Page 51 of Bonds and Beasts

"Lumi, we have an issue." Thankfully, I don't need to sound calm right now. My mate has been taken, and if Lumi took her, she should be expecting the call to be about my panic and devastation.

"Oh? What's that, dear?" Lumi's voice is smooth, but there's another noise in the background.

"Our omega, the one we found here, has been taken."

She gasps on cue. I can't help but feel like I'm reading from a script and she's delivering her lines perfectly. "That's terrible! How could that have happened? You still have the private security."

My hand grips the phone so tight my knuckles go white. The private security that Lumi hired. The private security that also disappeared when Adison did. Likely, they delivered my omega right to her.

The guy tracing the call makes a continue motion.

"I want to start a PR campaign to make sure we're ahead of this." The words are acid on my tongue. I don't give a damn about the optics. All I care about is getting my omega back. But this is the language Lumi speaks.

"Of course, I can call my team today." That noise is still in the background. A familiar swoosh swoosh sound that I can't quite place. Lumi rambles on about ad placement and spots on late night shows as though I'm planning to travel anywhere without my omega. She could talk forever about PR campaigns, which is why I brought it up.

The man tracking the phone gives me a thumbs up. My chest feels like it's closing in on my lungs. They know where Adison is. Still, I don't want to tip Lumi off. If she gets spooked, she could move Adison, and we'd be in the dark again.

"That all sounds great, Lumi. Book the news outlets that will give us the best exposure and set up our flights. You can text me the information."

"Will do!" she says brightly, clearly forgetting that this should not be a moment for happiness. It's hard to remember to be worried when you clearly aren't. Right before she hangs up, I hear the noise again. Behind me, the same sound comes through the window from the beach below, and I know exactly what it is.

It's the waves on the lake.

Adison

The door doesn't lock. It doesn't even click shut all the way after the person in black walks out through it.

Slowly and painfully, I use my body to wiggle, shake, and partially roll over. I carefully use the tip of my nose to pull the lip of the door away from the frame, opening it a fraction. The bright light of day greets me, shining and warm for a late autumn day. Gulls scream overhead and I can hear the gentle lapping of waves against the shore.

I hadn’t noticed it in my panic, but slight movement beneath me tells me that I'm on a boat. The setup of the walls and floors resemble one of those pretty, expensive ones that tourists leave at the dock year round. A monogram on one of the walls reads RM—Rosevale Manor.

This is my boat. Well, my parents' old boat that still sits at the docks. How did someone have access to my boat? I immediately think of Mr. Clocks. I'd been told he was still in jail, but maybe he escaped.

The sound of heels on the wood floor of the deck click by. I stay very still but I can't see the person. As they begin to talk, I realize they must be right around the corner. I also realize that the voice belongs to a woman.

"Lumi speaking," she says.

Lumi. That's the name of my pack's agent. The one in LA. But why is she out here, and why has she assaulted and kidnapped me? For money? Little pieces start coming together. This whole time, we've been receiving threats against me specifically. Has it been Lumi?

Lumi goes on and on about news outlets and time slots before everything goes silent.

Heels click again and I try to retreat, to push the door so it looks closed again, but it's too late. A woman walks around the corner. She's wearing the same black outfit as before but without the mask or glasses. Her white-blonde hair is up, makeup covering her face. She's in her early sixties, but lean and elegant like a painting. When her ice blue eyes land on me, her expression falls and she tuts.

"Oh, my dear. I wish you hadn't done that," she says with an exaggerated pout. She grabs my arm and drags me out of the room I'd been locked in and into a sitting area within the cabin. She's strong for an older woman, her perfectly manicured, pointed nails digging into my skin and drawing blood. Her alpha scent is expensive, like gold made into fragrance.

"I don't understand why you're doing this," I say, as she drops me like a sack of potatoes. I hiss as pain lances up my shoulder and I barely manage to keep myself from smacking my head against the floor. The sting across my cheek where she slapped me earlier still throbs and I'm sure I have a hot pink handprint across my face. "I've never even met you."

She sighs. "I suppose getting rid of you is for the best. Without you around, they won't have much of a case against Edgar."

Edgar. So much information is coming at me so fast that it takes me a moment to place the name. "Edgar Clocks? You know Mr. Clocks?"

Lumi turns to smirk at me. "Those alphas, they're so stupid. I've managed their careers for ten years now. Since they were teenagers. I've been meticulous. It was the one thing I wasn't sure would work in my plan with Edgar: that I would botch their hotel reservation. That I wouldn't have double and triple checked that their suite was ready. Ridiculous. But they bought it. You know why? They don't pay attention to the little things. They never see the bigger picture. I see the bigger picture. Always.

"Which is why, when I met Edgar at an investment seminar in Houston and he told me about his little situation, I knew we could make both of our problems disappear." She pauses and glances at herself in a round mirror hanging on the wall. "It didn't hurt that he was excellent in bed either."

I wish I could shut my hearing off. I want to retch.

"He wanted Rosevale Manor. With you out of the way, there was no one else to inherit your estate. Edgar, as the named secondary beneficiary, would get everything if he just had one very important slip of paper."