I nodded, my throat too tight to speak.
Kira looked at me. "I’m sorry, Nai. Are you all right?"
"No," I said honestly. "But it will be. Eventually."
She moved to my side, wrapping an arm around my shoulders. "What do you need?"
I looked at the Alphas who claimed to be my mates. At the truth they'd just laid at my feet. "I need to lie down. I need to sleep. I need to pretend for just a few more hours that my life makes sense."
"Okay," Kira said. "Then that's what we'll do."
She guided me out of the dining room, away from the Alphas, the truth, and the future I didn't know how to face yet. I climbed the stairs to the room that had been my sanctuary and I couldn't help but wonder. What happens now?
Right now, I sure as hell didn’t know.
NAOMI
The DNA results came back three days later.
Three days of existing in limbo and staying in their home because I was too sore and too emotionally exhausted to face my apartment. The Alphas gave me careful space while simultaneously watching me like I might disappear. Rowan handed me the sealed envelope at breakfast.
"You don't have to open it now," he said quietly. "You can take your time."
I stared at the envelope. Inside was proof. Confirmation that everything I'd believed about myself was wrong. Or proof that they were lying. That this was all some elaborate manipulation. I’d heard the courier when they’d arrived with news. Watched him drive away. Whatever was in here was legit and either way, my world was about to change.
"I want to open it now," I said. "I need to know."
Kellan moved to stand behind my chair, close enough that I could feel his presence but not touching. Rowan sat across from me, his expression carefully neutral.
I broke the seal and pulled out the papers. Clinical. Sterile. Numbers and percentages and technical language that boiled down to one simple truth. 99.9% probability of biological relationship. I was their daughter. The daughter of two Alphas I hadn’t seen in twenty nine years. The heir to a bloodline I knew nothing about.
Everything they'd said was true. The woman I'd called mother, who'd raised me, loved me, died protecting me, wasn't my biological mother. She'd been a victim. Just like me. The paper slipped from my fingers.
"Naomi?" Kellan's hand settled on my shoulder.
"It's true." My voice sounded distant, disconnected. "All of it. Everything you said. It's all true."
"I'm sorry," Rowan said quietly.
"For what?" I asked, not sure what he could be apologizing for.
"For you having to find out this way." He paused. "For not finding you sooner."
I looked up at him. "You searched the entire time, though?"
"Yeah, and we never stopped. Never bonded with anyone else." His voice cracked. "Never gave up hope that we'd find you."
They’d searched almost my entire life.
"So someone took me to—what? Sell me? Use me?"
"We don't know their endgame. The investigation went cold years ago. But—" He exchanged a look with Kellan. "We're reopening it. Now that we've found you, we can trace backwards. Figure out who took you. Why."
"And if they come back?" The question came out smaller than I intended.
"Then we protect you," Kellan said firmly. "That's not negotiable."
I wanted to argue and insist I could protect myself. But the truth was, I was terrified. They’d been successful once, what would keep them from doing it again. Everything I'd built, my independence, my plans, my carefully constructed life, felt like sand slipping through my fingers.
