Page 34 of Omega Hunted
“You didn’t know that.”
“I did.”
“I’m feral with a destroyed bond,” I snapped and heard his sharp intake of breath and felt like shit. “And you haven’t spoken to me in three years.”
“I didn’t need to, and you’re not feral. You still have things to fight for.”
“That’s a hell of a gamble to make with an innocent omega’s life.”
“It wasn’t a gamble.” His voice hardened just enough to stop me interrupting again. “I knew exactly who I was sending him to.”
I closed my eyes. “You knew the man I used to be.”
“I know the wolf who loved my little brother.”
For a long moment, neither of us spoke. I stared into the darkness beyond the window, remembering Raff standing in this very kitchen laughing because he’d somehow convinced Ronan that pineapple belonged on pizza. Ronan had spent twenty minutes arguing the point while eating three slices anyway, and Brec had laughed so hard he’d nearly choked on his beer.
“Raff trusted you,” Ronan said. “Completely. There wasn’t a place on this earth he’d have felt safer than beside you.”
My throat tightened.
“He’s gone.”
“I know.”
“So don’t tell me what Raff would’ve wanted.”
“I’m telling you what I know.”
I rested my free hand on the edge of the sink, gripping the stainless steel hard enough that my knuckles whitened.
“You think because I loved Raff that somehow qualifies me to look after a traumatized omega carrying a baby?”
“I think loving Raff tells me everything I need to know about the kind of man you still are.”
“You’ve got more faith in me than I do.”
“I always did, Alpha.”
His answer came so simply that I had nowhere to go with it.
“I couldn’t keep Raff alive,” I said.
“No.”
“I failed him.”
“No.” Ronan’s voice was suddenly firm, carrying the quiet authority that had once steadied an entire team. “You loved him until his last breath. Those aren’t the same thing.”
I swallowed hard.
“The facility I took the omega from was SED, one of their supposed safe centers, but I’m telling you now, it’s a fucking prison, and they’ll come for Soren,” Ronan continued after a moment. “They’ll throw everything they have at finding him. Not to mention there’s a bounty on him—a big one.”
“Fuck.”
“I needed someone who’d stand in front of him instead of handing him over.”
Another silence settled between us, but this one felt different. Not empty. Not broken. Just… familiar, the kind we’d shared on stakeouts and long drives home when words weren’t necessary because we already understood each other.
