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She grinned. “The guys in suits glaring at everyone who walks past out front?” I nodded at that. Laura’s smile fell away, then she leaned in closer. “Just be careful. He starts with light touches, praise, making you feel like a star, then it escalates. One day, you’ll be cornered in the office and threatened with what will happen if you speak up.”
“God, I’m so sorry. That’s awful,” I breathed out, horrified he’d crossed those lines with her. I’d been waiting for him to escalate our interactions, but the danger at our doorstep had made it harder for him to manage that. He usually didn’t have a good excuse for getting me alone since he’d made such a production of wanting me to be protected.
“It was months of being the new prized possession for him. I’d go to events and do his bidding. Everyone there hated me.” She chuckled ruefully.
She’d described my life at the campaign office perfectly. Veronica and the others loathed me, thanks to Burke ensuring I was by his side for every major event and praising my accomplishments. I’d never heard him do the same to anyone else.
“If I wasn’t being paid so well, I might have left, but I convinced myself to endure it until he took it too far. After that, I never went back. I ghosted him the best I could.”
“I don’t blame you. I would if I could,” I said. “He’s not for the faint of heart, that’s for sure.”
“No, he’s not,” she agreed. “He’s not shy about his tastes, either.” She gestured to me, then herself. “We look like sisters.”
“We do,” I agreed. “It’s funny… His wife doesn’t look like us.” Sure, she was a petite brunette, but with her constant sneer and piercing eyes, she lacked the softness we had. Maybe that was why Burke was so obsessed with omegas like us.
“I have a feeling she can’t stand him either,” Laura said with a snort of laughter. “I’m sorry to drag you out. I just wanted to warn you in case it wasn’t too late. What I gave you is some evidence of what kind of man he really is. I gathered it over the course of my time there. It started out as me protecting myself, then I kept it in case I needed blackmail to stay safe.”
“That was a smart plan,” I told her. It seemed we’d both been more than he’d bargained for. Who knew how far Burke would take things. He was an alpha who had the support of far too many people. “He loves to play with fire.”
“I have a hard time believing any omega working there actually believes in his bullshit. If you don’t, I hope you have a way to use this like I never could or at least can get it in the right hands.”
Admitting it out loud could be incriminating, so I simply smiled and took a sip of my coffee. She took that as agreement and relaxed a bit.
“I’ve seen his new plans. I’m afraid of a world where that becomes a reality, and you will be too when you see what I gave you,” she said ominously.
I’d been afraid of what Burke could do to this world from the moment I met him, but “Thank you,” was all I said. Understanding filled her eyes as she nodded, realizing I wouldn’t be giving anything away. We were both smart enough to read between the lines.
“I’m going to grab a coffee to go. I need to get to work. Thank you for trusting me enough to meet me, Bailey. Good luck.”
With that, she walked away, and I slipped outside. Hayes and Sterling silently escorted me to the SUV, then Sterling drove around the side of the building, so Cyrus and Hayes could climb in.
“Well, was it insightful?”
“I’m not sure,” I admitted as I opened my bag and slipped out the book. Cyrus chuckled at the sexy couple posing on the cover.
“Nice diversion,” he noted.
“I was confused when she handed it to me, but the girl was smart. She’d worked for him before me, said she collected all this in case she needed blackmail to stay safe.”
I flipped the pages until I found them, several photos and a USB. The photos were of him kissing and groping several women, which wouldn’t paint him in a good light.
“I hope there’s more,” Hayes said as I handed him the disk. “Those will add to the pile, but they’re not quite a smoking gun.”
“Agreed. Let’s reserve judgment until we see what’s on here,” I said. She was too smart to hand over just some risky pictures. What politician hadn’t been caught with his pants down a time or too? No, this had to be bigger.
* * *
“Holy shit,”I breathed out as I listened to the video playing on Hayes’ screens. Burke was standing among a few other men, some whose faces I recognized from events he’d dragged me to.
“The new girls are in,” Burke said with a grin. It was full of so much heated excitement that I didn’t have to guess what he meant, but the rest of the world wouldn’t put the context together.
“Are they feisty?” a man asked as he rubbed his jaw, hanging on Burke’s every word. “You know I like my girls with a bit of fight. It’s so much more fun to break them.”
“First heats are hitting soon,” he promised, “and the scientist found something to speed it up. They’re ours for the picking… for a price, of course.”
“Worth it,” a third added in, holding up a glass of booze for them to clink. “Now, if you can set their sights on your new intern…”
“Oh, don’t think I haven’t started that ball rolling. She’ll be right alongside the other breeders before we know it,” Burke said grandly, as if he were the king to some special court.
