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The taunt doesn’t land the way I think he expects it to.

All it brings me is relief.

If my father isn’t coming, then maybe he’s run away, and he’s stopped hurting Caelan.

Maybe I was able to save him long enough for his friends to get to him.

I feel Gav take a step closer to the bathtub, where I’m curled in a ball, shaking. Silas grabs my shoulders and pulls me into a sitting position.

“Where is he? Tell us where your father is, girl!”

With a dark curse, Silas yanks his hands away from me. I sway and fall to the side, landing on the tile in a pathetic, broken heap.

The water’s still pounding against my sensitive flesh, burrowing under my skin like hundreds of tiny needles, but I don’t care about the cold. It’s a welcome contrast to the fire in my veins.

My freezing fingers, my chattering teeth, the wet breaths sawing in and out of my lungs—I compartmentalize all of it. Shove it into a box and lock it away tight so I can focus on the only thing that really matters.

Sending my energy to Caelan.

Silas’s next words have tears of joy pooling on my lower lashes.

“They’ve got him. He’s down in one of the cells. They’re getting ready to have him move right now.”

“How is he?” Gav asks.

With renewed fight, I lift my head, straining to hear Silas’s answer. I want to ask them to take me to him. If I can get closer, I know I can help even more.

Part of it is selfish, too. I need to be near him. My heart, my soul, my very bones ache for him.

“He’s not great. Vae said it looked like that asshole had him on a slow-drip of diluted silver, and Dax is getting him triaged. The rest of the place is clear; no one else is here.” Silas’s footsteps come closer. “Except for her.”

His disgust is unmistakable. As someone who spent her entire life living with the constant disappointment and hatred of a parent, picking up on non-verbal and tonal cues has become a matter of self-preservation.

But even if I’d grown up surrounded by a loving family, there’s no mistaking Silas’s feelings.

He hates me.

I release a choked sob, too tired to hold it back. I’m both elated that they found Caelan and terrified for him. A slow-drip of silver? How? How did my Father pull that off, let alone have it already prepared?

“Oh, now you cry? Now that you know you’re screwed, yeah?” I blink open bleary eyes and squint into the bright light.

Silas’s face comes into focus, loathing painted in every line of his expression.

“Don’t you glare at me,” he hisses. “You’re so fucked when Dax and Vae get their hands on you. You’ll scream for your daddy then, but there will be no one to help you.”

I drop my eyes. Dominance rolls off of him in waves and batters against my Omega.

Who are Dax and Vae? What are they going to do to me?

While Silas taunts me, Gav rifles through my vanity, every time he slams a drawer shut, I flinch.

“What are you looking for, Gavran?”

“A fucking suppressant. It only smells like Omega in this room. It’s nowhere else in the house. If she’s off them, her scent would be everywhere. She’s clearly been taking them, so where the fuck are they?”

“Sink,” I whisper weakly.

Gavran’s eyes snap to mine, and I instinctively look away and bare my neck in submission.