Page 111 of What We Don't Say: Part One

Calliope nods, but I see the familiar apology rising in her face. Before it can become words, Sloane reaches up and catches her wrist, pressing his mouth to the inside of it. The gesture is more desperate than polished, but it does what it needs to do. Her breath shakes, and the apology goes back down.

I wait until Theo’s eyes begin to focus again before I touch his cheek. “I’m going to step into the study with Sloane for a few minutes. We’ll be close.”

Theo’s gaze moves from me to the doorway. “Is Garrett in his office?”

“I don’t know.” I won’t lie to him, and I won’t feed the fear either. “We’ll keep the doors open between us.”

He nods after a moment. “Okay.”

Sloane stands only after Theo lets go of his hand. His body turns toward the hallway before his mind catches up, and I put a hand flat against his chest as soon as we clear the sunroom door. He stops because I make him, but the growl that comes out of him vibrates under my palm.

“Study,” I say.

“He put his hands on him.” Sloane’s voice is barely controlled. “He put his hands on our Omega and filled his head with that.”

“I know,” I tell him, and the words barely make it through my own restraint.

“He did it to Callie too.” His eyes cut toward the kitchen, the stairs, every place Garrett might be. “He’s been doing it to her all week. Longer. Fuck, Idris, longer.”

“I know that too.” I keep my hand on his chest until his eyes return to mine. “Study. Now.”

He goes because the alternative is ripping open Garrett’s office door while Theo shakes in the sunroom and Calliope tries to hold herself together with one hand in an Omega’s hair. I close the study door most of the way behind us, leaving it open a few inches so the hall can still carry sound. Sloane paces once, then catches the edge of the desk with both hands, head bowed, shoulders heaving.

I stand between him and the door. It’s deliberate, and he sees it. His mouth curls with fury, but he doesn’t try to move me.

“Say it,” he demands. “Whatever you’re calculating, say it before I do something that makes you stop me harder.”

I keep my voice level. “Theo’s silence changes around Garrett.”

Sloane’s grip tightens on the desk, and the answer comes through his teeth. “Yes.”

“Calliope’s words disappear after Garrett speaks to her,” I continue, watching the confirmation move across Sloane’s face before he can shape it into speech. “You keep sensing command pressure without catching a bark.”

“Yes,” he says, and this time the word sounds like something dragged out of him. His hands flex against the desk as if the wood might hold him where reason can’t.

“I asked Theo one question about whether Garrett told him not to ask Calliope for something.” My jaw tightens around the next part, but I don’t let anger change my volume. “He locked so hard Calliope felt it through his hand.”

Sloane closes his eyes. The sound he makes is quiet and ruined, worse than a roar because he keeps the roar swallowed. “I felt something earlier. In the hall. It wasn’t a bark, but my Alpha kept reacting like there was one. I thought I was losing my mind.”

“You’re not,” I say, and I step closer because he needs the pressure of another Alpha in the room before his own instincts fill all the space. “We’re naming what we have.”

He looks at me then, and there’s blood in his expression. “Don’t smooth this over.”

“I’m not soothing you.” I hold his stare until the words land under the rage. “We have a pattern. Theo locks around Garrett’s name. Calliope makes herself smaller after Garrett corrects her. Your body keeps sensing command pressure without a clean verbal trigger.”

Sloane pushes away from the desk. “That’s enough.”

I put a hand on his chest when he steps toward the door. “It’s enough to change how we move. It isn’t enough to confront a pack-law attorney who controls the filings, Bellwether communication, household accounts, and the visible structure of this family.”

His eyes go black at the edges. “He’s poisoning them, and you want me to wait.”

“I want you to protect them in a way he can’t use against them.”

Sloane’s breathing turns rough. “He’s head Alpha on paper.”

“Yes.”

“I’m Callie’s bonded Alpha.”