“Goodnight, Ash,” I say, my voice rougher than I’d like.
She nods, then slips out into the night, Beckett’s hoodie hanging to mid-thigh. I slam the car into gear and pull out, just below tire squealing speed before I turn into that caveman alpha stereotype. I should not have given her Beckett’s hoodie. It’s wildly inappropriate to be thinking about ripping it off her with everything that just went down.
Three blocks away, unease replaces the insta-horny. I slam the Charger into park at the red light. There’s no traffic I have to worry about at this time of night.
I’m an ass. What the fuck am I thinking? I just dropped her at the curb like she’s a grocery delivery?
I don’t know exactly what’s happening at her house, but all signs point to it not being safe. And the scent match truth bomb just exploded.
I didn’t even fucking walk her to her door like a goddamn gentleman.
I make a U-turn at the next intersection. I’m just going to drive by, make sure she got in safely.
As I round the corner, I slam on the brakes a house away. She, in fact, did not make it inside. A man is standing on the top step to the front door, under the porch light that’s more like a floodlight, highlighting every crease in his face and shining off the growing bald spot on his dome.
Ash stands perfectly still, her spine straight, her hands hidden in the hoodie. The man steps closer, invading her space. Ash doesn’t retreat, doesn’t flinch. There’s something practiced in her stillness, like she’s been doing it her whole life.
The man moves again, gesturing over his shoulder, then back at Ash. As he shifts, the light catches his face. Weathered skin, dark hair streaked with gray. If I was closer, I’d see the scar through his eyebrow.
The scar Reed gave him.
Randal Voss.
He looks decades older than the last time I saw him, when he had a shotgun trained on me. But it is absolutely Randal Voss, Reed’s father.
The asshole that’s blackmailing us.
He makes an aggressive hand gesture and kicks the door wide. Ash’s head falls defeated as she follows him in. The door shuts smoothly.
Motherfucker. Did I get this all wrong? Is Ash part of it? Part of whatever scheme Voss cooked up? His little agent? Did she get close to Beckett just to fuck us? Is she a good enough actress to pull this off? You can’t fake a scent match, can you? Is Ash playing us more than the standard puckbunny or gold digger?
Some long forgotten memory chooses this exact moment to squeeze its way out of my brain.
Reed’s mom was trashy in all the good ways. Big hair, a cigarette always hanging from her red lips, with a mason jar of sweet tea in her hand. We were twelve when she got pregnant. Randal hadn’t been happy about it, and went absolutely shitballs when they found out it would be a girl. Reed had been stoked. Probably out of spite, his mom named the baby after herself. Randal lost his shit.“Stupidest fucking thing I ever did hear. A two-bit whore named Ash Lee naming her baby Ash Lynn.”She died a year later, and Randal insisted we call the baby Lynn.
Ash.
Lynn.
Voss.
Bile and fury rise in my throat, and I clamp my hand over my mouth. Too many conflicting thoughts explode in my head at the same time.
Ash is Reed’s sister.
I fucked Reed’s sister.
Pierce is scent matched to Reed’s sister.
Beckett is in love with Reed’s sister.
Randal is doing terrible things to Reed’s sister.
Fuck me.
Reed’s dad was always obsessed with omegas. Not that a beta like him had a chance with one. Reed found his dad’s porn stash, like every teenage boy eventually does, and it was all knotting porn. All very graphic. I was the first one of us to become an alpha. I think I was fourteen. Randal gave me one of those mags. It was unsettling.
That last year, Lynn had the biggest crush on Pierce. She had always chased after us. We were so much older than her that we never gave it a second thought. Lynn was Reed’s sister, for god’s sake. Randal made a big deal of it one night. He was drunk, which wasn’t unusual, and squared off with Pierce, which was also not unusual. He accused Pierce of grooming her. We all knew that was laughably untrue, but Pierce started spending less time at Reed’s after that.
