Track 29 Hold On

"Oh, fuck," Sadie breathes as the building behind us explodes. Not the whole thing, but a section of it damn close to where we just were. "They almost killed us." She sounds dazed. Really fucking dazed.

Even though my head is throbbing and my ears are ringing, I drag myself over to her, carefully running my hands down her body, lingering on the bruise on her forehead that I think matches mine. Sylvie is on the other side of her, breathing heavily, muscles trembling.

"Did we make it?" she asks shakily, eyes closed. "Are we out?"

I nod and give her the same examination I gave Sadie. "Yeah, Vee. We're out. We made it."

Sadie rolls toward us, sliding her hand down my arm to lace her fingers with mine. "You have the drive?"

I reach around and pat where it's shoved in the back of my pants. "Yep. I hope Ethan could get something useful off the computer."

Sadie presses up to sit and nods. "Oh, I'm sure he did. He's a genius." She reaches down and drags Sylvie into an upright position. "Come on, let's move. We gotta get this shit to the cops before Apex can make a statement about how we're the terrorist bad guys who blew up their totally legit business."

That makes my stomach sink. "You think they'll do that?"

Sylvie snorts as she leans on me and Sadie, the three of us stumbling to our feet together. "I wouldn't put it past them. It's no secret that both of our packs have been not so subtly trying to bring down the corporation."

"They'll probably say we staged this whole thing to further our agenda or something."

My stomach clenches even further as we make our way around the block and toward the flashing red and blue lights. "Fuck. They could try to sue us, couldn't they?"

The smaller women look up at me, squeezing me tighter. "They can try, but they won't succeed," Sadie reassures me. "I know Ethan got what we needed to keep that from happening."

I want to ask how she can be sure. I want her to reassure me again that I won't get convicted of some kind of crime here. But I don't think she can. Sadie and Sylvie both have powerful packs that will fight to keep them from being incarcerated. I don't.

Even if all three of us were convicted of a terrorist act, they're omegas. They'd go to some soft security prison that had things like meditation and painting to rehabilitate them… whereas I'll just go to prison. Probably maximum security for life, because that is my freaking luck.

But they don't need to hear any of that, so I smile and nod. "Yeah, of course. You're right."

Vee gives me a look like she knows I'm lying through my teeth, but she doesn't say anything. Or maybe she would have, except at that moment we round the building and a cry goes up from the crowd of people there. Sadie and Sylvie stumble forward as I stay put, lingering as ten men rush toward us. Or rather, toward my two friends. They split into groups, the white-haired Swift a few steps ahead of everyone else.

My friend lets out a little sob as he slams into her.

Swift smacks a kiss onto Sadie's lips, lifting her off the ground. Her legs part around his waist as her hands clamp on his cheeks. "Told you I'd never lose you again, Cherrybomb," he murmurs against her mouth. The rest of the Falcones slam into them, running hands over her body to check that she's okay. The tenderness with which they handle her makes my chest ache, both in a good way and with jealousy. I'll never have that.

I look away to find Vee surrounded by her pack, all of them purring and petting her. The ache grows. Tears spring to my eyes, and I take a deep breath, focusing on the tips of my shoes.

Police and guards and paramedics bustle around me, and I stay exactly where I am, hands fisted, counting in and out to regulate my breathing. I have to take care of myself. No one else is going to do it.

If some part of me hoped the Cordova pack would come for me, that Gage would come for me, I squash it. They didn't. I'm alone.

They probably don't even know someone kidnapped me. Why would they? They washed their hands of me, couldn't get away from me fast enough. Or even if they do know, why would they care? In their minds, I'm a master manipulator.

I wonder if it had only been me that was taken, if Sadie and Sylvie had thwarted their kidnappers, if they remained tucked up safely with their packs, how long would it have taken for anyone to even notice I was gone?

Hours at the Snack Shack have been sporadic at best since I started seeing the Cordova pack. It's likely that our normal customers would have just assumed I was back together with them… or maybe that I took a long vacation to escape everyone's judgment. Either way, it probably would have been days before anyone reported me missing.

"Excuse me, miss?" I lift my eyes with a forced smile on my lips. It's a habit more than anything. I find a beta paramedic in front of me, brown eyes running over me from head to foot. "You were in the facility when the explosion happened?"

"Yes," I nod.

"If you'll come with me, we need to get you checked out."

"Oh, no, I'm fine." My smile turns soothing. For him . To make him feel better. "Really. Just a little shaken up."

His lips curve into a smile that tells me he knows better. "I'm sure that's the case, but we still need to check you over. If you're fine like you say, it shouldn't take too long."

I flick my gaze up to where Sadie and Sylvie are still surrounded by their packs, with a medical professional looking them both over, and I nod. "Yes, of course."

"This way." He places a hand at the small of my back and guides me over to the open doors of an ambulance. "Climb up." I do, taking a seat on the gurney, and resting my forearms on my knees. This position draws attention to my trembling hands, so I lean back, sliding my palms over my shorts and then tucking them under my thighs.

The paramedic sits across from me and runs a few basic tests, shining a light in my eyes, checking my reflexes. He patches up the few scrapes I have, the deeper cut on my thigh from Sadie's boot knife, and then gives me two painkillers and calls me good.

And the whole time, I feel so goddamn alone.

In a way that I haven't felt since I lost my parents and Gage was half a world away.

There's this hollow ache deep in my stomach, just like there was back then, when I lost the most important people in the world to me. It took a long time for that hollow ache to fill back up. Sadie and Sylvie helped so much with that, but they have their own lives now, their own packs. They're moving away from Lake Kilrose and into Granton.

I'm so happy for them, I really am.

But I'm lonely too.

I will continue to be lonely until the day I die. Because as much as I like to be a glass half full kind of girl, I'm finding it really fucking hard to find the positive in the few drops of liquid at the bottom of my cup.

I'll never find another pack like the Cordovas.

I'll never find a lone alpha I want as much as I want Gage.

Might as well call me Buttercup, because I'm pretty sure, ‘I will never love again,' will be engraved on my tombstone.

"If you start feeling woozy or lightheaded, or any other intense pain, go to the doctor immediately," the paramedic says, drawing my attention away from my morose thoughts.

I smile at him, pushing to my feet. "Thank you so much. I will."

I climb out of the back of the ambulance and right into a camera, a microphone and a woman with a sneer on her face. "Sorrel Forbes, the girl who broke the Cordova Pack's heart. Were you in the building when it exploded?"

I blink at her, words caught in my throat, because what the hell? I don't know what one has to do with the other, and I honestly just don't have the capacity to deal with the media right now. Or ever, for that matter.

She pushes the microphone closer to my face. "Are you under investigation for the explosion? Are you trying to get the Cordova pack's attention with this stunt? Did you fake a kidnapping?"

"I'm sorry… what? " My mouth falls open at the slew of questions that don't make any sense. In the past I might have just smiled and given a polite answer of ‘no comment,' But I really have no fucks left to give. So instead I ask, "are you even a journalist? Jesus! I'm obviously not under investigation for what happened here. If I was, I would be in the back of one of the many police cars around us, probably in handcuffs. I would think someone whose job it is to report the facts would be able to at least put two and two together. That equals four, in case you can't do math."

Her mouth falls open, and she tries to take the microphone away from my mouth, but my hand whips out and holds it in place. "And for the record, I didn't break the Cordova pack's hearts. They broke mine. They didn't trust me enough. They didn't trust that I loved them, and instead fell for the first fucking ploy to break us up, to keep me away from them." I'm vaguely aware at the back of my head that I sound like a raving lunatic. I know I need to shut up and get out of here, but I am so fucking tired of being a doormat. Of letting everyone walk all over me, because I don't want them to feel uncomfortable.

I glare at the woman and then at that camera. "And no, I didn't commit a terrorist act to get their fucking attention. Even the almighty Cordova pack is not worth killing people over. Apex Pharmaceuticals kidnapped me and my friends for reasons I don't really feel like going into right now. I'm sure it'll all come out when the police release a statement." glare firmly in place, I release the microphone and move to push past them. The need to get away, to be free of the eyes and the people, pushes my feet forward, makes my exhausted aching muscles move. I need to find a place where I can break down in solitude.

I should have known that I would still be the villain. No matter that I'm the victim here, that this had nothing to do with the Cordova pack at all. The media will always find a way to paint me with the brush of evil.

My eyes latch onto a patch of darkness, outside of the flashing lights and the cameras filming the scene. There's the vague shape of trees and my feet move to it without conscious thought.

Space. I need space and quiet and to fall apart in peace.