Page 145 of My Unhinged Alphas
The bathroom door opens a minute later and Lena steps out dressed, hair pulled back with her fingers, face scrubbed into something more awake and less vulnerable. Good. I prefer her like that. Easier to deal with.
We head out just after.
The morning is washed-out and cold, the motel lot still damp from night mist, gravel crunching under our boots. Havoc drives because he claims I’m worse company before coffee. Vale takes the front passenger seat. Lena and I end up in the back.
Nobody comments on that either.
The ride is mostly quiet. Havoc keeps one hand on the wheel, the other drumming against the door, too restless for the hour.Vale watches the road like he expects it to rearrange itself if he blinks wrong. Lena sits beside me, not touching, staring out the window at nothing much. I can feel the tension in her anyway.
By the time the house comes into view, that ugly pressure is back in all of us. It’s a neat place from the outside. Quiet street. Manicured lawn edges. Expensive windows. The kind of house that tries to look respectable while hiding rot in the basement.
Gabriel Voss is already there.
He’s standing near the front walk in dark clothes, hands in his coat pockets, expression unreadable. He looks like he belongs to the morning less than the house does.
Havoc kills the engine.
Nobody moves for a second.
Then Vale opens his door. I follow. Lena starts to get out too.
“No,” I say.
She looks at me immediately. “No?”
“You wait outside.”
“With me,” Havoc says lightly, circling around the hood. “I’m delightful in daylight.”
Lena gives him a dead stare. “I would rather eat glass.”
“Unkind.”
I ignore both of them. “You stay with Havoc.”
That gets a laugh out of her, short and disbelieving. “Absolutely not.”
“It isn’t a discussion.”
“Yes, it is.” She steps away from the car, shutting the door behind her harder than necessary. “I’m not standing out here while you all go inside and decide what my life means without me.”
“This is not your call.”
She comes closer, eyes bright with anger now. “No. I’m not letting that guy take any more power from me.”
For a second nobody says anything. Her chest is rising fast. Her hands are clenched at her sides. There’s fear there, sure, but more anger than fear, and I understand that better than I’d like.
Vale is watching her carefully. Havoc’s grin has gone quieter.
I say, “This could get ugly.”
“It already is,” she shoots back. “He drugged me. He dragged me into this. He doesn’t get to keep deciding where I go, what I see, and what gets hidden from me.”
Voss looks from her to me, mildly interested now. “Strong opinion.”
I don’t look at him.
Lena keeps her eyes on mine. “If you’re going in there, I’m going in there.”
