Pack of Lies, page 8
I cleared my throat, trying to find the right words. Quentin knew me. Denzel did too, but with Quentin… it was different. This was the man who’d held me through the loss of Ava while D was out setting things right.
“I’ve been better,” I said.
“Do you need me to punch Denny in the face the next time I see him?”
You’ll want to regardless of if I ask you to.
“Might be a good idea.”
“Got it, baby. He’s got one black eye, coming right up.” Quentin laughed, his tone wry.
“I love you,” I blurted.
Quentin stopped laughing. He moved through the house, I could tell by the rustling. “Jubilee, baby, what is wrong? Not that it’s not wonderful when you tell me that, but you aren’t usually so free with it.”
He was away from Marlowe now. It was why he’d gone through the trouble of moving through the house; he knew I would want anything sensitive kept away from our omega’s ears. At the end of the day, I was Marlowe’s alpha and instinct told me never to show weakness around him.
“This is just… hard,” I said. “And I wanted you to know I love you.”
“I love you, too. You know you can tell me specifics. I won’t tell Marlie.”
Quentin would definitely tell him this.
“It’s not my secret to tell,” I muttered.
“My idiot brother,” Quentin said with a curse. “He’s going to get a lot more than a punch in the face from me when he gets home. If he’s going to keep acting like a controlling cunt, he’d better be prepared for pack lead to be taken from him.”
As a beta, Quentin couldn’t take pack lead. I couldn’t either, because I doubted I would win a fight against him, and Denzel wouldn’t go quietly. Reese, though… he had a chance, and Quentin was more Reese’s friend than Denzel was. Plus, they would have aligning opinions when these secrets got out.
Which was inevitable, whether Denzel thought he could magically fix everything or not.
“Having you keep secrets from me is low,” Quentin continued. “I’ve let it slide with Marlie, because he’s sensitive. But me? Whatever he’s keeping secret, it’s because he knows I’ll disagree and call him on it. You guys are doing something stupid with those records you stole, aren’t you? Wait, don’t tell me. I’m not going to make you deal with his wrath. I’ll get this information out of him myself.”
He muttered a few more choice words under his breath while walking back through the house.
“He’s not going to be willing to give it up,” I warned.
“I have dirt on him dating back to the day I was born. Now that I know he’s hiding something, he’ll spill it. Don’t worry, baby. I’ve got you.”
Quentin had gotten back to Marlowe, because I heard a gentle murmur through the line and then my omega’s soft voice. “I miss you,” he said. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you feel bad about it. Denzel better let you come back soon.”
“I don’t blame you for being whiny,” I said, fighting to stop my voice from sounding choked. Tears were welling in my eyes. I fucking hated this. “It’s your natural state of being. My needy omega. Since I don’t usually leave you, it must be rough.”
“Every second of the day I’m horny and anxious. It’s been four days, and it only gets worse. But that’s not your fault. I’m just excited for the second I get to see you again, and I love you.”
“I know, honey. Love you too.”
I had to stop speaking because I lost the fight with my tears. The door to the lab clicked as someone used their key card to access it, and I spun my stool to face the far wall. One of the grad students called out a greeting and I waved a hand vaguely in their direction, hoping they didn’t come over here.
“Tell Reese I love him, too. He always gets flustered when I tell him that,” Marlowe said.
“He does,” I said.
My omega wasn’t stupid or naive, as much as he may appear to be to an outsider. He could tell my voice was choked and I was struggling too hard to hide it.
“Whatever it is, we’ll get through it,” he said.
“I love you, baby,” Quentin said, grabbing the phone back.
“Love you too,” I mumbled, before frantically jabbing at the end call button.
A moment later it rang again, and this time the call was Denzel. I answered it. “I’ll be out in fifteen minutes,” I said, immediately hanging up.
Hopefully, he was too involved in himself to figure out I’d been crying. Wiping at my tears, I took my fifteen minutes to make myself look presentable, handing off the solution to the grad student.
He would use it before I would, at this rate. It was a good thing I had vacation accrued at the university, or they would be upset about my extended absence. As it was, they likely weren’t pleased.
Down at the SUV, now surrounded by cars as the day started in earnest, I ignored every one of Denzel’s attempts at conversation.
If he wasn’t going to listen to our advice, I wouldn’t be listening to him speak. Period. I wished I had the guts to go against his orders, too, but it wasn’t going to be me. Not when my secret might be the biggest of them all.
TEN
THORN
I woke up to Jubilee and Denzel gone, and Reese asleep. He slept like a log, not reacting when I waved a hand in front of his face or shook his shoulder.
This was as alone as I was ever going to get in this apartment, and I didn’t know what to do with it.
I went through cupboards, as if I was going to find notes telling me everything they were hiding taped to the bottom of shelves. There was a gun in a spot like that, which I was sure they had intentionally avoided telling me about. I opened the drawers on the coffee table, finding nothing suspicious. It made sense nothing would be lingering in the furnishings, considering this was a safe house and not their main residence.
To get information, I would have to go through their personal items, and I wasn’t comfortable.
My hands were within a couple inches of Jubilee’s bag when I stopped, feeling like it was an immense invasion of privacy. If anything, I should go through Denzel’s bag. He was the one keeping secrets, whether it was only that he was going to offer me another option or not.
I talked myself down from that idea. His bag was in Reese’s sightline the second the man opened his eyes, and I didn’t have the same excuse I would have if I’d been going through Jubilee’s bag. With Jubilee, I was wearing his clothes. I could have been looking for a new set. I’d rejected Denzel’s clothes twice over, so it wouldn’t be believable if I said that with him.
By the time I’d mused through my options the front door was opening, and I’d lost my chance.
“You went out early,” I said, peering at Jubilee.
He wandered through the door first, a bag hung on his arm. There was a bit of redness around his eyes, but overall he looked much less tired than he had yesterday. The bed had still been warm when I’d woken up, so I assumed he’d slept through the night.
“Needed to pick something up from work,” he murmured, placing the bag upright on the dining room table.
Denzel sauntered in behind him, looking grumpy as fuck and mildly annoyed. So, normal. I might even call those expressions ‘Denzel in high spirits.’
“What?”
“You ask a lot of questions,” Denzel said, turning his grumpiness on me. “This is how we’re going to prove to you that you’re our scent match.”
“I’m not sure how you figured out how to overcome my insurmountable experimental side effect, but have at it,” I said dryly.
Jubilee shimmied the bag down, revealing the box it had been holding. Removing the lid exposed a series of eight vials. They had liquid filling them halfway, the tops on tightly.
In my silver room, there had been vials too. A whole row of them on top of a set of cabinets. With my body bound to the surgical table, they had been one of the few things I’d been able to see. In the haze of fever, the blue liquid filling those vials had seemed to swirl with rainbow colours as I stared.
I shuddered, taking a step back without thinking.
Denzel noticed, eyebrows pulling together. He glanced at the vials, moving the lid of the box to partially block my view.
My body relaxed without the visual, even though I knew they were still there.
“We’re going to give you eight pack scents to smell,” Jubilee explained. “They’re in the vials, and one of the scents is our pack. The hope is that once the scents are side-by-side, you’ll be able to tell ours is strongest.”
“How do I know you didn’t tamper with the vials to make yours strongest?” I asked.
This experiment was pointless.
I already knew their scents were stronger than any other alpha or pack I’d ever scented since my sense of smell had been destroyed. There wasn’t a big sample size, considering the majority of the scientists and nurses and doctors at the Centre had been betas, but big enough for me to know.
The evidence was pointing toward them being my scent match mates, and not lying about it. I’d been enjoying lingering in my denial, though. Could they blame me? Why would I want Denzel as a scent match?
“Um, you’re going to have to trust us, I guess,” Jubilee said with a half-hearted shrug. “These scents came right from the university lab, no tampering. Ours was there already because I insisted it be part of the collection.”
Of course he had. It made sense he’d want to support the science he did on a daily basis.
“Fine. I’ll try it.”
When I tried to step forward I faltered, swallowing hard at the vials again. Anything medical brought up memories I’d done my best to repress. The Centre had been a different environment because it was basically one big trigger. Here, I was given the illusion of comfort and normalcy until something like this popped up.
Denzel was the one who fixed the issue, surprisingly.
Grabbing one vial, he placed it in a tall mug with a cupcake pattern on it. It hid the reality of what was inside, and when he popped the top I was able to hold the mug without my hand shaking. Hovering it beneath my nose, I already knew the answer.
I just wasn’t sure if I was ready to give it.
This didn’t hold a candle to their scents.
Denzel and Jubilee handed me every vial in the series, hidden in ceramic mugs, until I’d scented them all. Theirs had been the strongest. Still not strong, by any means. No scents were for me, but I’d noticed theirs invading my space more and more as I’d grown more accustomed to them.
They were my scent matches.
But when I looked up and Denzel was smirking, looking smug, I shrugged my shoulders. “They all smell the same to me.”
His smirk dropped into a scowl. “No way.”
“Yes, way. I can’t tell you from Adam,” I said.
Jubilee was disappointed, but sighed and redid the lid on the last vial. “I told you it might not work, D. Her biology has been messed with, and it’s hard for me to know how.”
“She has to be able to smell us somehow. She’s our scent match.”
His scent was increasing in intensity, aura a bit unstable again. We’d only been here for a couple days, but he was unravelling. My disbelief in what they meant to me was causing him distress. Guilt made me doubt myself, but only for a moment.
Denzel’s hand smacked the dining room table, the sound loud enough I heard Reese’s feet hit the floor. He rushed from the bedroom in only a pair of boxers, his morning wood prominently on display. Wide-eyed and rumpled, he took in the scene and groaned.
“Fuck, Denzel. Couldn’t you control your temper until I was awake? You nearly gave me a heart attack, thinking someone was in here to hurt her,” he said.
He adjusted himself in the boxers. I stared at the bulge, which I could see every tiny detail of. It was pointless to try and keep my arousal under wraps, my scent perfuming the air and drawing all attention to me.
Denzel snorted softly. “You lied about the scents. Definitely.”
I glared at him, even though I had. “Omegas get aroused by alphas who aren’t their scent match all the time. Reese’s cock is on display. If I had my tits out, I bet you’d get hard, whether I was your scent matched omega or not.”
Crossing his arms over his chest, he shook his head. “No, I wouldn’t. If you weren’t my scent match, I wouldn’t even look at you with your tits out.”
I stared at him, trying to process what he’d said. A part of me realized I’d baited him, and he’d risen to the bait, but…
Jubilee gasped, and Denzel frowned until he realized what he’d said, his expression slowly filling with horror. “Fuck, that’s not what I meant,” he said.
“No, message received,” I muttered. “Good to know you don’t think I’m attractive, only my omega designation and my scent.”
Turning on my heel, I made my way to the bedroom, wanting to curl up in a ball and hide for a while. Another migraine hadn’t hit yet, but another side effect I experienced was mood swings. Bad ones. When I felt a bit sad, it was a crapshoot whether I was going to dissolve into a heap of tears or be able to function.
Right now, it was tears.
I didn’t want him to think it had anything to do with him, when it was only stupid side effects.
His hand caught my arm and I yanked it out of his grip, but he crowded me up against the wall. “That is not what I meant,” he muttered. “You’re gorgeous, Thorn. Any man would turn to watch you walk down the street, fully clothed. Let alone half naked. I only meant…”
He trailed off.
Biting my trembling lip, the first few tears fell and he looked horrified to have caused them. “What did you mean?” I urged, voice choked.
“I meant…”
Whatever he had meant, he couldn’t say it. Maybe it was another facet of the secrets he was keeping from me.
Shoving at his chest, I sobbed when he didn’t move. I was breaking down completely, and a part of me wanted to shove my face against his neck and scent mark him. Claim him in the way I hadn’t been letting him claim me.
“I just didn’t mean what it sounded like, Thorn.”
“Liar.”
“I’m telling the truth.”
“I fucking doubt that,”
When I shoved him again, he moved and stopped crowding me back against the wall. It wasn’t because of my pushing, though, or because he made the choice on his own. Reese’s hand was wrapped around his arm and pulling. Their auras were both flaring, Jubilee standing off to the side.
Denzel couldn’t even give me space when he’d been the one to majorly fuck up.
Pushing off the wall I stormed into the bedroom, door slamming behind me, but I wasn’t left in peace for long.
Reese cursed at Denzel when the handle turned, eliminating the tiny amount of privacy I’d had. Tears were streaming down my cheeks now, my hands clenched into fists.
“I am absolutely telling the truth about how I view you. Stunning. It was a slip of the damn tongue to say anything else.”
His insistence was overbearing and suffocating, and I hated it. I wanted to be alone with my tears and my thoughts.
“It doesn’t matter anyway,” I snapped. “I wouldn’t fuck you if you were the last alpha on the planet.”
There was a flash of something new in his expression. Discomfort? “Whether you would or wouldn’t, you need to believe I didn’t mean to say that,” he said.
I might believe him, but I couldn’t decide with him hovering. Nor could I work through the feelings that had been brought to the surface by being dismissed. My pack was supposed to want me for me. They might be my last chance to find someone who did.
My parents hadn’t wanted me. The Centre only wanted me for what I could do for them. Was that what Denzel wanted too? He wanted me for what I would bring him? An omega to fuck, to have on his arm for events?
These alphas wouldn’t be my pack if they only wanted me because I happened to be a scent match.
I wasn’t going to give up my last chance.
“Get out,” I said quietly.
“Thorn—”
“Get out!” I shouted that time, retreating as he tried to come closer to me again.
He stalled. His hands were fisted like mine, and he looked halfway to angry. As if he had any fucking right to be.
“I don’t want to see your fucking face right now. Actually, I don’t want to see it again until you’re willing to stop lying. You might be telling the truth about this being a slip of the tongue, but I don’t care. You’re a filthy liar because of everything else, anyway.”
“You’re not letting me apologize,” he growled.
“Is this an apology? It feels like an attack. I don’t want to hear your voice either. Don’t you have a suburban paradise of a home? Go home. Leave me the fuck alone, and when you come back all I want to hear is an offer of other places I can go, because I don’t want to play house here anymore.”
No longer halfway to angry, his aura flared with his temper and he huffed. Reese managed to manhandle him out of the bedroom, the door shutting to leave me alone. That was followed by a series of thumps and bumps and footsteps until the front door shook the house.
And then silence.
And no more fucking Denzel.
Perfect.
My body relaxed, and I curled into the bed to cry and nurse my headache.
One emotional breakdown later, and I was kind of feeling… better.
This was Denzel’s chance to offer me the out he’d mentioned in the alley beside the bookstore. I may have said I would take it, but I wasn’t yet convinced.
Reese and Jubilee were sweet enough to make up for Denzel’s asshole status.
Well, if he wasn’t pack lead, they would be.
With Denzel as lead, the whole pack got a little dicey.
However, if they would let me go, I could consider they might not be horrible for me. I only had to wait and see if Denzel was going to allow me to leave so easily.
I stayed curled up in bed until Reese brought me a meal, averting his eyes from me until I caught his hand on his way out. “I want you,” I said.
