AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Vee’s eyes widen, and she looks at all of us. “What? All of them?” I nod in confirmation. “Because of me?” It’s barely more than a whisper, hurt lacing every word. She drops her gaze away from us and murmurs, almost to herself, “I was never going to be good enough, was I?”
“No, angel. You are good enough. You’re fucking perfect. They just… couldn’t see it.”
Jacks moves even closer, drawn to her. No doubt his alpha is demanding her gather her close and purr away her hurt, but he stays where he is, respecting the boundaries she set for us during this conversation. “It was Maxim. I’ve had years to think about it, and I’m sure of it. He convinced the rest of them you were the wrong choice for us, that you would destroy us. And that Yasmin would be our salvation.”
Ford scoffs and shakes his head. “My parents had hearts in their eyes at the idea of me mating the top omega at the academy.”
“That Yasmin was a Forsyth helped,” Asher adds.
“Our fathers were eager to get into business with them,” Davis runs a hand through his curly brown hair. “Nevermind that we would have been miserable with Yasmin. She would have been too.”
Vee’s listening, I can tell she is, but she has the faraway look in her eyes as she’s staring right through us. “I don’t get it. I don’t understand… I know I’m not from a wealthy family. I know my grandmother was a money grubbing awful person, but I never… I tried so hard to be what they would want. I thought most of your parents liked me.” Her voice is so small and hurt, and I can see her pulling away again.
“They did,” I rush to reassure her. “They do. Believe me, Vee. They loved you.”
“Then why?”
“Everyone thought you were going to be a beta, pip.” Ford cuts right to the heart of the matter. “And they knew we would build our pack around you. That we wouldn’t look for an omega. And a pack like ours, with our status without an omega?”
Jackson’s jaw ticks. “Maxim Werth is very fucking persuasive, baby girl. We thought we could humor them, just spend some time with Yasmin, make a show of testing our options. None of us wanted her, Vee. I think it’s important for you to know that. She was never a threat to you or your relationship with us.”
“We hoped that spending time with her would be enough, you know?” Davis says, tipping his head to look at the floor. “Humor them into thinking we were considering her. But… they saw through it. Threatened to cut us off if we didn’t do what they wanted.”
“So you went along with having Yasmin join the pack because of money? You broke my heart, rejected me.” I wince at the reminder that, because of us, she’s sick now. The rest of my pack does too. “Because of money? Because you needed to keep living the lavish lifestyle you were accustomed to?”
“No. Fuck no,” Ford answers, uncrossing his arms and taking a step toward her. “No, pip. We wanted to give you the life you deserved. We were fucking kids. You and Davis hadn’t even graduated high school yet. Jackson still had two years of college left.”
“When I say they threatened to cut us off, I mean they were going to pull our tuition, baby girl. None of us would have been able to afford an education without drowning in debts. And that’s… That’s not the life we wanted for you, Vee. We didn’t want to start our pack with no money, already sinking under the weight of debt. We wanted you to go to school too, to be able to pay for it for you.”
“We needed to be able to take care of you, angel.”
Vee’s brow furrows. “Why wouldn’t you just tell me this?”
“I didn’t want you to worry about it.” Jackson’s gray eyes burn into her.
“We didn’t,” I stress, because sure he made the call, but the rest of us went along with it.
“But we planned to,” Asher offers. “After the party. We were going to tell you everything.”
“After the party where you were essentially engaged to another woman? How would telling me this after the fact help? Seems like something we should have discussed before it even got to that point.”
“Believe me, beautiful. We know. I’m sure not one of us regrets anything in our lives more than not telling you before that fucking party.”
“There wasn’t time,” Jackson says, almost stubbornly. “They sprung it on us, Vee. Told us a few hours before the party what it was actually for. We just… I wanted us to have enough time to really talk about it, to make sure you understood it was all fake. That it changed nothing for us.”
“But it did. It changed everything.” Vee shakes her head. “Even if you had warned me, Jacks, I’m not sure I would have… Do you have any idea what it was like for me? Watching the five of you dote on her? Touch her? Kiss her? How long were you thinking I would live with that? With the news articles about your perfect omega? With you hiding me away like a dirty low class secret and being with her?”
“Just until I graduated and received my trust. Once we had that money, we would have said fuck it to all the other inheritances. It would have been enough to take care of you.”
“Two years?” Vee snaps. “Two fucking years? You thought I would just sit idly by and watch you build a pack with someone else?”
Not one of us can defend ourselves, because yes. That is exactly what we thought would happen. That we could publicly be with Yasmin, fool the entire fucking world, and privately be with Vee.
“We honestly didn’t see any other option,” Asher murmurs, still calm and collected. Though I can tell he’s trying hard not to let the acrid pheromones coming off our omega get to him. She doesn’t want any of us to make this better through physical touch.
An alpha can calm a distraught omega just by holding them, but it would be too easy—cheating—if any of them did that now. We deserve to feel her anger and hurt. She’s been living with it for seven years.
Vee takes a deep breath, struggling to get herself under control. When she feels like she has, her eyes lift to us again. “Okay, I don’t necessarily agree with your reasoning… but I guess I can see…” She shakes her head. “No, I really can’t. I won’t pretend like I do.”
