11.2

“Is that where you draw the line?” Suddenly, she was furious. And terrified. It suddenly seemed so easy , so simple to manipulate Gabriel into that kind of situation.

He closed the distance between them and brushed his thumb along the line of her jaw, collecting her tear. “I need you to explain this reaction.” His expression finally collapsed, showing her a glimpse of confusion and shame, his russet eyes glimmering. “I don’t understand. If something like that can cause a minor infraction, I need to know?—”

“This isn’t about me .” She pushed against his chest, frustrated. He didn’t seem to notice. “I pushed you,” she growled, even more frustrated.

“I’ll stumble later,” he promised, wiping another tear. “And I’ll never make that deal again.”

“You better not,” she threatened, but her stupid voice wobbled. “If you’re going to make a trade or a deal, it better have nothing to do with your body.”

His eyes suddenly dropped to her lips, and all the air was sucked from the room.

“You care about me.” He was saying it like he had only just noticed .

“No,” she lied, ineffectually shoving him again. “I pushed you.”

He stepped back calmly. She would have preferred a stumble, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. He was staring at her like he couldn’t understand her at all, but she had caught sight of something on the shelf behind him and was no longer paying attention.

“Is that my sweatshirt?” she asked, confused. “I lost that last year.”

He didn’t answer, and she stepped past him, shock freezing her into place. The shelf was full of her things.

The bodysuit she had worn during one of her shibari performances with Kalen. One of the dresses she had worn while dancing. A crop top, a jumper, a handful of silk hair ties, Kilian’s faded yellow T-shirt that she used to love wearing to bed. And … panties. Multiple pairs of them. They looked clean and were neatly folded.

“You washed and folded them,” she said numbly.

“That’s the part that surprises you?” he asked calmly, moving behind her again, his heat skittering across her back. “What am I going to do with them dirty, Isobel?”

“Should I be insulted? That you didn’t want my dirty panties?”

He planted his hands on the shelves either side of her, leaning closer, boxing her in. “I only wash your clothes when they stop smelling like you.”

“Everything in here looks washed.”

“Then it’s time I steal something new.”

His hands dropped from the shelf, brushing up over her tights until he reached the waistband. There was something about his hands spanning the bare skin of her waist, the bulk of them just visible beneath her shirt, that had liquid heat immediately pooling low in her stomach, her entire body tensing in anticipation.

He paused there, both of them breathing too loudly. She wasn’t sure how to proceed, but she wanted to. Badly .

“I … c-can take them off myself,” she whispered, her face flaming red.

He growled, his hips suddenly pushing into her, pressing her against the shelves, the movement so sudden she had to grasp the shelf to steady herself. His erection curved into her spine.

“That’s not the problem,” he said lowly.

“I can shower?”

“No.” He tensed. “I like it when you smell like you.” And then, after a pause: “I just don’t know if I can be what you need.”

Her stomach clenched. “You don’t have a single unwashed thing here. That has to be driving you crazy. What kind of system is that?”

He chuckled, his breath stirring her hair. “Are you trying to goad me into fucking you, Sigma? Is that what you like to do?”

“Just stating facts. There’s a flaw in your system. A production and supply issue. I thought you were better than that.”

He laughed softly against the top of her head before gripping her waist and spinning her around. And then he stepped back, his hands falling out from beneath her shirt. “I know you love to test our control, but control isn’t something I can give up.”

This wasn’t him flirting; this was him being deadly serious.

She nodded, worrying her lip. “You shouldn’t do anything you’re not ready for.”

His smile was slight but sharp. “I don’t feel completely in control, and you drive me insane. I don’t think I should push things while I feel so … rattled. I could end up like Oscar, or I could push myself past my comfort levels without realising it. I forget about those things when I’m with you.”

“You don’t have to explain.” She wished she could reach out and touch him, and thankfully, he closed the distance between them again, large palms brushing down her arms, warming her skin, until he reached her fingers, which he twisted between his own.

“Will you sleep here tonight?” he asked. “I put a blanket in the cupboard for you.”

She bit back a smile. “Are you trying to get me to rub myself all over your bed so you won’t have to steal another pair of panties?”

He jerked her forward, spun behind her, and spanked her. Hard . “Get ready for bed, puppy.”

She hurried back to her room and put herself through a shower almost numbly. As surprised as Gabriel had been that she cared so much about him, she had to admit she had been just as shocked to find out the same thing about him. After her shower, she began to reach for the shirt she had worn to bed last night, but paused, her fingers brushing the sleeve. It was Cian’s.

I like it when you smell like you.

There was an odd flutter in her belly as she pulled on a cotton tank with cute, matching little booty shorts instead, texting the group to check that the coast was clear before she looped the cameras, since she wasn’t sure if Theodore and Kilian were back yet and didn’t want to start a loop when they were in any of the common rooms.

She made her way back to Gabriel’s room, closing the door and leaning back against it as she took in the sight before her. Gabriel was sitting up in his bed, fresh out of a shower with only black sweatpants on, his laptop resting on his thighs as he tapped away, the muscles in his arms twitching with the movement. Beside him was a second pillow, and a fluffy, cream-coloured blanket.

“I plugged in a phone charger for you,” he said, without looking up from his screen.

There was also a fresh bottle of water on her side of the bed, and a steaming cup of peppermint tea, which he had apparently noticed she liked to drink at night. She was a little too shocked to make a joke about it, so she just curled up on the bed, plugged in her phone, and cradled the tea, edging into the warmth of his side to see what he was doing.

Scheduling their social media accounts, of course.

“You should take a break,” she said.

He scoffed and continued typing.

“Seriously.” She nudged him ever so slightly with her shoulder.

“Like you do?” he asked, finally looking away from his screen.

“What if my feet get cold?” she asked, switching tack to tease him a little about the bedtime preparations he had made.

“Socks are in the drawer.”

She pulled away from him, rolling to her stomach and setting her tea on his bedside table. She tugged open the drawer, finding a folded pair of fluffy socks, an eye mask, lip balm, a hairbrush, and a book. Technical Manual and Dictionary of Classical Ballet .

She bit down on her lip to keep from laughing. “What’s the book for?”

“In case you get bored.”

“How could I ever get bored with you around.” She glanced at him over her shoulder.

His eyes were on her ass, his fingers curled into fists. He carefully closed his laptop and rolled off the bed, placing it on his desk. His walk back to the bed was more purposeful, more of a prowl, and she felt stuck, unable to so much as twitch. It seemed like the smallest movement from her would force him to pounce, but instead, he only stretched back out and turned off the lights.

“Should I—” she began, but he cut her off.

“Come here.”

She edged toward him, curling into his side as he held his arm open, making room for her.

“What if I get hungry?” she whispered.

He chuckled, aware that she was teasing him, and swatted her ass again. “Go to sleep.”

Isobel’s first session with Teak after the fall break had her hopes plummeting. The bond specialist’s recovery seemed to have plateaued. She had lost weight, her bones now prominent beneath her skin, her once warm, beautiful eyes now sallow and empty. Their sessions grew shorter and shorter, because Isobel had no new information to offer up, and eventually, Teak changed them to once a month.

When Isobel needed more pills, she texted her father and he booked another session with her at the Icon Cafe. This time, he arrived with more than one gift bag. He was trailed in by a harried-looking assistant whose arms were overflowing with shopping bags.

“I had my personal shopper purchase suits for the Alphas,” he said as soon as he sat down. He waved his assistant off, and the man placed all the bags on the floor before disappearing. “I saw them at your performance last night and they were wearing the same sad excuses for suits as they were at your first performance. I assume the ones who weren’t there looked just as pathetic. What the fuck are they spending their Ironside stipends on?”

Isobel rubbed at her temples, fighting off an immediate headache. “Their families?” she ventured, drawing out the answer like it should have been obvious. “What do you care?”

“They’re a direct reflection on you,” he grumbled, smacking her hand away when she robotically moved to pour his tea, falling into the motions of her duties as she did every Saturday.

She blinked at him, staring, as he poured her a glass of tea.

Usually, her guests wanted her to wait on them hand and foot and got annoyed if her attention wavered from them for even a moment.

“They need to look as good as you do,” Braun continued. “I had one of my assistants request their sizes from their Ironside records, but I accounted a little for the Alpha growth cycle, so they should fit nicely.”

She was still staring at him, her mouth slightly unhinged. He nudged the tea toward her.

“Their suits aren’t that bad,” she finally said.

He gave her a droll, tired look. “Yes, they are. They need to be respected in here. If they look like they don’t have two dollars to rub together, people will assume they’re easy targets. People will start offering or demanding they do things for money. They need to look like they don’t need anything. It will discourage some of the patrons from trying to take advantage of them. Mind you, I said some of the patrons. Not all of them.”

“What the hell has gotten into you?” she demanded. “You don’t care about other people.”

“I care about my people,” he snarled, his composure breaking before he shockingly reeled it under control, giving her a stern look.

This time, her mouth really did fall open. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“You’re my daughter.” He sighed, reaching for his own drink. “The only progeny I have. Whoever is attached to you is also attached to me.”

He knew .

He knew they were her mates.

“Congratulations,” she said, unable to help the sarcasm from her voice. She couldn’t believe he knew. She needed to make sure. “You always wished I was an Alpha. Now you have ten of them.”

He stared at the table for several long, awkward seconds before his chest filled with air. “I didn’t wish you were an Alpha. I just wished I could look at you and not feel death.”

A grimace tightened her features. “I was a baby. You can’t blame me for what happened.”

“Welcome to the world, kid.” His laugh was empty. “That’s what we do.”

She had no idea what to do with this version of her father. If anything, he scared her more than the old version because it all felt like an act, a mask that would crack when she was least expecting it.

“I’ve been seeing someone,” he blurted without warning.

“What?” Her head snapped up.

“A psychiatrist,” he clarified, a hint of colour in his cheeks, his hands tightening into fists. “I also started reading your mother’s journals. I know you’re confused about how I’m acting. I can see it in your face.”

“You told a human psychiatrist what you told me?” she asked, her brows inching higher. “About … what happened back in the settlement? Mom? Your brother?”

He laughed. “Fuck no, Isobel. Jesus. I told him I had an abusive upbringing. I told him about my own father and how I started to repeat some of those patterns with you. It’s not going to be an overnight fix … but I’m trying. I just thought you should know.”

She levelled him with a searching look before shrugging her shoulder lightly. “If you say so.”

That night, she found herself under the spell of her golden roses again. Her preoccupation had grown worse, and she often found herself getting up in the middle of the night to close her bathroom door because she couldn’t sleep when she could see them.

She was too tired to close the door that night, worn down into a puddle of limbs by Theodore, who had squeezed multiple orgasms from her body using his mouth before he flipped her over and filled her, making sure she would be too weak to ask for more.

She sighed, staring at the glint of moonlight shimmering off those gold petals. She could only see one of the vases, but her fingers itched to touch them again.

Theodore rolled onto his side, blocking her line of sight, his grey eyes blinking at her sleepily, surprised that she was still awake.

“Are you not exhausted enough, Illy?” He dragged her thigh over his hip, pulling her tight into the heat of his body as he lazily nuzzled into her neck.

She didn’t answer, tucking her head against his chest and sighing in relief. She closed her eyes, trying to forget about the soul artefact.

But the bond wasn’t willing to leave her alone. Almost as soon as she closed her eyes, she was dragged into a vision.

She jolted in shock, peering around. She was standing in a small bedroom, a filthy mattress on the floor. A man lay on the mattress with his pants undone and his belt unbuckled. He had a thick moustache and stringy black hair, blue eyes clouded as he puffed on a cigarette. His eyes were human, and there was a uniform jacket tossed to the side of the mattress.

He was a cop. A human cop.

“What—” she began, but Elijah swore so loudly that she jumped, turning to see the Alphas lined up against the wall behind her.

“Is this your memory?” she asked Elijah, who was as white as a sheet.

“No,” he answered, voice strained.

Frowning, she glanced to the others.

Gabriel looked like he was about to be sick. His hands were shaking.

“We h-have to get out of here,” he stuttered. She had never heard him sound that scared.

“Boy!” the cop called out. “Quit washing your fucking hands and get back in here.”

Isobel’s heart sank, and tears filled her eyes.

“I’ve seen him before,” she said, staring at the man. “He came to me as a remnant with my mom and Crowe. He’s dead.”

“Yeah,” Elijah said quietly. “Stick around long enough, and you’ll see it happen.”

A little boy, maybe around ten or twelve, walked back into the room. His hands and arms were red from scrubbing, his fingertips dripping with water. He was dressed in too-big, baggy clothes.

“I have to go home now,” he said, russet eyes empty.

“Like fuck,” the man replied. “I paid for two hours. I’m getting two hours. I didn’t say you could put your damn clothes back on, kid. Come here.” He jolted from the mattress, making a grab for the boy.

Isobel waited for him to dart out of reach. To run away. To fight, and kick, and scream. But he didn’t. Because he was a child, and this had happened to him before.

As soon as his little back hit the mattress, her vision went blurry, and she clutched her stomach, trying not to vomit.

Make it stop , she pleaded, screwing her eyes closed. She couldn’t watch this.

“Let’s get you dirty again, boy,” the man leered, and Isobel doubled over, dry retching onto the floor.

“It’s gone,” Theodore said quietly, fury and despair simmering in his voice. His hands were on her shoulders, pulling her up again. He was shaking.

Isobel blinked at their new setting. They were on the streets of what looked like one of the settlements. The moon was high in the sky, the streets shadowed, lacking any streetlights. There was a shuffling sound along the dirt road, and she peered at the wobbly outline, which slowly came into focus.

It was a different boy, this time, though he was dressed just like Gabriel had been, his clothes oversized, torn, and dirty. He had silver-blond hair, overlong, flopping into pale-grey eyes.

Elijah?

He was carrying something on his back, and as he shuffled closer, Isobel’s heart dropped right out of her body. Elijah clutched pale arms around his neck, a dirty blond head lolling on his shoulders. The little boy was naked, blood smeared over his legs, bruises littering his back, arms, and thighs. He was unconscious.

“Hold on, Gabey,” the little Elijah squeaked out. “Just hold on.”

They stood there and watched, unable to help, unable to interfere, as Elijah carried the broken body past them, his pace painfully slow.

Isobel glanced back at the real Gabriel and Elijah, tears spilling down her cheeks, words lodged into the back of her throat. She wanted to reach out to them, but they weren’t even comforting each other. In fact, the Alphas seemed to have edged a few inches away from Gabriel, like they knew he didn’t want them in his space. She watched him mournfully as she waited for the vision to end. He was so still, his eyes empty.

Fuck this . She edged closer and Elijah looked at her, shaking his head quickly. Usually, she would have listened. They knew each other best. But they didn’t know her and Gabriel’s relationship. It was more private than her connection with Theodore, Kilian, Cian, or Oscar.

But it was there, and she shakily placed her trust in it as she approached him. He never hesitated to reach out to her, to touch her. So she didn’t hesitate now. She slipped her arms gently around his waist. He froze for only a moment before he bent down and snatched her up, lifting her feet from the ground, his arms like two steel bands around her back and the low curve of her spine.

It was painful . He was holding her too tight. She could barely breathe, but she didn’t need to because he was finally breathing. He was sucking in deep gulps of her scent, dragging her higher up his body so that he could burrow his face into her neck. Hidden by the soft cloud of her wavy hair, he began to quietly cry, teardrops littering her skin and slipping down over her chest and arm.

She threaded her fingers into his hair, slowly stroking him, her fingers trembling.

Let’s get you dirty again, boy.

She couldn’t stop the words replaying over and over again in her mind. Gradually, Gabriel stopped silently crying, and the dampness against her neck dried. He let her down, and she glanced around.

“Why are we still here?” she whispered.

She turned, but Gabriel clutched her back to his body, his arms wrapped around her chest.

“Because it’s not over,” he said huskily.

She had no idea how long they stood there, but eventually, Elijah came back into sight, a boy with dark hair, honeyed skin, and hazel eyes striding beside him.

“My dad will help him,” the dark-haired boy promised. Niko . “Don’t worry, Eli.”

“It’s not good enough,” the young Elijah said. “He has to listen to their thoughts. He has to listen to what they think. He can’t do it anymore.”

Isobel jolted into motion as soon as they passed by her, Gabriel’s hold on her breaking apart. They were going back .

“Wait,” she said, even though she knew they couldn’t hear her.

Don’t go back there.

She hurried after them but didn’t have to go far. They stopped a few houses down and pushed inside. Isobel tailed them into the same small bedroom with the dirty mattress on the ground. The man was asleep, snoring loudly, a half-empty bottle of vodka wedged beneath his arm. His belt was still undone, his pants still hanging open.

“Wake up,” Elijah demanded, and there was a strange shiver of power in his voice. Not Alpha voice, but something else.

“You can’t,” Niko whispered, staring at the man with wide eyes as he jerked awake, pitching upright and blinking dizzily.

“Eli,” Niko tugged on the other boy’s arm. “You can’t use your powers on a human.”

Elijah shook him off, refocussing on the man.

“Die,” he said, the air shivering with that same power.

The man acted immediately, picking up the vodka bottle and smashing it against the floor.

Isobel sucked in a sharp breath as he picked up a broken shard of glass in each hand, his head shaking as he tried to fight against the compulsion. He began to shout, but Elijah cut him off.

“Shut up.”

He began to stab his own legs, his stomach, his arms, his neck.

Isobel closed her eyes, unable to watch, but when the horrific sounds finally stopped, she opened them again and focussed on Elijah, who had watched the whole thing.

The younger Elijah collapsed and threw up all over the floor. Now that it was done, he was shaking and sobbing, his anger drained, replaced by ashen cheeks and horrified grey eyes.

Niko dragged him out of the house and back to the street, and then stumbled back in, searching the drawers in the empty kitchen until he found a packet of matches.

“It’s o-okay,” he stuttered, even though his only company was a dead man. “It’ll be okay.”

He set fire to the curtains first.

Isobel jolted awake, sick and disoriented. She was standing in her bathroom back in Dorm A, her hands stinging. She frowned, looking down.

Was this another vision?

She was clutching the golden roses, half in her left hand, the other half in her right hand, thorns digging into her skin.

“Oh shit,” she whispered before raising her voice. “Theo!”

He was there in a second, hair dishevelled, bare, muscled chest rising and falling rapidly. “What is it? How did you get in here? Were you sleepwalking?” His eyes flicked down to her hands and widened. “Oh shit.”

Isobel’s room! he shouted through the bond.

The roses began to melt, pooling like hot metal into her bleeding palms, though it didn’t burn her. It almost felt like a balm for her cuts, and she turned her hands, displaying her palms as the golden liquid covered her skin. It didn’t drip onto the floor—it seemed alive, and it wanted to stay with her.

She heard the other Alphas bursting into the bedroom, but she couldn’t look away. The gold liquid seemed to bubble and condense, turning into small puddles cradled by her palms. The puddles grew smaller and separated, turning hard and shiny again until she was staring down at ten tiny gems, all in different colours. Golden amber, midnight blue, stormy grey, clear grey, pale green, golden green, red-brown, sapphire, and glittering onyx.

“That’s all?” Elijah was at her side, frowning down at the gems. “I was definitely expecting that many roses to turn into something much more dramatic. These are tiny, and they aren’t even attached to you.”

“They are,” she whispered, realising what the little gems were.

She pulled down her pyjama shirt to reveal her sternum piercing. All of the gems that had appeared were now gone.

She pinched one of the tiny gems between her fingers and pressed into the empty casing in her piercing.

It didn’t click or melt into place, but suddenly it was stuck there, and she couldn’t pick it off.

“Maybe we should just—” Moses ventured, but she shook her head, cutting him off.

“No, this is what I need to do.” She returned each of the little gems and then traced the piercing with her fingernail. Energy buzzed through her body, a smile splitting over her face.

She felt … powerful .

“Whoa.” Theodore grabbed her arms, spinning her to face him, his eyes wide. “I can feel that.”

“It feels like you, but it also feels like me,” Moses said with a frown, staring at the piercing.

She traced down to the pale green stone, pressing it inward. This time, it did shift. It clicked inward in the barest movement, lighting up slightly.

“Holy shit,” Kilian laughed out. “You’re invisible. And I can feel the draw on my energy.”

They were all staring at her, so she shifted to the side. Moses’s and Niko’s gazes shifted, eyes crawling in her direction. Their noses were better than the others.

Holy shit .

She should have touched the roses months ago.

She ducked between Theodore and Kilian, who both turned, following the heat of her body and her scent as she escaped into her bedroom. They knew roughly where she was but truly couldn’t see her.

“Oh my god,” she laughed out. “This is incredible.”

The little gem on her chest turned dull again, and they all followed her out into the bedroom.

Gabriel and Elijah stared at her piercing in apprehension, but neither of them said anything. She looked between them, feeling that ache of sorrow pulse back to life. Elijah’s brows drew together, and he quickly spoke, as if he really wanted to focus on this interesting new development instead of the memory they had all just witnessed.

“When the piercing was giving you powers, it gave you ferality, but ferality isn’t an ability. Shouldn’t it have given you charm or aggression?”

“What happened exactly?” Gabriel asked, eyeing her piercing, his hand scraping down the side of his handsome face. “When it gave you ferality?”

“Crowe was … he had me cornered. So I prayed. I’ve never prayed before, but Sophia and Maya had just introduced me to all this Gifted religion stuff, so I guess I thought why not . And then it happened. The gemstone glowed, and I got ferality.”

“Maybe the gemstones don’t give you our abilities so much as they give you our power,” Kilian said. “I could feel you using my power .” He tapped his chest. “Drawing it out of my body. So maybe you just pulled on the wrong power?”

“Or maybe the prayer worked,” Niko suggested casually, rubbing the back of his neck like he was embarrassed to suggest it. “You were begging them for help. It looks like they helped you—well, as much as the gods help anyone, anyway. They gave you access to Theo’s or Moses’ power, and that power includes ferality.”

She stared down at her chest, feeling a little less lucky.

After forming their bond, she had stopped worrying that the second ferality gemstone would appear, but suddenly it felt like a ticking bomb again.

Except this time, there were three gemstones that could give her ferality. And if it was triggered in any of the others?

She swallowed, tugging her shirt back up over the piercing. “Maybe I won’t experiment with the others. Seems like it only lasts for a minute or two, but I can cause all kinds of trouble in two minutes.”

“Don’t we know it,” Kilian murmured, falling onto her bed. “Are we done with drama for tonight?”

Theodore frowned at him. “I was sleeping there.”

Kilian dragged a pillow over his face, uncaring. Oscar wordlessly dropped onto the other side of the bed. Gabriel moved to the couch, lying down and linking his hands over his flat stomach. Elijah slumped into an armchair. Cian followed Gabriel and Elijah, holding out a hand for one of them to pass him a cushion, and then he spread out on the rug before the fireplace. Niko and Moses followed suit, stretching out on the floor. It couldn’t have been comfortable, but they were all so tired they would have been able to sleep on a cold concrete slab.

Kalen strode to Isobel, catching her chin and pulling her eyes up to his. His jaw worked, and then he surprised her by bending and pressing his hard lips into the soft swell of her own.

“Night,” he grunted, before striding from the room.

Mikel watched her for a few moments. “I’ll be just downstairs.”

Theodore picked her up as soon as the door closed behind Mikel, carrying her back to bed and placing her between Oscar and Kilian, and then he grabbed a spare cushion and joined the others on the rug.

This wasn’t about her.

This was about them . Their group. Their family.

After what they had seen, they needed each other.

She curled into Kilian, and ever-so-gently cracked open her walls, stirring at the dark cloud of trauma that hung over the room, coaxing it into the cavern of her chest.

She drank their sorrow until her eyelids were heavy, and then she cut herself off, melting into Kilian’s comforting arms.