighed, lowering his head.
“Or maybe a witness protection program,” I offered, hating to feel my omega’s grief over his brother’s transgressions.
“Yes!” Lucas grasped onto that. “The witness protection program. If I help the cops bring down the Dumfries gang, maybe the Westfield family, too, then they’ll whisk me off, giveme a new identity, and I won’t ever have to worry about any of this again.”
We all looked to Fenn. “It’s a possibility,” he said with a wince, rubbing the back of his neck.
Fenn didn’t really have the ability to make any promises along those lines, but I kind of got the impression it wasn’t incredibly likely the witness protection program was an option. I wasn’t going to tell Lucas, though.
“This is perfect,” Lucas said, his restlessness turning into a dance of excitement. “I can totally do this. It’ll be fun, like playacting. I’ll act all cool and suave when Wally and the guys arrive, I’ll lure them in, and then the cops can jump out and make the arrests. I might even come off looking like a major hero in the whole thing.”
“Yeah, maybe you will,” Linus said, though that wasn’t what he was feeling at all.
