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“Really?”

“Yeah. I swear.”

“We all swear,” Archer adds.

“I—I’m not interested in any other packs,” I say, resting my hand on top of Archer’s. “Only you guys.”

I feel Archer relax slightly from behind me, which surprises me. Did he actually think I’d be interested in anyone else?

“How have you guys been?” I ask them.

All the tension in each of their bodies seems to return instantly.

Something is wrong.

Something has happened.

“What’s going on?” I whisper.

“It’s—it’s nothing bad,” Madden says, trying to reassure me. His efforts are unsuccessful because I can see some sort of hesitation in his eyes, almost like he’s hiding something from me.

“Tell me, please.”

“We found your parents,” Archer says, his voice low and intense as if he’s trying to hold back his anger. “We went to your home in the Southside.”

“You—you went there?”

The horror I feel deep in my gut quickly twists into shame. I knew when I told the police everything that had happened to me that people would eventually find them, and the place I grew up in, and that horrible, horrible cellar. I just didn’t think it would be my guys.

“You saw—” I swallow hard, blinking away the flashes of memories that are fighting their way into my brain. “You saw the cellar?”

“We did,” Archer says, his arms tensing around me. “We’re so fucking sorry you had to go through that shit. You didn’t deserve it. Not at all.”

It’s your duty as an omega. What the fuck kinda daughter are you if you’re not gonna earn your keep on your back?

I haven’t heard my dad’s voice in my head in what feels like forever. I was told all my life that I deserved it. That it was my duty, my purpose, to let men take from me.

Alpha Niall always told me that by disobeying his orders, I wasasking for punishment. He’d say I deserved everything that was happening to me.

“You didn’t deserve it,” Archer whispers again, his thumb tracing small circles on my inner wrist.

It’s like he can hear my thoughts.

I guess he sort of can, considering my stress is so obvious he can probably taste it in the air around us.

“We confronted your parents before they were arrested,” Kane explains. “We wanted to try and see what information we could gather from them.”

“We learned about the alpha that wanted to buy you,” Archer says. “It turns out, Charlotte was right, and the people you thought were your parents weren’t actually your parents. The alpha that wanted to buy you was the one who dropped you off when you were a baby.”

I swallow hard, my hands tightening on Archer’s forearm.

What? Alpha Niall has known me ever since I was a baby?

“Did—did they tell you this?”

“Yeah,” Chase says. “Your fake-mom tried to stab me in the chest with a kitchen knife, too.”

“What? Oh my god, are you okay?” I try to jump to my feet to see whether Chase is okay, but Archer’s arms still band tightly across my midsection.