They had been stupid, getting involved in mercenary shit for the cash. They should have known better. From the sounds of it, his girl already had one target on her back. She didn't need another by getting herself mixed up in their baggage.
When she frowns at his non-answer, Tenor responds to her question for him, his voice resigned. "We're in for murder, baby."
"Not the first time either," Luke says, apparently wanting to make sure Eden knew exactly how fucked up they were, not wanting her to labour under any illusion that they were good men.
Tenor's voice is a bitter, low muttering. "Bastard deserved what he got."
Poor Eden looks like she swallowed a bug at their words. Fear fills her scent and it's like a goddamn knife to the gut to see her looking at them like that. But it didn't fucking matter that they were bad men. They were bad men who were going to keep her safe, no matter what it fucking took.
Julius clears his throat, refocussing on her, needing to make sure he has all the facts before he can try and formulate a plan.
"Eden." She turns to face him again. "You're saying you didn'thave a lawyer assigned to you for your trial? There was no due process? Nothing?"
"No. There was just the meeting at that lawyer's office. I think his last name was Raymond?" Eden confirms, chewing her lip with nerves but apparently not enough to make her bolt.
He scowls, but he forces himself to make his voice softer for her. "Thank you for telling us. We'll sort this out, sweetheart."
He would call every fucking lawyer in the phone book before he found one to take her case and file an appeal if he had to. There was no way he was going to sit back a minute longer and let his mate stay in this shithole.
He'd already tried before and failed, both lawyers he'd called had hung up the phone immediately when they heard where he was calling from. But he was a hard fucking bastard and he had never thrown in the gauntlet before, no matter what hopeless situations he'd found himself in. And he wasn't going to start now. Not now that he had actually found something in this piece of shit world that actually mattered.
Chapter Eleven
Eden
???
Tenor and Luke accompany her back to her nest, their eyes skirting over her nervously as she starts the painful task of rebuilding it that she did each evening. It tore her apart every morning as she had to dismantle it and return the blankets back to the other bunks to pass inspection.
The only time she ever fully tore her nest down before was when she was being moved to a new foster home. Otherwise she just cleaned each blanket individually before adding it back in, never taking the nest fully apart. It felt wrong to do it, like she was removing a limb every morning.
The males seemed like they were trying to make themselves seem smaller and less threatening again, as if she might reject them now that she knew they were in on a murder charge.
She guesses she should be more upset than she is, but at the same time... she had already seen Luke and Julius kill multiple men already like it was nothing, like it was just another Tuesday for them. It's not really a surprise to hear that this isn't the first time.
Was this a dealbreaker for her? She knew what the answershouldbe. Eden abhorred violence. She worked so hard with the kids at the school to try and help them find another path, to try and keep them from becoming... well, criminals. And look how well that had worked out for her.
But... she'd never met any alphas, any men at all, who made her feel safe. Not until she'd met them, no matter that it was in a prison.
Was it because of the prison that she felt safe with them? She didn't think so. It seemed like the opposite, like maybe she'd be even more attached to them outside, when she wasn't constantly on edge and at risk of being raped and murdered by the rest of the inmates.
These three alphas were the only ones to ever make her feel safe and comfortable, like she could really trust them, like she might actually fit in with them.
They were the only ones she'd ever desired likethat.The way they set her body buzzing with need for them, even outside of her heat spikes, the way they'd made her feel things she didn't even know it was possible to feel, was unlike anything she had ever experienced before.
Was that insane? Maybe. But how could she fight it right now? It wasn't like she had a ton of other options, and despite seeing their violence firsthand, it didn't scare her as much as she thought it would have. As much as they had shown her firsthand the violence that they were capable of, it had been for her, to protect her.
All she had known in her treatment by these men was kindness and generosity and tenderness. Even when they could have taken advantage of her. Even when they could have forced her to do things she didn't want or degraded her or used her like a... what had Luke called it? A prison wife? They had still treated her gently.
It wasn't like she hadn't dated alphas before, but it had been nothing like this.
The last foster mother she'd had before she'd aged out of the system had tried setting her up with some alphas. The beta female had meant well, Eden knew. She just wanted her to have someone to take care of her and keep her safe.
None of the alphas she'd grown up with were good men. Most of them were hardened criminals before they were sixteen. She'd thought about trying to date a beta man too, thinking that maybe they would be safer, but none of them had ever looked at her like a person. She was nothing more than anomegato them,a novelty. They didn't actually seeEden.
Her foster mother had used some sort of agency to set her up with alphas from the better parts of town, alphas who lived lives of luxury and comfort and who would take care of her. Omegas were rare, and some alphas would pay good money to meet one and get the chance of mating one to centre their pack and balance their hormones.
She'd gone on one date with a pack of doctors who had looked at her with so much pity when she sat there in her second hand clothes and had no idea what any of the French words on the menu were. They had been so patronizing she had been frozen to the seat, unable to stammer out more than one word answers. She didn't see them again.
