Forbidden: Part One – Chapter 54

A massive alpha, almost as broad as me, stepped out of the car with a scowl. Josie let out a happy squeal and threw open the front door to run out and meet him. Sam Larsson was a tall, Black alpha with a short afro and mistrusting eyes. His face broke into a massive grin as Josie threw herself at him, and he spun her around with a laugh before setting her back down. His eyes locked with mine over Josie’s head, the scowl returning. I instinctually flexed my arms and then felt ridiculous. This was Josie’s friend. We owed him a shit-ton for protecting her.

“So… Josie didn’t mention her best friend looks like a fucking military leader and is built like a tank,” Theo muttered.

The passenger side door opened and another alpha stepped out. Gerald couldn’t have been more of a contrast to Sam if he tried. He was a ginger with a slight build, nerdy glasses, and a friendly gaze. He gave the three of us a cheerful wave before pulling Josie into his arms.

“Come on,” Ben said, a smile tugging on his lips. “Let’s go say hi.”

Josie made all the introductions, practically bouncing with happiness. Her eyes kept returning to Sam as if afraid he was going to disappear. The possessive part of me didn’t want her to pay attention to anyone else, especially not another alpha, but the joy she exuded helped me settle down. I couldn’t stop myself from snagging her hand as we walked back into the house. She grasped it with both of hers and beamed at me.

“Thanks for letting them come stay,” she said softly, pressing her body against mine.

I melted, amazed at how easy it was to please our omega. If seeing Sam made her this happy, I could put my possessiveness aside for a day.

Jealousy surged through me as I shifted, trying to get comfortable on the lounge chair that was too small and way too empty of my omega. I looked over again to the couch where Josie was giggling with Gerald at the movie they’d put on. Apparently, this was the second movie in the series we started the other night, not that I was paying attention to anything happening on the screen. Sam was on Gerald’s other side, and Theo was pressed up against Josie, his face expressionless.

Theo had continued to spiral since Josie’s nightmare. Yesterday, I could sense his anxious chaos through the bond, but now he was shielding his emotions, pulling away from us and barely speaking. He also hadn’t left Josie’s side. I knew it was hurting her, how far he had retreated within himself. I wanted to help him come out of this mood, but right now, I was just pissed that I wasn’t the one sitting next to Josie. I didn’t know how it was possible to miss someone who was sitting a few feet away, but the absence of her skin on mine felt like a piercing wound. Maybe you’re not as okay as you’re pretending to be. I scoffed. Of course, I wasn’t fucking okay.

Josie had another nightmare last night. It wasn’t as intense as the first one, and we helped her come out of it quickly, but it still left me off-kilter. I struggled to reconcile the vibrant, smiling woman in front of me with the one curled up on the floor, fear saturating her scent as tears trickled down her cheeks. I had been so convinced I could protect her from anyone who dared try to cause her harm I’d forgotten one crucial thing: I couldn’t protect her from the scars left on her mind any more than I could prevent my own nightmares from visiting me each night. Not each night, I reminded myself. Not since Josie started sleeping next to you.

Helplessness surged through me, gripping my heart like a vise. As if she could sense the direction of my thoughts, Josie looked over at me.

“You okay?”

I nodded and did my best to smile. She didn’t look convinced by my effort. I saw her nose scrunch up and realized she could sense my feelings through my scent. Fuck, how could I have forgotten that? And once we were bonded, she would have a direct line to my emotions. The fear of burdening her with my feelings warred with my primal alpha desire to see my bite on her.

“I need more snacks,” Sam said, giving Gerald a kiss on the cheek. “You want anything?”

Josie and Gerald both shook their heads.

“You sure? Because I know how you both get about snacks. I’m going to come back and you’ll want something.”

“Shh, you’re talking over the good part,” Gerald said, gesturing wildly at Sam.

Sam rolled his eyes, but his lips twitched. As he got up, he shot me a meaningful look. Knowing this might be the only chance to talk with him without Josie, I got up and followed him to the kitchen. Theo and Ben followed, making excuses for why they needed to go to the kitchen.

Sam turned to face me behind the island, expression severe and body defensive.

I cleared my throat. “We wanted to get a chance to talk with you alone. But before that, I wanted to thank you.”

A brief look of shock flitted across Sam’s features.

“Josie told us two nights ago… about the DA and the device. And how much you helped her. We’re forever in your debt for what you did for her,” I continued.

“I didn’t do it for you,” Sam said. “There’s never a debt when it comes to her. I would do anything for her, always.”

I nodded and crossed my arms. “Still, we are in your debt. Josie sees you as family. And…” Fuck. Why was this so hard? My entire upbringing and my inner alpha fought against me. You should always treat outside alphas as threats. Never let your guard down. I forced myself to unclench my fists. “We hope you’ll consider us part of your family.”

This time, the surprise was clear on Sam’s face. He chuckled and rubbed the back of his neck. “Well, fuck, I wasn’t expecting that.”

“Great, have we got the alpha posturing out of the way?” Ben asked cheerfully. “Because our mate definitely needs more snacks.” He pulled out a large serving plate and started putting together a cheese board.

Sam smiled. “It’s fun to see them together,” he said, nodding to where Josie and Gerald were sitting in the other room.

“We do have some questions for you,” I said. Theo was standing next to me, his arms crossed. I tried to sense his feelings through the bond, but he was still shutting me out.

I turned my attention back to Sam. “Our company has a security contract with Greytex Industries.” I watched Sam for a reaction, but his face remained blank.

“Last week, Ben and I were called out to their facility for an additional security evaluation. They were worried about someone being able to hack into their servers.”

“Paranoid is more like it,” Ben muttered, scooping pimento cheese onto the board. Good, that was Josie’s favorite.

“We found medical charts for a pilot program they’re running,” I said.

Sam’s gaze snapped to mine. “What was the name of the pilot program?”

“Project Excer,” I said.

“Fuck.” Sam’s gaze went back out to where Josie was sitting. He lowered his voice. “I’m assuming you know what the project is?”

“We didn’t when we read the files, but then after Josie told us…” I said, trailing off.

“Do you have the charts?”

“All copied over,” Ben said. “And I covered my tracks,” he added when Sam opened his mouth.

“We’re meeting with Charlie tomorrow and are giving her the files,” I said.

“Who’s Charlie?” Sam asked.

“She’s a hacker with the Alliance. We work together quite a bit,” Ben said.

“I’m assuming you’ve shown Josie what you found?”

I clenched my jaw, guilt swirling in my stomach. “No.”

Sam raised his eyebrows. “Why not?”

“We just realized the other night there was a connection.”

Sam looked at the three of us, his expression turning to one of disdain. “You’re not planning to give them to her?”

“We’re trying to protect her,” Theo snarled, finally breaking his silence.

The temperature in the room dropped. Fuck, I’d underestimated what Theo was feeling right now.

“You think I’m not looking out for her?” Sam asked, his voice low. He took a few steps towards Theo.

“We don’t know you,” Theo hissed out.

I grasped Theo’s shoulder. “Tone it down.” Ben was looking between Theo and Sam, wide-eyed.

“I guess we’re not done with the alpha posturing,” he muttered, pulling crackers out of the pantry.

“Can you tell us about the device?” I asked. “Josie said you were the one who removed it.”

Sam crossed his arms, leaning back on the counter in what some might have interpreted as a relaxed stance, but I knew he was on the defensive.

“Yeah, I removed it,” he said. “What do you want to know?”

“How did you get it out?” Ben asked.

The question broke Sam’s stoic expression and he shuddered. “It was the night before I moved to Sol. I’d just moved her into my apartment, and I forced her to tell me everything that happened. She told me the device was still in her and she needed it out. I told her we would find a doctor to do it or at least find a way to give her some fucking anesthesia. But she kept crying and screaming that I had to do it now. She said it had to hurt, that the pain was the only way she could be sure it was really out. I didn’t know what to do.”

My knuckles were white from squeezing the countertop. The haunted look in Sam’s eyes was the only reason I didn’t punch him. He had cut her open, dug out that device with nothing to block the pain. Flashes of Ben and Theo’s distress and anger radiated through the bond, but we all kept silent, needing to hear the rest of Sam’s story.

“I kept saying no. Finally, she got a knife and said she would do it if I didn’t.” Sam took a shaky breath, running his hand over his face. “The device was only about a centimeter wide, but I had to cut quite a bit to have room to get it out. As I stitched her up, she just held the device, staring at it without blinking. It was like she needed to memorize the feeling of it being out of her.”

“What did you do with it?” Ben asked. I could tell his mind was spinning with the need to analyze the implant.

“I gave it to my Alliance contact. Amirah told me the other day that analyzing it helped their team develop the new alpha tabs.”

“Does Josie know that?” Ben asked.

Sam shook his head. “I haven’t had time to tell her, but I was planning to while I was here. It’ll make her feel good to know. Just like you need to let her read those files. That fucker, Glen Jacoby, and those doctors did shit to her body without permission. You can’t give those files to the Alliance without letting her see them first. She’s already been a huge asset to the Alliance without knowing it, and she could do more to take down the government if she wanted.”

“She went through all of that, and you want to put her in harm’s way to work for the Alliance,” Theo growled, his rage dangerously close to the surface. Everyone assumed I was the most aggressive of the three. But I had seen Theo fight when we were younger. He could be a scary fucker when he wanted to be.

Anger flashed in Sam’s eyes. “It’s because she went through all that she needs to do it. They made her feel powerless, helpless, like her life wasn’t worth shit. Fighting back, taking them down, will remind her she’s powerful as fuck. You didn’t know her before the DA. I’ve never known someone as vibrant as Josie. She took risks all the time, fighting back in all these small ways. She forced me to teach her to drive, wore all these outfits that pissed her mom off, and argued with her pack fathers even though she knew they would punish her for it. She was so fucking fearless. Honestly, it scared the shit out of me. But nothing has ever scared me as much as seeing her so broken after what they did to her.”

My inner alpha didn’t want to hear what Sam was saying. He wanted to keep our mate protected and locked away. But part of me recognized the truth in his words. Joining the Alliance and trying to take down the Designation Government had given me a purpose after Ellie’s murder. Were we depriving Josie of the same by sheltering her?

“This is as close as I’ve seen her to the Josie I knew growing up,” Sam added begrudgingly. “You three are good for her, but only if you support her in reclaiming these parts of herself. If you hold her back, you’re doing her a disservice to satisfy your own selfishness.”

Theo growled at Sam, the tension escalating in the room. I caught a faint whiff of burnt vanilla. Someone was eavesdropping. I stepped away from the argument, and sure enough, my little omega was pressed against the wall just around the corner. Her eyes widened when she saw me, and then they narrowed and she set her jaw.

“What are the files you’re hiding from me?”

I closed my eyes for a moment, gathering myself.

“Ben and I found some files from that job we went to. We didn’t know what they were when we first saw them. But we think it’s your medical chart from when they implanted the device.”

“You weren’t going to tell me?” she asked, her voice high-pitched and betrayal clear on her face.

“Fuck. We would have, eventually. I wouldn’t have been able to keep it from you. But I wanted to protect you. Didn’t want you to be in any more pain.”

“That’s not your decision to make,” Josie said fiercely.

I would have been tempted to smile if this wasn’t such a serious conversation. Seeing the fire behind her eyes, even when directed at me, filled me with joy and hope. Hope that she was healing. She was so fucking strong.

“I know. It was wrong,” I said.

“You promise you would have shown me?”

“Yes. I’m sorry we didn’t tell you yesterday.”

She gazed into my eyes for a long moment, and it was as if time stood still.

“Okay,” she said slowly. “But no more hiding things from me.”

I nodded my agreement and opened my arms to her. She threw herself into them, and I easily picked her up, her arms and legs wrapping around me. Relief flooded me at her forgiveness.

Josie snuggled into my chest, pressing her face into my neck.

“Did having my device really help the Alliance?”

“Sounds like it, sweetheart,” I said, my heart clenching with the vulnerability I heard in her voice.

“Maybe that makes it worth it,” she whispered.

I growled, unable to stop myself. “Nothing is fucking worth what you went through. Nothing.” I balanced her weight on one arm so I could cup her face. “But it made a difference.”

Josie’s eyes shone with unshed tears, and her bottom lip trembled.

“Oh, baby girl,” I sighed into her hair as she burst into tears.

“I just… feel relieved it wasn’t all for nothing,” she shuddered.

“I know, sweetheart.”

I crushed her to me, holding her through her waves of grief. I felt Theo and Ben’s presence as we all gathered into one big group hug. After what felt like way too short a time, Josie lifted her head from my chest.

“Did Amirah really say that?” she asked Sam, who I realized was standing behind me.

“Yeah, she did. Some Alliance scientists used the technology in your device to make the new alpha tabs. And those tabs will help us take down this fucking government.”

Josie shivered. “Good,” she said, fierceness lighting up her eyes.

I shifted so I could see Sam. His hard gaze met mine and I saw the truth there. Josie needed to be a part of this fight, and it was our job to support her, not shield her.