“Hardly a delta,” Mason commented. “Since he wouldn’t even give you his fucking knot.”
I shrugged before hitting play, not wanting to revisit that portion of my past.
Dean’s voice filtered into the room but it didn’t stir anything in me. “Hey sweetheart, I know it’s been a minute. I’m sosorry we haven’t called more. You know how it is. Hockey’s always been a part of us. We thought you’d understand, not do something like this. Milo is losing his mind over here. Just let us know what’s going on,” he pleaded. “Call me back.”
It cut off there and I clicked on the next one from Sutton.
“This little tantrum needs to stop. You need to come home right now, Lana. We aren’t the type to play games.” Sharp and to the point, like I was an annoyance.
“The fucking irony,” Kieran gasped with a startled laugh. “All they’ve done is play games with you.”
The next was another from the delta. Sutton’s voice ranted on for several minutes, explaining how I was being disrespectful.
Then it was on to the alpha. I knew his was going to piss me off, but I played it anyway. I wanted to hear whatever bullshit he was trying to spew.
“Lana. You know how I feel about cheating. How fucking dare you.”
That was where the voicemail ended, nothing else. No accountability or confusion, just pure venom. It had my bloodboiling.
The front door slammed open, my brother’s voice ringing out. “You assholes better be decent in here. I’m coming in.”
“Come join the party,” Kieran called. “They finally know.”
Conrad’s pounding footsteps hurried in as he ran the entire way back to us. “Are you fucking kidding me? They know?” he asked, his smile blinding like it was finally Christmas morning. Then he turned to me and winced. “Sorry. I guess this might be a touchy subject for you.”
I snorted. “I mean, I’m finally fucking angry. I don’t know about touchy.”
“What have they said?” he asked.
I gave him the recap, the guys chiming in on bits I forgot or glossed over.
My brother’s face was downright livid by the time I finished speaking. Cade reached over, playing the last voicemail again.
Conrad listened, barely moving. As it ended, he turned around, ready to storm out of the house, but Mason caught him by the arm.
“Oh no, I need you to wait,” Mason argued. “I wanna know what bullshit these assholes have to say for themselves before you go. We all know it’s only going to get worse. If we’re going to beat their asses, let’s make it count.”
He wasn’t wrong. It absolutely did get worse from there. I swallowed down my annoyance as Dean’s voice echoed through the phone again, another round of begging me to hear them out.
But it was the final voicemail, with all three voices coming in, that was truly the icing on the cake.
“We just got home. Where the hell is your stuff, Lana? You don’t get to leave us without a single word. You couldn’t even do the courtesy of telling us that you were done?” Milo demanded on a growl.
Dean chimed in, pissed off now as well. “After everything we’ve all been through together, this is what we mean to you?”
Milo cut him off, continuing his rant. “I knew that you were always the petty, vapid princess that they painted you out to be. I overlooked it because I thought, surely, there was more to this girl. I liked the way that you submitted so beautifully for us. But this? There’s no coming back from this. Maybe I should’ve used my bark on you more.”
Conrad reached over, snatching my phone and slamming it against the wall so quickly not one of us could stop him. The phone exploded into a ton of pieces, the loud crack startling me.
His chest was heaving, and I don’t think he realized what he had done until we were all frozen, staring at the mess it made on the kitchen tile. His voice was strange and hollow when he finally spoke.
“I’m sorry, sis. I’ll get you another one.”
There was only so much my brother could take, and apparently he’d hit his limit. I felt terrible that he’d even had to endure any of this. I brought him into my drama.
Conrad turned to me, eyes narrowing as if he knew exactly where my thoughts were going.
“None of this is on you,” he said firmly, his voice still sounding strange as he turned to go out the door.
