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They shook their head and leaned in to kiss me. It was too brief, and when they started to pull away, I held the back of their neck, pressing my forehead to theirs.
“Thanks. Love you, Shae.”
“Love you, too. How about I see if everyone will eat here? Miles would bring food in.”
I nodded enthusiastically and turned back to my desk as they went to coordinate a working pack dinner. The article was up on the screen and I quickly found his name, Justin Grant, then dipped into the man’s digital footprint. He was high enough up the ladder at the Foundation to make money, but little red flags started popping up here and there. His car was far too nice, not setting off an alarm on its own, but paired with the fact that his wife, a proclaimed stay-at-home-mom based on her socials, had an identical car in a different color—alarm bells went off. They also managed to live in a neighborhood that was a reach for his listed annual salary. Their taxes didn’t indicate any additional income or financial windfalls that would explain away their spending.
I was trolling through his wife’s social media accounts when my chair was spun around, and I came face-to-face with a grinning Theo.
“Time to eat, Biscuit.”
I looked around. Amy and the others must have left while I was working. They understood what it was like to go down a rabbit hole like this, though. Hopefully they wouldn’t think I was being rude. The blinds were open in Trevor’s office, and I could see Miles and Shae setting up take out containers, plates, and more. This was what life could be like, too. Not just hot sex and dates and bonding, but lazy nights on the couch and dinners around the office when one of us had to work late. I could hardly believe it was real. Theo’s finger slid along his bondmark and lit a fire in my veins.
“I don’t want to be hard while looking at Mary Grant’s Casino Night posts, Theo. That’s weird.”
He laughed and looked over at my screen for a second before he stilled, and all of the emotion slid from his face. Leaning closer to the screen, he poked at the picture I’d been looking at.
“When was this taken?”
I spun back to the screen to see what had captured his attention, but it was just a photo of the couple standing with some other Foundation employees in front of a casino floor. I’d just scrolled to this photo and hadn’t checked any of the details yet.
“It was posted two months ago at the, fucking hell, Senet Casino… Theo?”
He stood suddenly and I felt a tugging in the bond, like he was calling me to him but I was right there.
The beep that indicated someone gaining entrance to the area went off a moment later and Jade nearly ran into the BullPen from the short hallway, looking around wildly.
“Jade!”
Theo’s shout pulled the attention of the others who began filing out of Trevor’s office and moving toward us. Jade got there first, her face a mix of confusion and alarm, like she’d been prepared for a fight but found no threat.
“Why’d you call to me like that? Fuck, Theo, I thought something was wrong.”
He’d called Jade though the bond? How could I learn to do that tugging thing? Theo stabbed his finger into the screen, pointing to the sort of blurry image of two men in the background.
“It’s him, isn’t it? That Alpha fucker from the warehouse.”
Jade squinted at the screen and I watched her expression cycle from mild annoyance to recognition and then, finally, rage.
“Yes.”
“Ethan, can you find any other pictures of that night or pictures of that man?”
I nodded and began pulling up any other photos from that night at that location. Dinner was mostly forgotten as we all crowded around the screen. Finally, I found an image that had a clearer view of the Alpha who’d tortured and sold human beings, hurt my Beta, and turned my Alpha. A sharp intake of breath behind me had me whirling. Shae was staring at the screen as their scent became a suffocating mixture of rotten berries as they grappled with their fear and anger. Jade and Miles surrounded them and Trevor reached out to hold one of their hands. I started to stand, to go to them until they shook their head. A broken little whimper slipped out of my mouth, before Shae moved to me and cupped my face.
“I wasn’t rejecting you, baby. I just meant to keep working. I am fine but that man has been elusive for too long. Find him for us.”
I kissed them quickly and spun around, tapping into a facial recognition program and running it through the state’s driver’s license database as well as through a criminal one. While that was running in the background, I continued to look through the photos of that night, with Theo lurking behind me. One in particular caught my eye and I could not fucking believe it.
“Son of a bitch!”
“What?”
Theo leaned in to see what had set me off and his growl rumbled to life as he pulled me from my chair and into his lap. The others, who’d been sitting nearby, came back over to see what was happening. I twisted around on Theo’s lap until I could see his face.
“Hey." I booped his nose and his scowl deepened. “It’s a picture. You don’t have to protect me from a picture, and I need to work.”
He kicked my chair away and rolled his chair, with us both on it, a foot or so to the left until we were in front of my monitor. My knees hit the edge of the desk and I huffed, ready to protest, when the chair’s sudden drop had me gripping the arms like they were oh shit handles in a car. I shot a glare over my shoulder at Theo who just arched his brows at me, as if to say, problem solved.
