She hesitates for about three seconds before sliding off the desk and into my lap, curling against my chest like she belongs there. Which she does, even if she doesn't know it yet. Her slight weight settles something in me, that alpha need to hold and protect.
I knew better than to think getting her through a heat would mean getting past all her walls, but they're coming down, little by little. One brick at a time. That's a victory.
"What's wrong?" I ask, wrapping my arms around her carefully, ready to let go if she tenses. But she doesn't. She melts into me like she's been waiting for someone to hold her together.
"Felix is going to leave." The words come out small, broken. "I can feel it. He's pulling away, making plans, and he thinks I don't notice but I've known him for seven years. I know when he's building walls."
My chest tightens. "You think he's going after whoever hired you?"
She shakes her head against my shoulder. "No. Well, maybe. But that's not..." She takes a shaky breath. "His brother. He's going to go after his brother. Evan."
The name hangs in the air like a curse. I know pieces of their past, fragments Felix let slip, things Juniper's mentioned in passing, but not the whole story. Just enough to know that whatever happened at that place, the Serpents' Den, it broke something in both of them that never quite healed right.
"I only know bits and pieces," I admit, my hand moving to stroke her hair without conscious thought. "About where you came from. What happened to you both."
She's quiet for so long I think she's not going to answer. Then she says, "Do you want to know? It's not... it's not a nice story."
"I want to know everything about you," I say, and mean it. "The good, the bad, the ugly. All of it."
She shifts in my lap, getting comfortable like she's settling in for a long story. Her fingers find mine, playing with them absently while she talks.
"The Serpents' Den was hell dressed up as heaven," she starts, her voice distant like she's looking at memories through frosted glass. "High-end brothel for alphas with too much money and specific tastes. Usually young. Felix's brother Evan owned it. Still owns it, probably."
My hands tighten involuntarily. Everything the Psychos have spent years fighting against. I already suspected as much. That there were places out there even we couldn't reach, victims we couldn't save, who've been through worse than even four seasoned vigilantes could imagine. But knowing our mates were two of them…
She feels it, pats my arm like she's comforting me instead of the other way around.
"Felix was born there. Literally. His mom was one of the omegas, died when he was little. Evan took over the Serpents' Den when their father died and raised him, if you can call it that. Kept him as... I don't know what to call it. Not quite a worker, not quite family. Something in between. Something worse."
"Fuck," I breathe, because what else can you say to that?
"He was supposed to be an enforcer. Keep the omegas in line, make sure no one caused trouble. But Felix was always too soft for it, even when he tried to pretend otherwise. He'd sneak extra food to the ones who were struggling, pretend not to notice when someone broke a rule." She laughs, but it's bitter. "His brother fucking hated that. Used to beat the shit out of him for it. And sold him to clients when he realized Felix wasn't going to be following in his bootsteps."
I want to find this Evan and introduce him to some enhanced interrogation techniques I learned in the military. But I keep my mouth shut, let her talk.
"I got there when I was barely fifteen," she continues. "They found me on the streets, having an episode. I'd run away from home technically, but my mom basically kicked me out when she realized I was…. broken."
Her voice cracks on the word, like she's remembering the first time it was used against her. I hold her tighter, wanting to tell her that broken or not, she's the strongest person I've ever met. That most people who've been through what she has would shatter into a thousand pieces, and the fact that she managed to fit them back together with gold and steel makes her something precious to be treasured, not thrown away. But something tells me these words don't come easily to her, so I let her speak.
"The shadows were really bad then," she continues softly, "before Felix taught me how to manage them. Evan's scouts thought I was high, an easy target. Drugged me, threw me in a van, and next thing I knew I was in this gorgeous room that smelled like death under all the perfume."
Her voice goes flat, emotionless, and somehow that's worse than if she was crying.
"They tried everything to break me. Beatings, starvation, isolation. They had this hole—literally just a pit in the basement where they'd throw the troublemakers. No light, no sound except your own screaming. I spent a week down there once because I bit Evan when he tried to..." She trails off, shrugs. "Doesn't matter."
"It matters," I say fiercely. "Everything that happened to you matters."
Because one day, I'm going to make the bastard who did it pay for every scar he inflicted on her and Felix, mental and physical.
She looks up at me, those hazel eyes seeing too much. "You're going to make me cry if you keep being nice."
"Then cry. You're safe here."
She blinks hard, looks away. "Felix saved me. He was supposed to be watching me, making sure I didn't cause more trouble. But instead he'd sneak in at night, bring me food, hold me when the shadows got too loud. He taught me how to fight, how to hide weapons, how to read people. Everything I needed to survive."
"And you fell in love," I say, not a question.
"How could I not?" She laughs, wet and broken. "We were the same age. Neither of us had family, at least, not a real one. We understood each other the way no one else did or could. He was the only light in that darkness. The only person who saw me as more than a broken omega to be used and discarded. We started planning our escape almost immediately, but it took three years. Three years of saving money, gathering supplies, learning skills. Three years of pretending, of playing roles, of watching other omegas disappear and knowing we couldn't save them all."
