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If I didn’t know better, I’d say he might be enjoying himself. On my next breath, the thick, rich aroma of coffee is so strong and smooth that I almost feel dizzy.
After staring me down for several moments, he sighs, shoving his hands into his pockets. “Everyone has a price.”
My mouth actually falls open. This alpha—who pays me peanuts at work and uses his superiority as an excuse to berate me constantly—is now trying to bribe me to get his way? And for what? So I can be homeless?
I look around the room as if there’s something I might be missing. “In case this escaped your grasp,” I tell him, “I don’t exactly have a lot of options, here. I can stay in my apartment, or I can go sleep at my friend’s house. She’s about to have a heat, so I doubt that her four alphas would?—”
He growls, “Not an option.”
I resist the unladylike urge to snort at him. “Excuse me? They’re happily bonded! I go over there all the time.”
Smith takes two slow steps forward, each rippling with deadly intent. “Not. Anymore.”
His alpha energy lodges a lump in my throat. My stomach squirms, trying to tell me to run and hide. Or whine and present.
chapter
twenty-two
Remi Skyes’ apartment building slants to the left.
There are several reasons why I find that disturbing, both as a consumer and a property developer.
But, mostly, I’m just disturbed by myself.
For one, I am an irredeemable asshole for the way I’ve acted. I already know that. I knew it as it was happening. I’ve even considered slipping extra cash into the tip jar on several occasions, knowing she would get the majority of it if I did.
Which is also appalling.
Money? That was my solution? Throw some cash at the person I treated like trash?
Growing up, Cassian and I never had money. Our parents were lower middle class. We were lucky to have any cash to put into a tip jar. Let alone hundreds of dollars of hush money.
When I look back on why I’ve done what I have to get to this point, it all makes sense. It was logical, methodical.
Necessary? I told myself it was, at the time.
I’ve done what I was raised to do—be a good alpha. Provide, protect, secure our future, change it for the better. I didn’t realize it was changing me. I never expected to look up one day and realize I don’t recognize myself anymore.
For example, did I seriously park outside an omega’s apartment building for three hours?
Too proud to go ring her doorbell?
Too obsessed to leave?
I know the guys were here earlier. Cassian sent me a bare-bones text telling me they had tried to order her dinner, but she asked them to leave because of her building’s rules. The end of the conversation was succinct, but the words weighed heavy on my mind.
You have to fix this for the pack, or there won’t be one anymore.
I don’t even know that I blame him. The hours of reflection have given me plenty of time to remember my teenaged brother, clearly head-over-heels for the girl who used to meet him in the mornings to read with him. He barely described her at all—hell, he barely spoke in sentences, back then. But, often, his stories about her were the only glimpse of the real Cassian that I got to see, week in and week out.
I remember the relief and gratitude I felt whenever I listened to him talk about her—this angel who somehow made his time in that shitty group home bearable.
And now I’ve hurt her. Scared her.
So. Many. Times.
I keep seeing the look on Remi’s face when she recognized me. The utter devastation and… disappointment.
