39. Lucy

Liam grimaced,but neither him nor Cas tried to jump in and insist I had no reason to worry about that.

Frankie eyed me from across our desks and carefully placed ginger on top of her sushi as she considered my question. "Why exactly are you asking me about River Steele?"

"Well…" It wasn't just that Liam went out with her a few years ago. There was more to it than that. "A few days ago Randolph Steele reached out to Nicolette Valor about having Liam go out on another date with River. I'm just wondering why they waited until Gideon died to bring it up again when it didn't work out the first time."

"I suppose they could be trying to capitalize on an opportunity, but it could just be a coincidence." Frankie sat back and considered me. "Do you really want to know, or do you just want me to talk to her and find out what's going on?"

Glancing over at Liam, I decided this world of legacies wasn't something I could avoid anymore.

"I want to know if River might have a motive or if it's just her father trying to get a contract with Valor," I admitted, bouncing my leg up and down as I considered if Randolph Steele should move to the top of our list of suspects. "If she was the one who originated the idea, it might not have nothing to do with the case, but there is a possibility it has everything to do with the case."

A flicker of anxiety went through me but it didn't feel like mine. It was instinct to send them a wave of reassurance through the bond. I didn't know how I did it, all I knew was that it worked because Liam smiled and went back to his phone.

Cas, on the other hand, never stopped watching me.

I watched Frankie pop the last piece of sushi in her mouth before pushing the plate back. She studied me as she chewed, clearly wondering what I remembered from the years we'd spent in the Lopez compound together.

"Steele has been a legacy pack for almost as long as Lopez has," Frankie reminded me. "About a hundred years ago, they ran this city after making a fortune in mining iron, copper, and gold. That money allowed them to invest in industrialization and hire scientists to create different kinds of alloys until they'd cornered the market on steel."

"I don't know the details of their current finances or businesses, but their wealth started slowly declining about forty years ago." Frankie tapped her fingers on her desk and studied her monitor. "At some point, Lopez surpassed them in wealth despite focusing on law and accounting firms."

"Valor was always neck and neck with them in terms of net value until my mother took over the pack," Liam admitted. He set his phone down and gave us his full attention. "Part of the reason I don't like doing business with them is because they're not only unreliable, but they're shady as fuck. My mother and I assume their alpha is trying to hide just how bad things have gotten."

Frankie nodded in agreement and I chewed on the inside of my cheek as I considered what that could mean.

"Do they have any ties with the Grimm pack?" I opened the folder that had all the information on what the legacy packs have been up to over the last month to see if I'd missed anything.

"No one really has ties with the Grimm pack. They offer services. That's it." Frankie crossed her arms over her chest and glared at the empty plate in front of her. "There's nothing Grimm won't sell if you have the money."

That was an interesting possibility.

Could someone have purchased their services to make sure data was erased from the Valor servers? Or maybe they'd even gone as far as to hire them to kill Gideon Valor.

"Valor has never worked with the Grimm pack." Liam crossed his arms over his chest, watching me like a hawk. "Not officially at least. I have hired them for cleanup more than a few times but I also have dirt on them I doubt your agency files have."

"What dirt?" Frankie sounded unreasonably excited to hear this new gossip.

I turned my cup so I could see the little axolotl with glasses while reading a book on it. The tea was still hot thanks to the mug warmer Cas had ordered at some point.

All this felt so new and strange, but it wasn't hard. That was probably the weirdest thing about it. Change was hard for me, but this…this actually made all the shit I normally struggled with easier.

I didn't have to remind myself a million times to eat before I felt sick to my stomach since Cas was always setting food in front of me whenever it was time to eat. I didn't have to throw out eight cups of tea because I kept forgetting to drink it before it got disgustingly cold now that he got me this. I didn't even have to clean up or dress myself if they made me pass out from exhaustion during sex.

They weren't interrupting my work either, or demanding my attention, but if they had something to add to the conversation, or a way to help, they offered it to me without hesitation. They wanted me to expect their help – enough so that I never had to ask for it.

Somehow, the biggest change in my life was the easiest and I was still trying to wrap my head around that.

"Frankie, you may be Lucy's family, but I'm not giving you dirt on Grimm for free." Liam snickered when Frankie stuck her tongue out at him. "Get your own dirt. I worked my ass off for this to make sure they wouldn't sell information about me to the highest bidder. I'm sure you could find something just as good if you wanted."

"Fine. See if I help you win over my father then." Frankie went back to her computer with a huff.

Frankie approved of my alphas.

My eyes started to burn as the emotions rose up to make the lump in my throat even worse than it already was.

The person I trusted most approved of my alphas and she wasn't throwing me away, but curating a new relationship dynamic while still ensuring I was being well taken care of.

It almost felt like that moment at a bonding ceremony when the alpha parent of the omega placed their hand in their new alpha's, trusting them to take care of someone precious to them as they relinquished the majority of their duties.

This was my new family.

"Lopez has hired Grimm here and there, but mostly for protection details and that kind of thing," Frankie went on. "I don't really know anyone in that pack. They bring only the bare minimum members to the legacy events, but I've never seen any of them openly work with Steele."

I cleared my throat and reminded myself I had to focus.

"Why did you ask about River specifically?" Cas gripped Liam's hair and pulled back, making the other alpha close his eyes in bliss. "She has no power within her pack. So, what could she possibly have to do with the contract or Gideon?"

Are you jealous?I could hear that thought loud and clear.

I rolled my eyes and clicked on the Steele file, selecting the dossier on the alpha Randolph. "River may be an omega princess from a legacy pack but she has five different bachelor's degrees she got before she was twenty-five: environmental design, city and regional planning, architectural engineering, interior architecture, and architectural design. By the time she was twenty-eight she had three master's degrees in mathematics, aeronautical engineering, and architecture. As the cherry on top of all that, she just finished her doctorate in metallurgical engineering at thirty-one. She's not just smart, she's a goddamn prodigy."

Her father allowed her to do as much school as she wanted but it didn't seem like he was letting her use it which infuriated me to no end.

"I don't know what they have her doing now, but she's very publicly active which gives her connections to every wealthy pack in the city. If there's something weird going on, she would know what it was. She'd know if someone in her pack wanted Gideon dead and who might be trying to get into the Valor servers."

I skimmed her father's profile, not impressed at all. His picture gave me bad vibes even if he was objectively attractive.

"Why didn't you like River?" I directed that question to Liam, genuinely curious. "She seems like the kind of person you'd be interested in."

"I like her as a friend," Liam agreed. He set his hand on Cas's thigh and studied me through slitted eyes while the other alpha played with his hair. "But as an omega…there was something off about her. I didn't like it."

"River is the only omega born in the Steele pack in two generations," Frankie added. "They've been using her as a bartering tool. Only a few days after her legacy debutante ball on her eighteenth birthday, her father announced her engagement to someone from a wealthy pack, I don't remember which one but they weren't a legacy."

I vaguely remembered that.

River was a year older than Frankie, who was only three years older than me and Francisco was in a bad mood the whole week after River turned eighteen. I could never figure out why, but if she'd been married that young…

"I thought they broke off that engagement?" I opened her eldest brother's file next.

"They did, but not six months later she was engaged again." Frankie grimaced and reached for her energy drink. "That one did go through with the marriage and it lasted three whole months before it was annulled. River's been married a total of three times but she's had a lot of other engagements that fell through for one reason or another. The weird thing though is that Steele never tried to marry her off to any legacy packs other than Valor. I don't know why they let that one fall through."

"Because Randolph Steele may be a scumbag, but he's not stupid." Liam glared at the wall and I could feel just how conflicted he was about all this and how worried Cas was about the both of us. "If Steele really is using River's value as an omega to lure in wealthy packs, and then breaking off the marriages and engagements to get money out of them while still creating the opportunity for more alliances…Randolph knows he can't break a deal like that with Valor and walk away with his life intact."

Grimm may be the most dangerous legacy pack in the city, but Valor was just as bad if for different reasons and that reputation offered the kind of protection very few could obtain.

It was the same kind of protection that Francisco Lopez kept trying to give me.

For fifteen years he's tried to bring me into his pack so the Lopez name could protect me, but I've rejected him every time.

I didn't want to live in the spotlight. I didn't want the world to know I was a defective omega Francisco Lopez adopted out of pity – the daughter of a serial killer he put away for life.

All these years later and he was still trying to get me to officially join his family.

Apparently, Francisco had even given me the rights to Arturo's life.

I couldn't count the amount of gifts he's tried to give me over the years that I always made sure to send right back to the Lopez compound, but this gift…this one I planned to keep and use to my benefit.

"If Steele is trying to revisit a business deal by getting River to marry Liam, then they're probably trying to capitalize on the fact that he will be the next one in line to take over the chairman position." Frankie drained her energy drink and then set down the can, schooling her features into a neutral expression. "If he wasn't your scent-matched alpha I would have been hoping for that to work out."

Liam growled a warning at Frankie, but I honestly didn't mind. We were already bonded. No one could take him away from me now.

"Why would you want that to work out? Does it benefit Lopez somehow?"

"I just think she deserves to be treated as more than an object. She's clearly suffering from some kind of abuse, but per pack laws, as outsiders, we have no right to interfere." Frankie gave Liam an apologetic shrug. "Liam's a very good alpha who would be able to protect her from her pack. If they got married, he wouldn't divorce her."

Liam sighed and gently pushed Cas's hand away. "If you care so much, then why don't you marry her?"

Frankie snorted. "Why the fuck would I marry her when I'm not interested in female omegas?"

"You're not interested in male omegas either," I muttered under my breath.

I could feel Frankie's death glare.

I cleared my throat and exited out of the eldest son's file, skipping over her five other alpha siblings to select River's file.

When I saw her most recent picture my jaw dropped. "Why wouldn't you propose to her? She's very pretty."

Everyone called her the perfect omega and I could see why.

Long white hair that was straight as a board. It could be natural or it could be trauma induced. I had no idea, but no one else in her family had hair that color. They all had gold or copper coloured hair. Either way, it suited her and the dark grey eyes that reminded me of her namesake.

The grey made her look as sharp as steel with the same dangerous potential.

She was curvy in all the right places and had a tiny waist just like most omegas did, but everything about her was just a little bit more extreme.

Full, pouty lips and a resumé with a list of languages and skills that would put every politician in our country to shame, not to mention all her degrees.

The only criticism she ever got was she never smiled.

Ever.

There wasn't a single picture of her smiling anywhere and no one had seen her flash one in person either. River Steele had a face that moved fashion designers, musicians, and artists all over the world – calling her their muse.

The perfect omega.

But they called her a cold-blooded bitch behind her back – the true viper of Steele.

Honestly, if Francisco was twenty years younger and unbonded I would say she was perfect for him.

Which was why it didn't make sense to me that Frankie wouldn't even consider River as an option when her and her father were a lot alike, whether she wanted to admit it or not.

"You really think I should risk it all for some omega I'm not interested in just because she's pretty?" Frankie raised an eyebrow at me and I could tell she was pissed, but I had no idea why.

"You don't have to bond her, but making a deal with her could work well for the both of you."

Frankie grabbed her empty plate and stood, snatching her empty can off the desk as she headed to the kitchen without a word.

I spun my chair around to watch her toss the dishes into the sink with enough aggression I flinched at the loud noise they made.

Looking over my shoulder at Liam and Cas, I wondered if they knew why she was so pissed about this. Was there some weird legacy thing I should know about, but didn't? Had I missed something obvious again?

It was entirely possible. I always excelled at saying shit I shouldn't.

Knowing what would and wouldn't piss someone off wasn't my forte. I was too objective sometimes and people had a hard time with how direct and blunt I could be. Frankie didn't usually have an issue with it, but this seemed different.

Liam made a shooing motion towards the kitchen, mouthing the words, Go talk to her. We'll give you guys some space.

They went down the hall toward my bedroom and I've never been more grateful that they knew what I needed before I did.

Frankie was clearly struggling with something and I needed to figure out what it was.