She leaked the photos and fed Richard intelligence for two weeks. She gave him the timing and the security gaps that let him walk into my building and put his fists on Amos.
"I need the full text chain, the store footage, and whatever identification you get on the purchaser." My voice is level. "All of it."
"I can have the records to your attorney by noon. The footage will take longer because we need the store's cooperation for a formal release." Morales hesitates. "Mr. Hale, I should tell you that if the identification is confirmed, we'll be pursuing conspiracy charges. Providing operational intelligence that facilitates an assault is a separate criminal offense from the assault itself."
"Good." I end the call.
I stand in the empty hallway and let it settle. The cold settles in and the planning starts. The damage she did last night is mine to address.
I go back into the room. Amos is still asleep. Mattaniah's eyes are open. He's watching me from the chair. The bond must have woken him.
His scent has shifted since I left. The air between the door and his chair tastes like fear.
"Who called?" His voice is rough with sleep.
"Detective Morales." I sit in my chair and lean forward with my elbows on my knees. "They pulled Father's phone records."
"Richard isn't my father." The correction is automatic and quiet.
"They pulled Richard's phone records. He received a text yesterday at six fourteen confirming that all three of us were working late with minimal security after hours. The text came from a prepaid phone." I hold his gaze. "Purchased three weeks ago at a convenience store in midtown. Security footage shows a woman matching your mother's description."
"How many messages?"
"Seventeen over two weeks. Our schedules, your doctor appointments, the security arrangements at the apartment." I keep my voice steady. "She's been feeding him intelligence since before the board vote."
Mattaniah's hand lifts from Amos' forearm and covers his own mouth. His eyes close. Through the bond something goes flat in a way I haven't felt from him before. His scent curdles, the sweetness souring so fast that Amos' monitor spikes on the next heartbeat.
"She knew I was pregnant." He says it behind his hand. "She knew about the baby and she sent him anyway."
"The texts include your doctor appointments. If she was tracking the Vasquez visit, she could have inferred the pregnancy from the specialty." An Omega seeing a post-suppressant pregnancy specialist at Metro North isn't a routine checkup.
"She knew." His hand drops from his mouth and his eyes open. "She always knows. She's been tracking me my entire life, counting the days from the heat the same way she counted the days on my blocker schedule."
The room is quiet except for Amos' monitor and the distant sound of a nurse's cart in the corridor. Mattaniah stares at the IV line running into Amos' hand.
"Two broken ribs." His voice is barely above a whisper. "Because my mother told a drunk Alpha exactly when and where to find us."
"I'm going to destroy her." I say it without inflection. Not for revenge and not because she's been working against us, but because she will never stop. "She'll keep feeding information to anyone who can use it against you, and next time it won't be broken ribs."
"I know." Mattaniah's voice is quiet.
"I need you to hear what I'm saying." I lean closer. "I'm going to use the phone records and the security footage to make sure she faces criminal prosecution. I'm filing a restraining order covering you and the baby. Every asset she has access to through Richard gets frozen."
"You're going to leave her with nothing."
"I'm going to leave her with the consequences of sending a violent Alpha to attack her pregnant son."
Mattaniah looks at me for a long time. Through the bond something resigns in him.
"She's my mother." He says it without emphasis.
"She is." I don't soften it. "And she sent Richard Hale to your workplace knowing you were there, knowing you were pregnant, knowing the security was thin. She chose that."
His throat works and his eyes move from me to Amos in the hospital bed. "Do what you have to do." He says quietly. "I won't stop you."
"I'm not asking for permission to go after her. I'm asking whether you need me to wait. If you need time before the charges are filed, tell me and I'll hold them."
"File them." His voice firms. "File them today. She made her choice when she sent that text." His hand finds Amos' on the hospital blanket. "Amos would tell you to document everything. So document everything."
