Page 44 of Knotted their Beauty

Marley shakes her head. “Nothing. Family Services, CPS, police records within a hundred and fifty mile radius. There’s nothing anywhere that matches.”

“And since we still haven’t found her hands…” Sy shrugs as he slumps back in his chair. “Her dentures probably had a serial number but those are long gone, and her surgeries were so standard there were thousands of people who matched the same procedures.”

“And no one matched the description, anyway.” It’s like this goddamn old lady doesn’t exist. “Has the artist finished with the reconstruction?”

“Not yet,” he says with a sigh. “Not that it will matter too much. She looks like she could be anyone’s mother or grandmother.”

Which leaves us with diddly shit.

After I found the feet, I was hoping the hands would soon follow, but they didn’t.

I lean back in my chair and scrub my palms over my face, pushing my fingers back through my hair as I close my eyes.

I could have been fired for the way I handled that entire scenario.

If it wasn’t for Baron, I would have been.

My lips try to curl into a smile as I think of him, the strange alpha who showed up out of nowhere and helped me dig through a crime scene.

My scent match.

That was the last fucking thing I expected, but to say I was relieved when he showed up would be an understatement. Relieved and surprised. Then again, I’m sure not many people expect to find their younger, extremely fit, kind of creepy scent match at the scene of a murder, so surprised was a feeling that makes sense.

The relief was really the strange part.

Having him help me dig through bloody sand in order to find the other foot was a huge help, but what he did next solidified the way his presence calmed and almost balanced me out.

Baron handled the feet and put them in a grocery bag, helped me get rid of any evidence I left behind, gave me something to change into, then sent me back to the hotel while he took the severed appendages to the police station.

That alpha sat through almost twelve hours of questioning, another few before and after waiting to be seen then released, was grilled as if he was the murderer himself, and has been followed nonstop ever since just so I didn’t have to deal with any kind of bullshit from contaminating a crime scene. Which would have been the least of my concerns, but still. Baron did all of that without even being asked, just took the initiative and rolled with it, all for me. And we’d just fucking met.

Who knew scent matching meant covering for your person at a crime scene?

Not that anything else has come of finding my match.

We didn’t exchange numbers, we barely spoke while we were at the beach, and I haven’t seen him since they released him from custody. I’m not sure what to do with finding my match in the midst of all of this bullshit, especially when I’ve only just started my relationship with Arlo.

I haven’t told him about Baron yet.

I’m not keeping it a secret, I wouldn’t do that, but it’s barely been two days since he found me, and I’ve been up to my eyeballs in this thirteenth victim. When I call to check in, I just want to talk to my daughter and my omega about their day. I want to hear about what they’ve been doing, how they are, and get my fix as often as I can, even if there isn’t much substance to it. I miss them both so much, and can’t wait for them to come out this weekend. The last thing I want to do is talk about me and whatever I’m dealing with.

I’m going to have to, though, and I know that.

It might be new, and I might not exactly be embracing him, but I’m going to want Baron to be a part of my life, of our life together, and that means I have to bring him up in conversation at least once before I tell my omega we have an alpha who’ll be railing us both the first chance we get.

Well, another alpha.

I’m still not sure how I feel about Lennox, aside from being extremely attracted to him. Just because I’ve jerked off to the idea of him knotting my ass while I fuck Arlo doesn’t mean I’m ready to bring him into our family, not yet anyway. Frankly, I’m still teetering on jealousy when it comes to Lennox and Arlo’s obvious attraction to him, despite where our relationship is going and the fantasies I’ve been entertaining.

The thing is, acting on my feelings for Arlo was hard enough. It was difficult getting there but what made it easier was the clear love he has for my daughter, and hers for him in return.

After Cali’s biological mother tried kidnapping her, running my ass over with her truck in the process, it was hard to fathom letting anyone into our life in any way, romantic or otherwise. If her own mother—the woman I assumed was my soul bond after she forced a bite on me—wanted to kidnap her, after attempting to drown her in the bath more than once, how could I trust a complete stranger I might date with my daughter’s safety let alone her heart?

We’ve been burned before, burned on a massive scale, and I’m not going to let that happen again.

Arlo has proven without even trying that he’s everything I could want in a partner, he’s shown how good he is, and how big he loves, but scent match or not, adding someone else to our family is scary.

Even if I can barely stop myself from getting a boner when I think about either of the alphas I’ve recently met.