Page 4 of Her True Alpha
Phee regretted telling her mother about that, but Mother kept asking about a baby. She wanted to know if Phee picked the right clinic, kept offering a list of suitable doctors, and had demanded Phee tell her which agency she would use to interview nurses. Every time Phee saw her mother, Mother launched into endless rounds of questions about a baby that didn’t exist. About a future family that would never be born.
So Phee had told her about the miscarriages.
And her mother responded with a disappointed, “Oh. That happens. Well, you will have an early cycle then. Best stay close to home. It could come at any time. And your contract won’t stop some ridiculous, low-level alpha from thinking he can make you want him. You have all the proper jewelry, and you smell like dear Swift for sure, but it won’t be enough. They’re animals, all of them.”
Mother was wrong, though. It took longer than it should have for Phee’s cycle to come again.
Kicking off her shoes, she let her mother talk. Menollie came over and picked them up. The girl gave Phee a silent once-over and slowly mouthed, “I will start you a hot bath. There is chicken soup heating, if you want it.”
Phee nodded, grateful.
“Well? Answer me,” Mother said impatiently.
Phee had no idea what the last question was. “I am fine, Mother. Don’t worry about me.”
“But I do worry about you, dear. You are doing so well. I am so proud of you. I really am. Last week, Ninah complimented me on what a fine young woman you are. I know she’s envious. She wishes her daughters were more like you.
“Alta Dryer—do you remember her? She was saying the same thing to me not two weeks ago. Poor Alta. She only had one girl, you know, and she ran off with a Sector 6 guardsman. It upset Alta so much. She was crying. I talked to her for hours. The guardsman has served well, I guess, but he is forty years from his days in the King’s Army and is still nothing more than a city guard. You know how competitive the field is among that type of male—brutes, all of them. Common as river stone.
“And, Phee, honey, you won’t believe it, but theybonded. I warned Alta about that. I told her she should find the proper suitors early. It’s so garish. Can you imagine? Poor Alta cried for hours on my shoulder.”
“She did?”
“Oh,hours. She is so worried for her daughter now. That male will have the run of her. He will make demands. Alta hasn’t seen her little girl for months. She thought she raised her daughter to know better.”
Mother went on and on for another ten minutes, as if she’d forgotten that Phee’s younger sister also mated a brute from the worst sector. Kidnapped from her bedroom on the eve of her bonding ceremony, Naya was taken into Sector 2. When Naya went into heat, even though she had a contract with another man, her desires overcame all her good sense. As a result, she chose the biggest, baddest alpha available. Much to their mother’s horror. Phee didn’t know if Mother was more upset that Naya gave him her bite and her blessing, or by the kidnapping and trauma Naya had suffered.
Phee went the more civilized route and agreed to a contract marriage with Grayson Swift. He was understanding of her first miscarriage and eager for a second chance. Then disappointed at their subsequent failure. She didn’t know whether he’d picked his first beta mistress before or after that.
“Mother, I’m sorry, I’m so very tired. I can’t talk another minute. Going to bathe and rest.”
“Phee, darling, you haven’t told me how the clinic visit went. I’ve gotten all chatty, I know.”
“We’ll talk soon, I’m sure.”
#
Mother buzzed in again about two hours later—just ten minutes after Phee watched her husband-mate walk out their front door.
Hair still wet, wearing a dressing gown, Phee went to the intercom in the main room and hit the answer button. “Hello, Mother.”
“Phee, darling. You didn’t. How could you do this to yourself?” Mother’s voice was watery and high.
“Do what?”
“It’s all over the news. Three nurses have been arrested, the senior nurse executed on the spot. Executed, Phee! There’s going to be a trial. Your name is everywhere. It is horrific.”
Phee sat down in one of the main room’s comfortable chairs. She’d been right—those beta nurseswereterrorizing omegas, and getting away with it in their quiet little clinic. If one had been executed already, that meant an alpha investigator was involved. No one could lie to a dominant; it was said their will could blow over the hardiest soul. Alpha investigators worked for the king himself. They were tried and tested truth detectors, and carried broadswords on their backs to distribute efficient justice.
“Was the doctor a part of it?”
“The doctor who called me? No, they don’t have evidence of that, but it was his clinic. You know what will happen. It’s just terrible. There was video. Ghastly video.”
“Video of what?”
“The arrest. Your father said they showed the execution too.”
“And the omegas? What did they find out?” The pain in that room had settled into Phee’s heart while she’d sat in the bath. By the time her husband-mate returned home from work, having also heard about the raid on the Flower Fertility Clinic and who set it in motion, Phee’s dark mood had become a chilling, bone-deep grief.
