I catch up with the group and notice that no one seems to have noticed that I was missing apart from Cyn, Vale, and Rory.
Cyn walks beside me while Rory stirs up Kevin.
“What are your families like?” I say before I can ask him to soothe the ache Kota has created.
Cyn blinks at me and looks away.
“You don’t have to tell me,” I mutter, regretting opening my mouth.Why on Earth would he want to share anything with me?
“No, it’s just that none of us have great families.”
“Really? I find that hard to believe.”
“No, it’s true. Kota’s an overachiever and needs to go out and make sure he goes above and beyond because his parents spent his whole life telling him he’s not enough. So everything he does is done with 100% of him.”
My gaze snags on Dakota. He’s smiling and looks happy, a gorgeous alpha with so much to offer the world. He would have been enough for me.
“Vale’s parents were absent. He was raised by tutors and nannies. Ended up in boarding school for a couple of years until he got kicked out, and we found him. Thus his need to control everything.”
“I don’t know what to say. I’m surprised none of the-”
I shut my mouth, but it’s too late.
“Bonnie Sanderson, have you been checking us out online?”
I shake my head vehemently. “No.”
“Liar,” he whispers, and that intimate whisper almost undoes me. I reach out, my fingers curling around his top, right above his hips. We stare at each other for a long moment. I think he sees all the broken and bruised parts of me.
“What about Rory?”
“Rory has his own scars, deeper than others. His parents used to fight, and his dad would really hurt his mother and him.”
My chest clenches. “It’s a good thing he’s dead, then.” I remember the funeral notice in the newspaper. Everyone said he was a good alpha. Of course, they lied.
Cyn flashes me a smile. “Yes, it is.”
“And you?”
Cyn sighs heavily. “Would you believe me if I told you I had the perfect childhood, and I am absolutely functional and normal?”
“No.”
He grunts. “You wound me.”
“No, I don’t.”
“Kids can be cruel.”
It takes me a moment to realise he’s telling me what I want to hear.
“I was not how I look now. Honestly, I was pale and sickly. I was small for my age, and my parents were too busy jet-setting to new places to notice that I needed them. I was bullied pretty badly throughout school. Vale is the one who became my protector, and Rory and Kota got me into shape and made sure I started eating enough.”
“Cyn…”
His hand brushes against mine. “We weren’t good alphas back then. We were hot messes, and we were so angry with the world, with our lot in life. It didn’t seem fair that this was what we had to live with. You wouldn’t have liked us.”
“How has anything changed?” I ask.
