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11. Finn
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Resisting the Beta 12. Naomi
Vowing not to be swallowed up by grief should the worst ever happen was easy. Putting it into practice is impossible. Walking away from Finn and Rami's feast was rude of me. But I needed to get out. I can't stand the idea of everyone hugging, questioning, working out crushed I am when Alpha Cillian and the rest return. But I've nowhere to go.. Before long, my chest tightens, and I'm heaving over a basin. "Hey, do you want to get out of here?" Finn asks like a mind-reader, and just like that, I find myself in his tiny cottage just a few streets away from the packhouse. To be honest, I don't even remember the walk over. I think he carried Rami. But now the numbness is starting to wear off, reality crushes me more every minute. Laid in Finn’s bed with a snuffling Rami, staring up into the darkness, wondering what Leona would think. Finn is scuttling around in the other room, apologising for the mess because he never stays here that often. One kitchen with a table, one bathroom
Resisting the Beta 13. Finn
I'm trying. Fuck knows what I'm getting right or wrong though. Holding her sobbing, exhausted little frame against me in the dark was right. Trying to do the same in the daylight, she recoiled. Plus it turns out that staring at her is my weakness. I can’t help it. She's grieving, lost in the dark. My urge to reach out and hold her isn't what she wants. I’ve been in that place before. So have my parents. Life made both of them retreat into themselves. It’s so tempting for me to follow the same path and back away from her. But I want to make this bond work. Getting to know Rami has been wild. Compared to the tea-party holding cousins with their pretty dresses and dollies he’s a whirling tornado. I think he’s fascinating. His mother even more so. Especially when Naomi changes out of my shirt into baggy black workout gear. Stood at the back of my house, where she thinks none of us can see, the blackness in her spirit lifts, replaced by a grey, bland nothing. She goes through
Resisting the Beta 14. Naomi
“I’m not wearing bright colours. Are you out of your mind? You look insane!” “I don’t want to look like a fucking piece of fruit either but it’s what Mama wants.” Phoebe sulks, sprawled across Finn’s kitchen table, her feet up on the wooden chair. We’ve avoided talking about Finn. The fact I was slumped against the kitchen wall sobbing my eyes out. Even my wolf couldn’t soothe the pain from feeling just how swiftly I killed Finn’s expression, his hope. I miss Leona so much. Even if it’s just to tell her she’s wrong about my mate. To eye roll at Phoebe’s pumpkin-wear. After drying my eyes and comparing our healing injuries, she even suggested the fist-wielding Rami was trying to copy my fighting routines. "Don't be silly Phoebe," before turning away. I don't want to leave this cottage. /Is it strange we know where everything is?/ Impes asks gently as I force myself to eat some toast. /Pantry organised like ours. Cups in the first shelf to the right of the basin?/ Coinc
Resisting the Beta 15. Finn
Her kiss short-circuited everything I had planned. Not that I had a crafty, functioning scheme. I just had to see her. The aim was to check in on her. Quietly. Cillian suggested it over the mindlink. Following my distant dust trails were Sawyer and Easton. /Naomi and Rami are staying at yours. Hard day./ /Okay/ I replied back, unsure of how much Cillian even knows about the state of play. /Did you find anything?/ /Yes. But let me check on her first./ If silence could growl, it would be the rattling impatience in Cillian’s measured response. /Don’t be long. Seriously./ Leaving the quad outside Cragstone, I ran back to my place. Knowing she was there gave me a chance to hope. All day long, the temptation to throw up my hands and retreat was overwhelming. Surrounded by the scars of the explosion, useless, charred up bits of books and hundreds of bits of paper floating about it all felt too hopeless. Sense suggested I should just invite the pain of rejection. Later, it w
Resisting the Beta 16. Naomi
Finn came back. I got to apologise for my stupid lashing out, and in return, he left me a quivering lump of jelly. If I didn’t wake feel so deliciously used and sore I’d swear it was a dream. His last act before leaving the room, wincing at the fury of the mindlinks Cillian was flinging his way, was to carefully pass me the sharp blade that had fallen to the floor. Taking a second to cast his eyes over my naked body, concentrated heat prickled over me. He might as well have held a blazing torch and passed it from head to toe. His ashy brown hair was a mussed up disaster, those grey eyes of his gleaming. “Hmm I’d love it if you were exactly like this when I get back,” he murmured, running a hand through my hair, stroking the nape of my neck softly. “I’ve got stuff to do Penkov, don’t start ordering me around now,” I whispered back, trying to be light-hearted. Except his eyes fluttered with gold. Then the ruthless animal drank in the surprise in my face at the red hot welt
Resisting the Beta 17. Finn
I’m used to being stared at. My size makes that a standard part of life. When I fought illegally, I used to love the glare of the cheap, blinding headlights. The way women like Diane Jackson saw me as a tree to climb. Then we went to war against rabid, uncontrollable hybrids that tore regular shifters apart. After that, people looked at me differently. Suddenly, my size didn’t make me a criminal or a fool. I became Alpha Cillian’s best man. My gigantic size was enough to take on a hybrid solo compared to others like Easton, Tucker, Riley, and Sawyer, who had to work in pairs. It helped me win the Head Beta role. Adding to the reasons for Leona to hate me. Except even Alpha Cillian noticed she changed after the tiny copper-haired Aria arrived. Beta Tucker began getting his black braids in a twist about border rotas going without updates. Stranding people from home a month too long. Beta Rhett, Eleanors mate, with his shaggy brown locks and constant scent of pine, reported areas of
Resisting the Beta 18. Naomi
Whoever killed Leona will be expecting me to revert to more savage ways. Well, the rules have changed. I'm missing my partner in crime, Cillian’s warning me I might die and Finn is nowhere to be seen. I’m a bit of a disaster right now. So, instead of blowing up, we calmly retrieved a bow and rubber-tipped arrow from the packhouse. A dusty relic engraved with Cillian’s tiny, misspelt name. Rami squealed with joy. I spend the entire day sitting on the wooden porch. Is how Leona spent the past couple of years? Rami shooting Diane Jackson in the ass with his rubber arrow was the highlight of a tedious day. I gave him the biggest bowl of strawberries after fake apologising. He’s a little wonder at it already, even if the target is only a metre or two away. /As soon as he is sure of his aim, we can bring out the real gear/ Impes chuckles dangerously. I tried not to care that Matilda kept the girls inside, away from Rami and his practice area. I also tried to pretend I wasn’t listen
Resisting the Beta 19. Finn
We got what we needed out of Theo and Maximus. Eventually. Fucking around with the sketches saw the bricks replaced. Looking at each other, knowing we were more than willing to bend those limbs into self-amputation, they finally cracked. Even so, I won’t forget the sound of Maxim’s knee tendon finally giving way as the second brick took its awful toll. Like a cow chewing, a wet popping that felt at odds with its owners wailing. But we have what we need. For now. A report of how and when they met, for how long and what the no-named guy looked like. Hayden is taking his copy to Alpha Zeke, Sawyer, to Alpha Nikolai of White Forest. I’ve got Cillian’s. Like fuck am I missing a chance to get back to Naomi. Once a week they would head towards the human border. The far western side of the Shadowlands territory. Where bare, miserable fir trees line the rocky outcrops. Nothing decent to be farmed after so many explosions. Silver-lanced barbed wire forms dangerous trenches. To beco
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