Page 133 of Beautifully Scarred Omega

I want to say more. Want to tell her that I understand her anger, that her fury is the same fury I’ve carried my entire life—for my mother, for every woman whose body was treated like something to be owned rather than respected. I want to tell her that we built Synthera to fix this. That Equinox exists because I watched my mother disappear inside a life she didn’t choose, and I swore no omega would ever be trapped like that again.

But the words don’t come. They stick in my throat, too raw, too close to the surface.

“I hope you come, Sophie,” I say instead, and leave before she can respond.

I’m already dialing Marcia before I’m out of the building.

She picks up on the second ring, her voice warm and unhurried, as if she’d been waiting for exactly this call at exactly this moment.

“Max, darling. What a lovely surprise.”

“Marcia, I need a favor.” My stride doesn’t slow. The gravel crunches under my shoes, and I keep my voice low even though there’s no one around to hear. “I’m bringing someone to see you this evening. She found the trial files—the adverse event logs. She’s angry, and she doesn’t have the full picture.”

“Ah.” She pauses. “And who is this someone?”

The question is simple. The answer should be simple. A colleague. An employee. The security consultant working on the investigation.

But the words that come out of my mouth aren’t any of those.

“Her name is Sophie. She’s—” I stop walking, staring at the gravel under my shoes, and the truth rises up through my chest before I can catch it. “She’s someone I care about, Marcia.”

There’s a pause on the line. Then Marcia says, softer now, “Bring her. I’ll be ready.”

I hang up and stand there for a moment, the phone still in my hand, the evening air cooling the back of my neck.

Someone I care about.

Maybe I’ve known since the first time she made me laugh. Or since the night I knelt on gravel and buckled her shoe and she put her hand in my hair. In that moment I felt everything she wanted to say and couldn’t.

I care what Sophie thinks of me. And I’ve never cared what anyone thinks of me.

My father taught me that. Taught me, through years of watching him wield power like a weapon, that the only way to survive is to never need anything from anyone. People can think whatever they want.

But Sophie looked at me with hatred in her eyes, and it felt like being gutted.

I pocket the phone and keep walking. By the time I reach the house, I’m moving on autopilot—through the garage, into the car, hands on the steering wheel, eyes on the driveway.

And wait.

Five minutes. Ten. Fifteen. I stare at the empty gravel curve where her car should appear, and the longer I sit here the more certain I become that she’s not coming. That she’s already back in her room packing her bag, or on the phone with Griffin, or just sitting at her desk staring at those adverse event logs and hating me.

Twenty minutes.

I grip the steering wheel. I don’t beg. I’ve never begged anyone for anything. Not once in my life. But sitting in this car watching the light fade, I realize I would beg Sophie. I would get on my knees on this gravel and ask her to let me explain, and the fact that I would scares me more than anything she could do to Synthera.

Because the idea of her looking at me with that hatred forever—the idea of never seeing her eyes crinkle when she laughs, never watching that reluctant smile break across her face—the idea of losing her before I ever really got the chance to know her does something to my chest that I don’t have words for.

Twenty-five minutes.

Gravel crunches.

I look up. Sophie’s car is coming up the back drive. It pulls up beside the garage and stops.

My grip on the steering wheel loosens and I close my eyes for half a second.

She gets out, walks toward my car, her face still closed off, still angry. But she’s here. She came.

She gets in the passenger seat and closes the door without looking at me.